Ween is an American rock band from New Hope, Pennsylvania, that was formed in 1984 by Aaron Freeman and Mickey Melchiondo, better known by their respective stage names Gene Ween and Dean Ween, who are the band's sole constant members. Generally categorized as an alternative rock band, they are known for their irreverent, highly eclectic catalog of songs inspired by funk, psychedelia, soul, country, gospel, prog, R&B, heavy metal, and punk rock.
Ween self-released several cassette albums from their formation until 1989, after which they officially released three lo-fi albums: GodWeenSatan: The Oneness (1990), The Pod (1991), and Pure Guava (1992). For Pure Guava, the band signed with major label Elektra Records. The album spawned the single "Push th' Little Daisies", which was a chart hit in Australia and the United States. Under Elektra, the band released five professionally recorded albums: Chocolate and Cheese (1994), 12 Golden Country Greats (1996), The Mollusk (1997), and White Pepper (2000). They later returned to independent labels for the albums Quebec (2003) and La Cucaracha (2007). Freeman quit the band in 2012 citing a need to treat his alcohol and drug abuse. Ween reformed in late 2015 and toured extensively without plans to record new material, but later entered an indefinite hiatus in 2024 citing Melchiondo's mental health as a reason.
For their first decade, Ween performed live as a duo backed by a Digital Audio Tape with pre-recorded drum machine patterns. Chris Williams, better known by his stage name Mean Ween, occasionally joined on bass guitar. With the release of Chocolate and Cheese, they stopped playing with Williams and expanded to a four-piece for live performances, later adding a fifth member. Their live members include drummer Claude Coleman Jr., bassist Dave Dreiwitz, and keyboardist Glenn McClelland. Ween also collaborated extensively with Andrew Weiss, who joined the band as a bassist in 1989 and also produced five of their nine studio albums. Despite never receiving much mainstream recognition, Ween has developed a large, devoted cult following and garnered critical acclaim.
History Early years (1984–1989) Aaron Freeman and Mickey Melchiondo met in a junior high school typing class in 1984. Freeman recalled, "We didn't like each other. He was a jock, and I was more of a trench-coat guy. But we sat next to each other in typing class and both realized we were into music." The name Ween was a word made up by the duo, a combination of the words wuss and penis. Their earliest home recordings were drug-fueled and free-spirited; Melchiondo would later say about this era, "the music was designed to be obnoxious".
From 1984 until 1994, Ween's live lineup consisted of Freeman on lead vocals and occasional rhythm guitar, Melchiondo on lead guitar and backing vocals, and a Digital Audio Tape (DAT) machine providing the pre-recorded backing tracks. They self-released several cassettes in the late eighties including Mrs. Slack (1984), Erica Peterson's Flaming Crib Death (1986), The Crucial Squeegie Lip (1987), Axis: Bold as Boognish (1988), The Live Brain Wedgie/WAD (1988), and Prime 5 (1988). In 1987, Freeman also released his own tape, Synthetic Socks, which featured Melchiondo on a few tracks. Ween's public debut was at the New Hope-Solebury High School talent show in 1986, where they performed a cover of Jimi Hendrix's "Purple Haze" with Chris Williams (a.k.a. Mean Ween) on bass and Karl Weimer on drums. Although this era was mostly just Freeman, Melchiondo and the DAT machine, they did play a few shows in the '80s as "The Ween" backed by the Rollins Band rhythm section, Andrew Weiss and Sim Cain.
By 1988, Ween had become regulars at John and Peter's in New Hope and City Gardens in Trenton, New Jersey. At City Gardens, they opened for acts such as They Might Be Giants, Butthole Surfers, and Henry Rollins. Following a February 1990 City Gardens performance where Ween's reception was lukewarm, Rollins got on stage and warned the crowd to "start liking them now", for one day, "you will get down on your filthy knees and crawl to the altar that is Ween".
Lo-fi period (1990–1993) Dave Ayers, working in A&R for Minneapolis-based record label Twin/Tone, went to see a live performance by alt-rock band Skunk in the late '80s in Maplewood, New Jersey in anticipation of signing them to a record deal. Ween, friends of Skunk, were the opening act that night. Ayers signed Ween to Twin/Tone that night, and would soon become the band's manager. Skunk would break up in 1991 and their drummer, Claude Coleman, Jr., would play a few shows with Ween in 1992 before joining the band full-time in 1994.
Ween's debut album for Twin/Tone, GodWeenSatan: The Oneness, was released on November 16, 1990. It consisted of 26 tracks that were written during their first six years, and can be thought of as a "best of" this era. Some of the songs, such as "You Fucked Up" and "Bumblebee", had already appeared on various Ween cassettes from the late '80s. "You Fucked Up", "Fat Lenny", "Nan", and the retitled Prince cover "L.M.L.Y.P." would become staples of the band's live show for years to come. Ween played their first overseas shows in support of the album, with a series of dates in the Netherlands in December/January 1990–91.
The band released their second full-length album, The Pod, in 1991 on the Shimmy-Disc label. It was recorded on a four-track cassette recorder from January to October 1990. The album borrows its title from the Solebury Township, Pennsylvania apartment in which it was recorded. The duo's use of drum machines, pitch-shifted guitars/vocals and drug-laced humor became a trademark part of their sound. The cover of The Pod was a parody of the cover of the 1975 Leonard Cohen album, The Best of Leonard Cohen, but with the head of Chris "Mean Ween" Williams (who played bass on the Pod track "Alone") in place of Cohen's. Although the liner notes claim the album was recorded under the influence of scotchgard, Freeman would later say that this was tongue-in-cheek. Following the release of The Pod, Ween embarked on their first extensive U.S. tour, as well as a week-long U.K. tour that included a recording with John Peel in the BBC studio. The February 1992 U.K. tour would be Ween's first performances with Claude Coleman Jr., and also featured Shimmy-Disc founder Kramer on bass.
