versus the audience. And it was hilarious — it was brilliant and it was great.
Matt Sweeney remembers this very same show. A guitarist, vocalist and producer best known for his work with Chavez, Billy Corgan’s Zwan and Bonnie “Prince” Billy, Sweeney also played in the New Jersey indie-rock band Skunk, which shared bills with Ween in the late ’80s and contained future Ween drummer Claude Coleman. He recalls Ween’s duo years with a kind of perverse awe:
I remember being blown away that Ween had become a band that everybody liked after years of being a band that would piss people off to the point of violence. I recall them opening for one of the early Fugazi shows at City Gardens — they were pelted with change by newly bald straight edge kids as Aaron sang the same Cat Stevens song over and over. Or the two of them clearing the room at NYC’s the Pyramid Club with [
Pure Guava
’s] “Reggaejunkiejew.” Mickey then gave Aaron an atomic wedgie for the benefit of the remaining few audience members. Keep in mind that people just playing to a tape deck was somehow really insulting and confrontational to a “rock” crowd.
As Ween established themselves as a major-label act and made an in-road on MTV, fans picked up on and even relished the duo’s confrontational attitude toward live performance. In a February, 1993
MTV News
segment onWeen, which features clips of Freeman and Melchiondo bringing their super-brown duo act to New York’s high-profile Irving Plaza venue a month earlier, fan interviews reveal a strange kind of masochism. “They think we suck,” one woman says. “I think they think we’re stupid for liking them because I think they’re a joke,” another clearly smitten female notes. Here, the segment cuts to an interview with the brothers Ween. “Our fans are the biggest losers in the whole world,” states Melchiondo with a smirk. Losers or not, the band’s growing cult clearly relished the less-is-more credo that Ween in the duo years prided themselves on. “The two guys have such a stage presence, even though they don’t have 50 instruments,” another showgoer says.
Ween’s ability to have it both ways, to reach a larger audience while retaining their initial DIY recording methods and every ounce of their insular obnoxiousness onstage, was no fluke. The band was fortunate enough to enjoy the support of a major-label staff who understood that to overdress Ween at this stage would be to spoil them. Steve Ralbovsky, the A&R representative who signed Ween to Elektra, explains:
The lo-fi thing was almost a mark of distinction. It was kind of a turn away from super-hi-fi, super-deluxe digital recording. It gave [Ween] another measure of uniqueness, and it wasn’t so lo-fi that it was an unpleasant listening experience. It was part of their sound, and part of who they were, and part of what they did. It hearkened to what they did live, and I didn’t giveit much of a second thought. If there was any second thought it was, “Sonically, this is cool that it’s 4-track and lo-fi.”
Ralbovsky’s faith in the band’s methods meant that he played a much more passive role in working with Ween than with many other artists. “It was basically: Give them the resources to make the records the way they wanted to make them, support their agenda within the label and try to come up with creative plans with my colleagues to support the releases,” he explains. “And just basically get out of the way.”
Even if Ralbovsky was committed to getting out of the way, Ween wanted to make it official. Dave Ayers, Ween’s manager at the time of the Elektra deal and the man responsible for Ween’s initial Twin/Tone signing, still marvels at the conditions of the major-label contract:
We were able to make this crazy record deal, still the best record deal I’ve ever been involved in. The record company not only had no artistic input; it said in the contract that the record company’s not allowed to
Matt Sweeney remembers this very same show. A guitarist, vocalist and producer best known for his work with Chavez, Billy Corgan’s Zwan and Bonnie “Prince” Billy, Sweeney also played in the New Jersey indie-rock band Skunk, which shared bills with Ween in the late ’80s and contained future Ween drummer Claude Coleman. He recalls Ween’s duo years with a kind of perverse awe:
I remember being blown away that Ween had become a band that everybody liked after years of being a band that would piss people off to the point of violence. I recall them opening for one of the early Fugazi shows at City Gardens — they were pelted with change by newly bald straight edge kids as Aaron sang the same Cat Stevens song over and over. Or the two of them clearing the room at NYC’s the Pyramid Club with [
Pure Guava
’s] “Reggaejunkiejew.” Mickey then gave Aaron an atomic wedgie for the benefit of the remaining few audience members. Keep in mind that people just playing to a tape deck was somehow really insulting and confrontational to a “rock” crowd.
As Ween established themselves as a major-label act and made an in-road on MTV, fans picked up on and even relished the duo’s confrontational attitude toward live performance. In a February, 1993
MTV News
segment onWeen, which features clips of Freeman and Melchiondo bringing their super-brown duo act to New York’s high-profile Irving Plaza venue a month earlier, fan interviews reveal a strange kind of masochism. “They think we suck,” one woman says. “I think they think we’re stupid for liking them because I think they’re a joke,” another clearly smitten female notes. Here, the segment cuts to an interview with the brothers Ween. “Our fans are the biggest losers in the whole world,” states Melchiondo with a smirk. Losers or not, the band’s growing cult clearly relished the less-is-more credo that Ween in the duo years prided themselves on. “The two guys have such a stage presence, even though they don’t have 50 instruments,” another showgoer says.
Ween’s ability to have it both ways, to reach a larger audience while retaining their initial DIY recording methods and every ounce of their insular obnoxiousness onstage, was no fluke. The band was fortunate enough to enjoy the support of a major-label staff who understood that to overdress Ween at this stage would be to spoil them. Steve Ralbovsky, the A&R representative who signed Ween to Elektra, explains:
The lo-fi thing was almost a mark of distinction. It was kind of a turn away from super-hi-fi, super-deluxe digital recording. It gave [Ween] another measure of uniqueness, and it wasn’t so lo-fi that it was an unpleasant listening experience. It was part of their sound, and part of who they were, and part of what they did. It hearkened to what they did live, and I didn’t giveit much of a second thought. If there was any second thought it was, “Sonically, this is cool that it’s 4-track and lo-fi.”
Ralbovsky’s faith in the band’s methods meant that he played a much more passive role in working with Ween than with many other artists. “It was basically: Give them the resources to make the records the way they wanted to make them, support their agenda within the label and try to come up with creative plans with my colleagues to support the releases,” he explains. “And just basically get out of the way.”
Even if Ralbovsky was committed to getting out of the way, Ween wanted to make it official. Dave Ayers, Ween’s manager at the time of the Elektra deal and the man responsible for Ween’s initial Twin/Tone signing, still marvels at the conditions of the major-label contract:
We were able to make this crazy record deal, still the best record deal I’ve ever been involved in. The record company not only had no artistic input; it said in the contract that the record company’s not allowed to
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