On Ween.

So, I saw Ween in concert on Saturday (thanks again to vfc for going with me). It was one of the best concerts I've ever been to. First, I've been a Ween fan for 10 years and had never seen them live. They played almost three hours and they covered their whole range of albums. Second, they were shooting for a dvd. I'm not at all excited about being ON the dvd, because I won't be, but I'm excited that THERE WILL BE A DVD. It will rule. Anyway, they played all sorts of great songs, and it was nice to hear them without all the weirdness that flows so rampantly through a typical Ween album. They played only a few songs off their new album. There were a lot of songs off of The Mollusk and Chocolate and Cheese. There were a few off of The Pod and Pure Guava, the two albums I'm least familiar with. But it was the shit and I'll be looking for 'em next time they're in town.

The trouble with Ween is this: It's impossible to tell someone about Ween. And it's impossible to play one or two representative songs. If you want to introduce someone to U2 or Steely Dan or Pavement or They Might Be Giants, you can pick two or three songs and give them a general idea of what they're in for. Not so with Ween. In fact, it's hard to pick two or three songs that represent what an ALBUM will sound like (a little easier with the early albums). Take Chocolate and Cheese, for instance (if I were going to recommend a "starter" Ween album, I think it would be this one): You start with the Elvis-in-Vegas Take Me Away, and then instantly slide into the fucked-up verses and beautiful chorus of Spinal Meningitis (Got Me Down). Then the 70's soul inspired Freedom of '76, followed by the distorted I Can't Put My Finger On It that sounds like it came right off of God Ween Satan, their debut. Well, except for the ocean sounds in the breaks. Then leap into the very beautiful guitar instrumental A Tear for Eddie and the poppy Roses are Free that could be a pop hit if not for the odd vocals and odder lyrics. The dark and moody (and weird, but that's a given) Baby Bitch is followed by one of the most fucked up songs on the album Mister, Won't You Please Help My Pony, which has to be heard to be believed. Immediately we switch gears to a cowboy song, Drifter in the Dark (acoustic guitar with a soft lead echoed line-by-line by a chorus), then the up-tempo Voodoo Lady, probably the most accessible song on the album. It's a fairly straightforward song with a catchy hook in the chorus and a bongo beat that makes you want to wiggle. Then we move into Joppa Road, which sounds like it's taken directly off of the early 70's AM Gold collection, where it sat next to Afternoon Delight and Chevy Van. From Joppa we move to the indescribable electronic fucked-up-weird-fest Candi, after which we move to the long and sprawling Mexican-inspired crime ballad Buenas Tardes Amigo, which is followed by the cartoony-but-catchy The H.I.V. Song (not to mention the weirdness of the lyrics, which are just "AIDS" and "H.I.V" between lines of the song). We finish the album with the straightforward song What Deaner Was Talking About, which again has a catchy tune that could be transformed (by a normal band) into a radio hit, and then another catchy song Don't Shit Where You Eat, which SHOULD be a radio hit, as is.

But my point is this: I can't tell you about Ween. If I had you for an hour, I might be able to give you a rough idea of their sound, but I can't. You might know one of their songs, Ocean Man, from a car commercial that's being played currently (I want to say Honda?). I'd like to put together a "Beginner's Guide to Ween", but I don't know if the guy who kindly lets me have bandwidth would appreciate it, and I don't know that I want to burn a bunch of CDs. So you'll just have to take my word for it.

Movie Review: Stark Raving Mad

Stark Raving Mad - This movie was directed by my friend David and he's going to be reading this entry. I'm going to be as honest as I can be, but I think he knows the jist of it: It's a good film, but it's not a great film. He can live with that, I think. It's never been released in theaters in the USA because they're too busy making important groundbreaking films like The Knight Rider movie and xXx 2. It's not currently available on dvd, either, though apparently that's about to be rectified since David recorded a commentary track for it last week. I got my dvd as a bootleg from China (quick take on the dvd: Great picture and sound until the last ten minutes when it got all fucky). Don't worry about the pirating, i've sent separate $0.34 checks to everyone involved in the film to cover their royalties. I think that's more than fair.

Now then, on to the movie. It's a crime story about a bank robbery that's taking place under the cover of a rave. It stars Seann William Scott, better known as "Stiffler" from the American Pie series (can we have a few more of those, please?). The supporting cast includes some people you'd know (Dave Foley of Kids in the Hall, Lou Diamond Phillips of Extreme Justice) and a bunch of others that you've seen but don't know. I wasn't overly impressed with Mr. Phillips, but Mr. Scott did a good (but not great) job in the lead role. I think the best performances were Timm Sharp as the number two guy and Patrick Breen as the neurotic safe cracker. They both did excellent jobs. Foley was also funny in a role you wouldn't expect. And mad propz to David's long time friend (and star of his short film Hate* (*a Comedy)) Paul Hungerford who did a great job in his role, too. He played the role perfectly (but his make-up seemed weird... Am I imagining that?). And when the rival gang bad-guy came on, I just kept thinking "That's Ben Fong-Torres! From Almost Famous! Ben Fong-Torres!". I like Ben Fong-Torres. Maybe I'll name my cat Ben Fong-Torres.

The story itself is understandably twisty and the movie is quite stylized. One criticism I have is that it doesn't stick to the stylish very well... It starts out stylish in the opening credits and throught the introduction of the characters, but then it kinda forgets that style, then picks it up again during the robbery proper. But the stories twists were surprising enough to keep it interesting and there were some genuinely funny scenes that I liked a bunch. I loved the fortune fish and the DJ (I should have played this role) and Monet Mazur (rawr)... It was an enjoyable movie and I wish it were released instead of some of this crap we've had thrown at us... Three stars out of four.

(Hey David, have you got me a date with Monet yet? If not her, I'll let Reagan Dale Neis have my babies.)