Chocolate and Cheese at 30

By Miles Silverstein

The conversation about the most versatile artists of all time recurrently echoes the same few names. David Bowie, Prince, Herbie Hancock, the Beatles – interject with Ween and get laughed out of the discussion. Behind the “joke band” veneer, Ween possesses some of the most diverse songwriting capabilities of any band or artist in modern music history. The truest exercise of this potential and the widest net the band ever cast is Chocolate and Cheese, an album which turns thirty this year. Its anniversary has been rung in with a new deluxe edition, complete with remasters, demos, and unreleased session tracks.

Chocolate and Cheese is the fourth album from the New Hope, Pennsylvania duo of Michael Melchiondo Jr. (Dean Ween) and Aaron Freeman (Gene Ween). On Ween’s first three records, GodWeenSatan, The Pod, and Pure Guava, the duo recorded oddball lo-fi experimentation straight to four-track. Live shows from the 1980’s into the mid-90’s saw the duo stand onstage with their guitars playing over a single Digital Audio Tape playback machine. For their fourth album, Ween made a conscious effort to get professional. They left the lo-fi DIY behind, expanded the band to a four-piece outfit, and went big.

Chocolate and Cheese calls everyone’s bluff. No two songs sound alike, yet each on their own slyly prove that Gene and Dean Ween can do anything their contemporaries can do just as well, if not better. ‘Baby Bitch’ is the best song Elliott Smith never wrote, ‘Voodoo Lady’ does the Red Hot Chili Peppers better than they could do themselves, ‘What Deaner Was Talkin’ About’ makes the Flaming Lips look obvious… the album is chock full of these kinds of songs: parodies at first glance, clever expressions of genuine new sincerity on every subsequent listen. Not only do Ween recognize that they can do everything anyone else can, but they also take advantage of their sheer originality to fill the rest of the album with songs that sound so unique they can (and have) only been described as Ween-core. ‘I Can’t Put My Finger on It’, the album’s lead single(?!), sounds like Cheech Marin reading Dr. Seuss over a Les Claypool side project. ‘Buenas Tardes Amigo’ is a seven minute tale told by a Mexican bandit reckoning with his friend’s betrayal, the man who killed his brother (or did he…), while Gene and Dean do their best Morricone impression for the instrumental. ‘Spinal Meningitis (Got Me Down)’ is rife with vocal pitching and narrated by a little boy who’s all down because he’s got – you guessed it – spinal meningitis (In their 2004 concert film, the live version of this song begins with the disclaimer, “This is a blues.” Sure, guys). Ween took alt rock by storm with a simple formula: Go so far down the satire rabbit hole that you boomerang back into sincere brilliance.

The thirtieth anniversary deluxe edition of Chocolate and Cheese furnishes the listener with a load of extra demo tracks that didn’t originally make the cut and were never finished, giving some insight into what the early stages of the Ween songwriting process look like. Fans attuned to the style of the early days will gravitate towards these previously-unreleased songs, their unfinished sound design more closely aligned with the lo-fi of those first three albums. It is a testament to the raw songwriting power of the band, and how incredible the early material could have sounded if Ween was a full band before 1994. The unreleased material is evidence that Chocolate and Cheese was originally a far more sweeping project, with more directions and inspirations originally left on the cutting room floor. ‘Dirty Money’ takes cues from ZZ Top, ‘Belgian Stew’ puts a goofy spin on Trent Reznor, ‘Smooth Mover’ fits right in among skate punk essentials – it goes without saying that Ween has a knack for songwriting versatility. 

Thirty years later, Ween’s influence on the weirder side of alternative music is unbroken. In a cultural epoch defined by oversaturation, those who are capable of reflecting the entire scene in a single work stand out. Chocolate and Cheese accomplished that for its time, and paved the way for many other albums to do the same in the decades since. Damon Albarn has cited Ween as a major influence on Gorillaz, and the playful scattershot deftness of 2005’s Demon Dayz doubtless captures the whole indie scene of the 2000’s. At the end of the 2010’s, 100 gecs released 1000 gecs, a sweeping tribute to the music of every corner of the internet. Another record clearly ushered in by the success of Chocolate and Cheese, 1000 gecs throws a blanket over all kinds of internet-fad music from ska punk to black MIDI (the genre, not the band). 

Ween are often overlooked. They’re the musical equivalent of the kid in the tie-dye shirt eating straight jelly sandwiches alone two tables over. Sure, he looks off to anyone unfamiliar with his motives, but as soon as you sit down next to him it becomes clear he is the coolest and most focused of us all. And I don’t know if you’ve ever had a straight jelly sandwich, but they’re pretty damn good.

Chocolate and Cheese (Deluxe Edition) is available everywhere now through Elektra Records.