Ween

Following a number of self-released cassettes, Ween's official debut, GodWeenSatan: The Oneness documents the awesome possibilities that result from two bong-addled suburban Pennsylvania kids with a four-track recorder, a sick 'n' twisted aesthetic sense, and a love for popular music at its most bloated and dramatic. Across 26 tracks (bolstered to 29 in the anniversary edition reissue), Gene and Dean Ween romp through Beefheart/Zappa-style dadaist blues with an anything-goes '80s punk sensibility that also encompasses quirky minimalism, bubblegum pop, boogie rock, folk rock, art rock, Satanic metal (and Satanic gospel!), reggae, folk, mariachi, Prince, the Boss, and more, all chainsawed and mutilated into small, pulpy chunks that only sometimes reveals its brilliance. Just as often, it's tough to stomach.

Its followup, The Pod, is just as low-fi and almost as sprawling (23 tracks), but not nearly as joyfully eclectic. Instead, the duo wallows mostly in a demonic acid rock that can be ponderous and overly murky. At its best, though, the album reveals glimpses of Ween's later genius at mocking rock conventions while simultaneously relishing them. Tracks such as the psychedelic art-rock indulgence "Right to the Ways and the Rules of the World," the glam-rock "Captain Fantasy," or "Sketches of Winkle" -- equal parts galloping proto-metal and Who-style Brit rock -- could serve as models for retro rockers Guided by Voices or metal parodists Tenacious D.

The duo's major-label debut, Pure Guava, pares the song list down to a more manageable 19 tracks, but only slightly smoothes the rough edges and the compositional excesses. The catchy 'n' cutesy novelty "Push th' Little Daisies" was presentable enough to earn significant airplay, and -- along with other catchy, totally twisted nuggets such as "Big Jilm" and "Pumpin' 4 the Man" -- shows Ween developing its own oddly accessible, relatively consistent sound.

Then Chocolate & Cheese pushed Ween into a whole other realm. Here, the low-fi noodlings get discarded almost entirely, replaced by a full band of players proficient in rock and pop vernaculars. "Freedom of '76" works as a nicely crafted, more subtlely humorous Philly-soul parody (or low-rent tribute?), while "Voodoo Lady" offers a spastic Latin-rock send-up (think Santana fronted by Cheech and Chong) that's not too far over the top to enjoy on its own musical merits. With Chocolate & Cheese, Ween graduates from the fringe to take its place alongside truly accessible eccentrics such as They Might Be Giants.

Taking a detour from its increasingly dynamic trampings of familiar pop styles, Ween headed to Nashville to record 12 Golden Country Greats with a cast of famed country sessionmen. The album's pedal steel, fiddles, and banjos scream "stunt," and white-trash parodies offer predictable mockings of Southern culture. But tracks such as "I'm Holding You" at least attempt earnest graftings of classic country music over Ween's warped images. As an exercise in testing the group's ability to stretch its sensibility across genre lines, it's pretty convincing.

The Mollusk picks up where Chocolate & Cheese left off, continuing Ween's renaissance as stylistically nimbly, musically rich idiot savants. Among the album's many water-themed songs, the title track -- a wonderfully goofy bit of folk psychedelia inspired by Donovan's "Atlantis" -- is most notable. "Ocean Man" is nearly as infectious, though, and the sea chanty "She Wanted to Leave" breaks new ground for the group by daring to trade formalistic in-jokes for some truly heartbreaking balladry.

The two-disc live retrospective, Paintin' the Town Brown: Ween Live 1990-1998, offers 19 songs from all stages of Ween's development: early on, as a duo with a drum machine, later as a full band, plus some selections featuring backup from Nashville session-men. All this, plus the inclusion of some rare songs not found on other albums, makes Paintin' the Town Brown a draw mainly for hard-core devotees.

Returning to studio releases after three years away, the group offered White Pepper, its most straightforward, pop-oriented album yet. While suitably populated with clever Chocolate & Cheese-style parody/ tributes -- the Jimmy Buffet-style "Bananas and Blow"; Steely Dan-like "Pandy Fackler" -- the record also features a surprising number of catchy, mainstream rock songs ("Even If You Don't," "Stay Forever") utterly devoid of sonic and lyrical mutations.

Since parting ways with Elektra, Ween has released two more live albums through its own Chocodog label: 2001's Live in Toronto, Canada and the following year's three-disc Live at Stubb's, neither of which are officially in print. And yet another live release, the two-disc CD/DVD combo Live in Chicago, followed once the group landed on new label Sanctuary. But not before Ween returned with a new studio record, Quebec. The record finds Ween moving even further toward a straightforward approach in the vein of White Pepper -- where the music was once truly twisted, it's now merely psychedelic, and often quite mildly at that. Aside from a Motorhead-inspired power-metal opening track ("It's Gonna Be a Long Night"), the old-timey "Here There Fancypants," and some Residents-style synth weirdness ("So Many People in the Neighborhood"), the majority of Quebec consists of breezy midtempo or folksy progressive rock. Vocal distortions and bits of weirdness still abound, but relative to the group's most creative work, Quebec is strictly easy listening Ween. (RONI SARIG)

From the 2004 The New Rolling Stone Album Guide