Frenchy’s Fracas

General Info
Artist/Group: Ween
Location: Paradiso, Amsterdam
When: 15 May 2008

Who?
They’re one of my all-time favorite bands and I never get tired of saying that! An uncompromising band of true musicians, mixing up the Classic 2-minute Punk track with Bluegrass, Rock and a bit of Electronica on the side. Their lyrics are politically incorrect, offending people from all genders and races, but somehow they get away with it. Somehow I just keep smiling when I hear their songs. Ween has really stretched my tolerance levels to the max.
I missed out on an earlier chance to see these guys perform, but now after quite some years, I was there to enjoy the wacky adventures of Gene and Dean Ween

Video clips at ||
Full set list of that evening, courtesy of Last.fm’s Hugo19709

The Show
The band started quite nicely on time, with Dean Ween hopping on the stage with crutches due to some alligator wrestling accident or something. It didn’t stop him from rocking his guitar sitting on a chair during the show.

The band played quite some songs I knew from the four excellent albums I have of them: Chocolate And Cheese, The Mollusk, Shinola and La Cucaracha.

Some of the more memorable ones:
Spinal Menangitis (Got Me Down)
Oooooh.. The live version also gives me the chills..

Voodoo Lady
Excellent fun!

Learnin’ to Love
The redneck anthem, gotta love it!

Fiesta
So incredibly wacky..

My Own Bare Hands
Kinda active-aggressive anthem, the crowd really enjoyed themselves.

Zoloft
The weirdest thing I’ve heard in quite some frigging time!! The song is like it’s title: a medicated form of hallucination; the repeated slow breakdowns were like being in a fishbowl looking at the outside view of purple bunnies tap-dancing on green ice. Loved it!!

Conclusion
Close to two and a half hours of pure noise, emotion and sentiment. Their music is so varied in styles and approaches, it’s mind-boggling. The Dean’s guitar solos and Gene’s vocal acrobatics are the best way to live in sin.

Last.fm’s uber-queen of soul, blkbetty, once wrote this great article called Can A Sister Rock? The Primal Urge for Rockin and Rollin. Well, this brother’s always had this urge for some strong guitar rock combined with a bit of the bizarre and this band, Ween, does that just perfectly.
A great concert with a great crowd and absolutely incredible music.

Rating:

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General Description
Artist/Band: Ween || ||
Album Title: La Cucaracha
Year: 2007

Please don’t use too much pesticide?

How I Got Into This Music
Their Chocolate & Cheese album is one of my alltime favorites. These guys are masters of every genre in the music business, taking it all apart and putting it all back together without a single piece missing, but still.. They seem to add something to the form, mostly brainless comedy mixed with sharp satire and some totally ruthless political incorrectness. Ween is always a blessing and a curse served on one dish. La Cucaracha is their latest release.

Google Search for reviews of this album || Album details at || || || Video clips at

Tracks that got my attention:
Fiesta
Heheh.. Really, really funny intro track! Europe used to be plagued by this weird phenomenon called James Last. Well this track is James Last on every forbidden chemical and organic substance. Just keeps putting a smile on my face and that weird drum solo in the middle section, wow!

Blue Balloon
These guys do this every time. There’s always at least one track that makes me so incredibly mellow, relaxed and content; on this album it’s this track. Very mellow guitars and vocals, corny effects and weird lyrics, love it!

Friends
Ironic cardio-fitness music, in itself a moot point, but hey..

Object
[Insane grin] Go search the interwebs for the lyrics. Murderously funny..

Learnin’ To Love
This track’s got this catchy hillbilly thing going on. The first white man I see stomping his feet to this song will make me leave in 10 seconds flat, because before you know, more white men will join in. And before you know, there’s a “Yeeehah!” too many and people start looking at you funny like measuring you for a length of rope. Love it.

My Own Bare Hands
I will not support the lyrics of this track. It makes me smile for the right reasons, but I know for sure that people will start taking the words literally and miss out on all the flaming sarcasm.

Sweetheart In The Summer
Works for me, that’s it..

Woman And Man
Wow.. 10 minutes long tribute to the 70’s Epic Tracks, you know the ones that had the encredible large storylines and awesomely complex musical changes in styles and structures? No? Oh.. Okay.

Your Party
It’s just mellow.. The lyrics kept me waiting for the other shoe to drop, but the shoes were tucked away under the bed.

Conclusion
It’s Ween, meaning that it’s not always gonna be what you expect, musically or quality-wise. But there’s no denying the talents of this band, serious musicians making music sound simple. Not one of their best albums, but I know for sure that I’ll still be thinking of this album in a few years time. That’s what Ween is about, for me.

Rating:

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General Description
Artist/Band: Benny Sings Rednose District
Album Title: Euh
Year: 2006

Dutch beats and weirdness!
 
