Courtesy of Ween
Conributing Reviewer
One might recognize Ween from its fabulous 1993 MTV smash "Push th' Little Daisies" from the album Pure Guava. No? Then maybe the gem "Pollo Asado" from The Pod (1991) comes to mind, in which a stoned Dean Ween orders a huge Mexican feast at Taco Bell only to have the cashier get the order all wrong and actually give Dean money to take the food.
Gene and Dean Ween are indeed quite proud of their limited success. They predicted they would take the "whole banana" in 1994 with the release of the blazing album Chocolate and Cheese. Well, 1994 is long past and it seems that ol' Gene and Dean were a little hasty predicting their place as the next Counting Crows. Ween will probably never even win a Grammy unless the judges are on `shrooms while also enjoying large, frothy mugs of German Weissbier. Oh well. It's truly a shame considering what a brilliant and hilarious album Chocolate and Cheese turned out to be.
The two members of Ween, Gene and Dean, began their cult success with the release of God, Ween, Satan -- the Oneness in 1990. Gene and Dean Ween are actually the stage names for Mickey Melchiondo and Aaron Freeman, two guys in their mid-20's from New Jersey. In their 10-plus-year career, Ween has released five albums, including its most recent album Twelve Golden Country Greats (1996), a true country album on which Ween is backed up by three musicians named Buddy, and which curiously enough has only 10 songs.
Gene and Dean Ween have successfully written songs in musical genres ranging from pop rock to Mexican to country. Ween continually delivers strange, silly, experimental tunes and lyrics for our listening pleasure -- or as my roommate might put it, displeasure.
Ween is one of those bands that a person either loves or hates. However, one can always expect to be surprised, horrified, and filled with gut-wrenching laughter when listening to Ween. Upon first listen, most people, including myself, find Ween to be so strange and experimental that it is almost unbearable. In fact, trying to turn my friends on to Ween is like pulling teeth. Holding weekly Ween listening parties for friends seems the only way to convert them to Ween aficionados. Admittedly, Ween is not for the average Bush fan. However, upon repeated listenings, the genius of Ween begins to speak to one. One begins to hum along with Ween's exotic melodies and bust out laughing at its wacky lyrics.
Chocolate and Cheese is by far Ween's most accessible album for those wishing to dip their feet into Ween's pool of weird, funky, foot-tapping melodies for the first time. This racy album cover has a picture of the mid-section of a buxom young woman sporting only a skimpy t-shirt and a humongous Ween belt, which personally reminds me of a diamond-studded chastity belt. Dean and Gene Ween are obviously not too interested in political correctness, but more in female anatomy. Dean even wrote in a note to fans that they were bummed that they "never even got to meet the chick on our cover." The sassy cover picture, however, sets an appropriate tongue-in-cheek mood for the twisted humor of the album.
Chocolate and Cheese begins with the upbeat "Take Me Away," which finds Dean singing to a lounge audience that claps at appropriate moments, eliciting a deep Elvis "Thank you" from Dean. The second song, "Spinal Meningitis (Got Me Down)," continues Ween's lyrical theme of songs about diseases begun with "Mononucleosis" from The Pod.
The guitar instrumental "A Tear for Eddie" written for the late Parliament guitarist Eddie Hazel is a moving piece which shows off the true musical talents of Gene and Dean. "Drifter in the Dark" is a perfect campfire song with its slow lyrical repeats, while "Buenas Tardes Amigo" is the Mexican revenge opus of the album, showcasing the fine Spanish and dead-on Mexican gunslinger voice of Dean.
What Deaner Was Talkin' About" is yet another beautiful song in which Gene imagines himself king and assures us that he would "dress to kill" in such a position. One of the strangest and funniest lyrical moments of this album is in "I Can't Put My Finger On It" when Dean mysteriously asks listeners if they are "surprised when he touches the dwarf inside." I for one am not, and actually enjoy it immensely when Gene does.
Dean describes Chocolate and Cheese as Ween's "bustin' out" album, and he's right on target. A diverse range of musical styles, soaring guitar solos, and even musical samples of crying sea gulls and an atomic bomb all combine to make Chocolate and Cheese an explosively fun album.
Ween is currently working on a new album tentatively titled The Mollusk, due in stores this spring. If you ever get a chance to see Ween in concert, be sure to bring Dean and Gene a homecooked meal, but as Ween puts it in the liner notes to Pure Guava, "Bring us hot meals. No more junk food, thanks."