Saturday, August 01, 2009

Ween - Pure Guava


How any song from an album like Pure Guava ended up having actual success in a mainstream media market, I have no fucking clue. But I suppose it makes sense that Beavis & Butthead would like it, so the army of stoners who wanted to be them would like it too. There’s no other explanation for the rampant weirdness -- the distorted vocal tracks, maniacal giddiness, and completely cracked songcraft -- than recognizing this as the flagrant misuse of commercially available products by a couple of guys who couldn’t afford proper black market drugs. There was a lot of angsty bullshit rock that came out of the early 90’s, but it did have the intended effect of making a market for musicians who just wanted to fly the freak flag: early Beck would be the most obvious example, but the Melvins, the Butthole Surfers, and Ween all got swept up in the wake of grunge, and history is doing us the favor of weeding out some of the whiny crap and remembering just how awesome some of those weirdos really were.

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