How I Got Into This Music
Saw a video clip of Benny Sings, I really liked the song, but.. I kept forgetting the name of the performer, silly me. Annoyance can also lead to results coz after a while I finally wrote down the name and started scanning for some material. Found this album, thinking that Rednose District’d be the title of the album, even sillier me.. This is a collaboration between two mellow DJ’s and one great vocalist.

Benny Sings at MySpace

Tracks that got my attention:
Beat 1
Sometimes funny sometimes seriously annoying - like the idea of using samples from almost every Hanna-Barbera TV animation series.

B.E.N.N.Y.S.I.N.G.S.R.E.D.N.O.S.E.D.I.S.T.R.I.C.T.
Another mixed feelings track: the catchy beat combined with catchy but sometimes very annoying vocals and keyboards

ABCDEFG
I was kinda getting worried at the beginning of this track. I wondered if the whole album would be so potentially annoying, but the simplistic lyrics of this song are saved by the great vocals and tight production

Miss Moral
Ok, now we’re cooking! Excellent track, the tech-lullaby theme combined with multi-track vocals are incredible, love this one!

Freedom
Remember Chris Rea’s “On The Beach”? The intro and chorus kinda reminds me of that song. Like it..

Ready To Rock
Man, I wish I was behind a turntable again, spinning discs coz I’m seriously curious if this track’d work. I love the hard tech sounds and beats, love the bass part even better! Reminds me of a track by Ween: Transitions

Oohweeooh (The May Songs)
Another walk-in-the-park track

Common Yall
Love the samples and keyboards!

Feel Like Comin’ Up
The mellowest of shit..

Conclusion
It’s frigging great to discover new stuff, especially when it’s in an area I almost never pay attention to: Dutch productions. I like this kind of surprise..
I’m not sure if it’s just the novelty that got my attention, don’t think so. This stuff oozes professional mucking about and still having fun. And that’s refreshing!

Rating: (just skip the first two tracks..)

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General Description
Artist/Band: Ween
Album Title: Shinola Volume 1
Year: 2005

Grinning back at the Beast while wearing my fluffy slippers
 
How I Got Into This Music
Read my review of “Chocolate And Cheese”, one of my all-time favorite albums. This band always keeps me off balance, sometimes scaring the living boognish out of me, but almost always putting that insane grin on my face that I seldomly use in public..
After that 1994 release I kept little track of later albums, with exception of the nautical “Mollusk”. But when this one came out I felt an old buzz coming over me, so I simply had to try this one out!

Tracks that got my attention:

Tastes Good on th’ Bun
Crazy and weird stuff from the brothers Ween. It takes a bit getting used to this wacky stuff, but you’ll wake up saying that title without knowing in a week.

Boys Club
Yep, listen to the lyrics and laugh your ass off on this hilariously funny feel-good track!

I Fell in Love Today
Don’t know how to explain the mellow sad-hapiness of this track, love it!

Big Fat Fuck
The public at large should know that we got Nobel Prize winning scientists working 24/7 to formulate a fitting explanation of the deeper meanings of this track, but in the meantime, your guess is as good as mine.. Nice song though.

Gabrielle
Great Thin Lizzy tribute!! You get the urge to jump and bounce around even when you’ve been in solitary confinement in a cupboard for a coupla years with no sight of getting out any time soon..

Did You See Me?
I have this weird association with this track: Pink Floyd.. I don’t know a lot of music from that band, so it’s one of those little mysteries I’ve gotta learn to live with. The intro also bears the threat of turning into that REM track I disgust so much that I can’t remember its title.

How High Can You Fly?
Hard to explain to civil minded people why this song gets to me: sometimes it can make me want to demolish everything in sight (except my fluffy slippers, of course) and sometimes it just steadies the nerves - excellent track!

Transitions
Walk in the park track, love it! These guys know how to make sweet songs, heheh..

Israel
I hope these guys know what they’re doing.. Total weirdness, but still a great song.

Rift
The vocals give me that Brian Ferry chill of smoothness and way too much hair conditioner, but it’s an unbelievably moody and driven song.

Monique the Freak
Basic rock mixed with funky vocals and guitars that’d make Prince call his lawyers.. Groove-rock.

Someday
Wow.. Nuff said!

Conclusion
Although this album’s a collection of previously unreleased(?) material, it still works as an album. Huh? Whatever.. These guys make the funniest, most intelligent and most interesting music I’ve heard in years. They like their production raw and uncompromising, using shockadelica seventies rock tracks, mixed with the loveliest ballads and the ever present wicked sense of semi-juvinile humor. Best album for me this year till now!

Rating: (it’s been a while..)