Ween signed with Elektra Records and released their major label debut Pure Guava on November 10, 1992. Pure Guava featured their highest charting single, "Push th' Little Daisies" which gained them media and MTV attention, as the video was a highlighted target on MTV's Beavis and Butt-Head. The song was also a hit in Australia, reaching number 18 on the singles chart. The track "Flies on My Dick" featured lead vocals by Guy Heller, singer of Melchiondo's other band, Moistboyz. Heller would occasionally perform the song live with Ween. Ween toured the U.S. in support of the album, and the show of December 9 in Chapel Hill, NC would later be released as the CD/DVD package At the Cat's Cradle, 1992 in 2008. Also in support of Pure Guava, Ween performed at MTV Spring Break in Daytona Beach, FL as well as on The Jane Pratt Show.
Signing with Elektra Records (1994–1996) Following the release of Pure Guava, Ween began to expand their live and studio lineup, providing both a crisper production sound in the studio and an easier live setup. Claude Coleman Jr. officially joined the band as drummer in March 1994, while Ween's long-time producer Andrew Weiss picked up the bass duties. The Weiss-produced Chocolate and Cheese was released in 1994, featuring tracks influenced by '70s pop/rock and soul, such as "Freedom of '76" and "Voodoo Lady", the latter of which appeared on the Road Trip and Dude, Where's My Car? soundtracks. The "Freedom of '76" music video was directed by Spike Jonze and the video for "I Can't Put My Finger On It" was filmed at a Middle Eastern restaurant and featured actual employees of the restaurant. Both videos would be shown on season 5 of Beavis and Butt-Head in 1995. Ween performed "I Can't Put My Finger On It" on Late Night with Conan O'Brien in January 1995. The Chocolate and Cheese track "Roses Are Free" began being covered by Phish regularly in concert in 1997. Freeman would later comment: "I like Trey Anastasio as a person, but as far as the music goes, all that jam band shit makes me want to puke". In 2011, Chocolate and Cheese would have a book written about it by Hank Shteamer, as a part of the 33⅓ book series about music albums. Of recording the album, Dean Ween said, "I saw someone wrote a book about Chocolate and Cheese, and my son put it in the bathroom. I was reading through it. What people were saying about me and Aaron [Freeman, aka Gene Ween] was that there was all this thought that went into this shit. It's total bullshit. We wrote a lot of material—it was good, we knew it was good—we picked our favorite songs and we put them out on the record. That was it. [Laughter.] And that's been true of every record I've made, from the first Ween record to the second Dean Ween record."
One month prior to the release of Chocolate and Cheese, Ween appeared in the Saturday Night Live film It's Pat, starring Julia Sweeney. The band (which in the film consisted of Freeman, Melchiondo, Weiss, and Weiss' brother John Weiss as the drummer) was featured in a supporting role and performed the Pod track "Pork Roll, Egg & Cheese" and the Pure Guava track "Don't Get 2 Close (2 My Fantasy)". The film was both a critical and box office failure, and was subsequently pulled from theaters one week after its opening weekend.
Also in 1994, Freeman, Melchiondo and Coleman collaborated with Japanese noise rock band Boredoms on a project released two years later as Z-Rock Hawaii. Melchiondo became a big fan of Boredoms upon seeing them live in Philadelphia in 1993, calling them "the heaviest band [he] had ever seen since the Butthole Surfers". Boredoms frontman Yamantaka Eye had previously released an album that heavily sampled Ween's Pod album. These recording sessions took place in a Pennington, New Jersey studio during the recording of Chocolate and Cheese.
Ween turned to Nashville studio musicians and producer Ben Vaughn for the November 1995 recording of 12 Golden Country Greats (1996) which contained only ten tracks. There are two theories regarding the title of the album. The first claim is that it refers to the dozen veteran musicians, known as The Shit Creek Boys, who played on the album. The second claim refers to the fact that the band did indeed record twelve songs during the demo sessions for the album. When it came time to record the actual album, the band chose not to use the songs "I Got No Darkside" and "So Long, Jerry" but kept the album title. "So Long, Jerry", a tribute to the then recently deceased Jerry Garcia, was featured as a B-Side on the "Piss Up a Rope" single. Sticking to Nashville tradition, Freeman and Melchiondo provided only vocals, allowing The Shit Creek Boys to play all the instruments. Elvis Presley's former backing vocal quartet The Jordanaires appeared on the tracks "I'm Holding You" and "Powder Blue".
After a brief return to the original lineup of Freeman, Melchiondo and the DAT machine for a series of dates opening for the Foo Fighters, Ween toured with the Shit Creek Boys in October 1996. This lineup performed not only 12 Golden Country Greats material, but also played Ween songs from previous eras with added country instrumentation, including the Pure Guava tracks "Pumpin' 4 the Man" and "Push th' Little Daisies" and the Chocolate and Cheese tracks "What Deaner Was Talkin' About" and "Buenas Tardes Amigo". Parts of the show of October 23 at Toronto's Phoenix Concert Theatre would later be released as the album, Live in Toronto Canada (2001).
Commercial breakthrough (1997–2001)