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weer?
WHO: Ween
WHERE: 40 Walt Club
WHEN: Wednesday, July 19, 9 p.m.
HOW MUCH: SI 5
T 1984, two mild-mannered eighth graders
J. I I met in a typing class at New Hope-
Solebury High School in Pennsylvania. Little did
Aaron Freeman and Mickey Melchiondo know that
a mighty deity had plans for them—plans that
involved music. Music and drugs. Their self-cre
ated demon-god Boognish rose from the mist and
bestowed upon the pair their alter-egos: "Gene
Ween" and "Dean Ween."
Ween established itself as one of the wackiest,
most subversive rock acts of the alternative rock
era, one whose work traveled far beyond the con
straints of taste, parody, novelty and satire.
Sixteen years later. Ween has released its sev
enth album White Pepper, and while the years of
substance abuse may be catching up to
them, the Boognish-powered, so-called 5
Poopship that is Ween shows no signs of 3
slowing down. Flagpole caught up to Dean ®
(Melchiondo) in New Orleans. Unfortunately, 2
two o'clock in the afternoon may have been 5
a bit too early: P
z
l~*
X
Flagpole: Hello, is Dean around?
Dean Ween (mumbling): Who's calling?
FP: This is the Flagpoie in Athens.
DW: Shit... I'm asleep man; can you call
me back?
FP: [An hour later] How are you feeling?
DW: Fuckin' horrible. It's New Orleans. I
got to bed at like seven-thirty or eight this
morning. We had a gig last night that went
really well You don't even need a reason in
this town to go out and get really drunk. I
was like... bad. Bad scene. I never had the
same shot twice all night, I must of drank 15
shots. Somebody gave me their medication. I
didn't know what the fuck it was...
FP: It says on your web site that you’re
looking forward to coming back to the 40
Watt.
DW: I booked us that gig. Well, I had a
booking agent do it, but it was my doing.
What happened was our tour was ending in
Florida a couple of days from now, and we got
booked to play on "Late Night With David
Letterman." I told our manager, rather than sit
around and get all settled back in, let's just keep
going on tour. We'll work our way home from
Florida. And the first place I said was the 40 Watt.
We were really honored a couple of years ago.
[The 40 Watt] offered us a bunch of money to play
New Year's Eve. I was really flattered by that.
FP: Has anything particularly nasty happened
on this leg of the tour?
DW: Yeah, nonstop, all the time, horrible... I
mean, on a Ween tour everyone is generally in bad
shape. We drink too much. Everyone likes to
indulge... all the time. But our audience is fucked.
It's a proven fact: the most fucked up people
listen to Ween. I see the dark side of humanity.
The lowest common denominator.
FP: What have been some shining moments for
Ween?
DW: I take all of this stuff for granted now,
how cool it actually is. We've had a lot of cool
things happen to us. We played with Yoko Ono on
her record. The "South Park" thing [the "Chef Aid"
episode] was amazing, because we got our own
little cutout characters. I've spent a lot of time
hanging out with ["South Park" co-creator] Matt
Stone at his house. Curt Kirkwood of the Meat
Puppets invited us to his house in Austin to go
swimming and have a barbecue. They've always
been one of my favorite bands ever. I've been
saying for 10 years in interviews—people say, "Is
there anyone you ever want to play with?" and I
say, "Yeah, I'd like to play with Curt Kirkwood."
He's probably as close to a guitar legend as punk
rock or alternative rock has. That was really
rewarding.
FP: You released a live album last year. Do you
have any plans for a “b-side" or "rarities " collec
tion?
DW: The live record happened because we
wanted to sell it on-line, and Elektra ended up
taking it from us and putting it out. We're still
making good records as far as I'm concerned, and
I don't want to do anyth ; ng that's even slightly
retrospective until I feel like it. I need a few years
off. What I would like to do is take our second
and third record, The Pod [1991] and Pure Guava
[1992]... We did them on four-track in our apart
ment, and there were a million other tunes we did
when we lived there that never got released. But
they really are one record, and it's funny: people
say, "Pure Guava is my least favorite, or The Tod is
my favorite," but they're one record; they really
are. So I’d like to take all the other stuff we didn't
put on there. That would be a cool thing, with
four discs with that shit.
FP: A few of the songs on White Pepper sound
like they could hove come off The Mollusk or 12
Golden Country Greats. Were any of them left over
from those albums?
DW: I think "Back to Basom" and "The Flutes
of Chi" would have totally fit on The Mollusk
[1997]. "Flutes Of Chi" goes all the way back to
Chocolate And Cheese [1994]. That's the most
failed Ween song ever. We tried to record that
song, I dunno, five times, six times even. That's
no joke. We started it for Chocolate And Cheese
[199G], and we did it for The Mollusk.
FP: Is there something in particular that made
it work this time?
DW: Every time we did it, we kinda got closer.
We put it up on the Chocodog [chocodog.com,
Ween's web site] for people to download. And
people love to say, 'That should have been on
your record; that's better than some of the songs
on the record." I started hearing it so much that
it was like, "You know what, we should just put
this on our new record." It sounds really cool;
there are no real standard instruments on it It's
all E-Bow, and mellotron, and Turkish bells and
drums, electric sitar, tablas, there's a sample in
there; it's just T-Rex going, "Owwww." Next time
you listen to it, listen for this little guy going,
"Owwww."
FP: What do you tend to drink the most
on-stage?
DW: I drink a lot of Rolling Rock beer,
because it's brewed right by where we live,
so it's on tap everywhere. So I still drink,
like, between 20 and 50 a day. Ween has
been like a bottle of Jack a night for years
and years. It's not cool... it's really
unhealthy, I feel myself falling apart. So now
we drink a bottle of vodka every night. It is a
little better for you.
FP: How do you want Ween to be remem
bered in the long run?
DW: I ve already gotten all the rewards
out of Ween anyone could ever hope to. We
get to make people happy at our gigs. I
already get to meet people every night who
say, "When I was growing up, all I ever did
was listen to your record and get high," and
that part of it is awesome. The bulk of the
shit people write about us is inaccurate and
wrong, and what most people think we do is
inaccurate and wrong. Most people think
we're a parody band, that we're trying to
parody music I think that time will tell, and
I don't think it's because we're a joke band. I
think it's because we've written a lot of good
songs. Which is all that really matters. I'd
like to be judged by our entire body of work.
FP: Final question: The Poopship versus
The Mothership, who would win?
DW: That might be the test question any
body's ever asked. Uh... The Mothership.
FP: At least you're humble.
Fritz Gibson
*
CHIP’S
Carrier Zi/cleeo Festival
.1 He* no lit for the* Harrow County
.Child AilvocacyCenter
July 22nd
bright Carrier & The Zgdeco RO' Dogs
Difthi Du & The Zgdeco Crew
Chubbg Carrier & The Bagou Swamp Band
Rog Carrier & The Zgdeco Night Rockers
Chili Competition begins at noon
Music starts at 2pm
Admission is $25 and includes both events.
Children under 12 are free.
Tickets available at Chip’s (770/307-2840)
or online at WWW.ticketWeb.com |
m FLAGPOLE JULY 19, 2000