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General Description
Artist/Band: Ween
Album Title: Chocolate And Cheese
Year: 1994

Probably indescribable.

How I Got Into This Music
Aaah.. let me take you back to Times Past, 1995 to be precise. In the morning before going to work I always had MTV on, just to check out whatever stuff was on. Now in Europe the programmers had this little ritual which was using the last five minutes of the hour to play a track they enjoy and not especially for commercial reasons. Don’t know if it’s true, but it seemed that way coz they’d put on clips that almost never got any airplay. So one morning I was hurrying to get to work (finding my socks, my tie, my shoes, you know, the usual) and that’s when it happened. I heard a white falsetto voice crooning real R&B style! So I skipped the Quest for the Lost Left Shoe to take a better look and listen. It was “Freedom of ‘76′ by this band called Ween.
The next day or two the clip was on again at the same time, so I really got to enjoy my mornings. The clip itself was about two guys getting arrested for stealing something or other (hey, we’re ten years on, so forgive my hazy recollection), but that voice, the backing vocals and the pure simplicity of it all made a lasting impression. So after a while a started looking for the album and when I saw the cover I thought: “No way! Not gonna buy it…“ Stupid, stupid lil me..
Then at the end of that year I went to Thailand with my then girlfriend for a nice vacation. I was browsing the cheap cassette tape markets in Bangkok, came across “Chocolate And Cheese“ and bought the silly thing. I had more tapes with me but for three weeks I only played that tape. Since then this album’s right Up There in my favorite album top five.

Tracks that got my attention (well, all of them actually, but still..):

Take Me Away
Really rough and ruggid guitar rock with a laidback bass line. Lyrics where especially relevant for my relationship during those times.

Spinal Meningitis (Got Me Down)
Scary track, the high pitched voice truely sounding like a child can still give me the shivers.

Freedom Of ‘76
Wow! Wow! Still one of the best tracks I’ve ever heard in my life! Exit: rational thought. Enter: total worship.

I Can’t Put My Finger On It
Things change over the years coz I really hated this screamy song, but now I find myself singing the whole song very often. Downside is that it’s usually in public on the train or something.. At least I always get a lot of space on the train ;o)

A Tear For Eddie
Wow.. Dunno what the track is about other than a seemingly dedication to a guy called Eddie. But the song goes from being incredibly cool and mellow to almost a eulogy for a lost guitar hero..

Roses Are Free
Heh, one of my favorite “Everything’s Fine“ tracks: just hearing this song takes away all the grindstone blues.. “Resist all the urges that make you wanna go out and kill..” Sounds like great therapy to me!

Baby Bitch
Great dialogue: how people can be utter bastards and bitches to others and especially themselves, love it!

Mister, Would You Please Help My Pony
I think that many bizarre art periods and styles joined together wouldn’t match the complete weirdness of this track. I still think the WSPA should use this as their theme song, heh..

Drifter In The Dark
Giddyap! Real cowboy song, you kinda wanna sit down with a group of people at a camp fire, grab a guitar and a harmonica and play this song. Now, don’t do this at home kids!

Voodoo Lady
Very Talking Heads, weird lyrics, great groove and beat!

Jappa Road
Oh, man.. This song really feels like a relaxed walk in the park or something. It’s so unbelievable simple and mellow, great bass at the end.

Candi
The power of repetition: the boys take us on a trip of utter monotony and weird lyrics. Doesn’t alway work for me.

Buenas Tardes Amigo
Now this song takes me back to my vacation in Thailand. The first coupla times I fast forwarded this track to the next one. But I still remember the first time I actually took time to listen through the whole thing: I never heard a Western movie plot being portrayed on one single song this way! You kinda imagine the images in your mind when listening to the song, love it!

The HIV Song
In 1995 this song was gutsy, to say the least. Now with South Park and such, it almost kinda sounds a bit mellow, but it still helps to put a smile on your face.

What Deaner Was Talking About
“If I Was King I’d Wear A Ring And Never Hurt My People“ - great line! Love the melancholy, love the voice, love it!

Don’t Shit Where You Eat
Great singalong song! Try at weddings, bar mitzvahs, etc. You’ll be the ultimate guest of honor..

Conclusion
Ween have blown my mind with this album, an impact that has lasted for almost ten years now. I can’t explain what’s the thing that gets me the most. It’s got very, very close links to images and memories of the time I first heard the album: being in bus from Bangkok to Ko Samet, the train ride to Chang Mai, walking along the Chao Phraya River in Bangkok.. All this and one album as a soundtrack.
Not only the memories, but also the songs themselves are very important to me, some of them still help me feel a bit better when I’m feeling down, some give me a manic grin on my face when dealing with funny shituations, some just make me relaxed. A great album! And I really love the album cover, heh..

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