The Mollusk

10/10

  If forced to choose at gunpoint I suppose I'd have to say The Mollusk is my favorite Ween album.  I still remember buying it the day it came out back in 1997 and studying the strange creature on the cover just wondering what the heck waited within.

  Well it turned out, it was probably Ween's strongest, most accessible, and best produced set of songs to date.  Don't get me wrong, there's still plenty of weirdness to be found.  Right from the strange morphing vocals of the very first track, which was apparently a cover of some sort of children's dance song, this is recognizably a Ween album.  There's typical Ween humor to be found all over the dang place as well.  But the good news is after the "joke" wears off you're left with a whole lot of really awesome songs with high re-listenability.  There seems to be an ocean theme at work across these tracks, but they still manage to include plenty of genre hopping as is their modus operandi.  And there's plenty of experimentation... there's just nothing particularly ear-splitting or abrasive.  There's no Mourning Glory to be found here.  It's definitely not The Pod or Pure Guava.  There are signs of... gasp... maturation.  There's even a straightforward pretty love song in the form of It's Going to Be (Alright).  If there's any irony or snark to be found in that song, I sure can't detect it.

  But the thing is, if you've been paying attention they've already started to "mature" and include sincere songs prior to this.  I'm pretty sure Sarah from Pure Guava isn't meant as any kind of joke.  Even Birthday Boy from their first album seems to me to be "serious."  They've already become more accessible and utilized better production on the two albums prior to this.  So really it's just a natural continuation of the path they were already on.  Did I mention the songs are awesome?

  Looking over the tracklist, the only one I can point to as a sort of weak link is the instrumental Pink Eye (On My Leg), but even that one has a fun, catchy melody to it and isn't unpleasant to listen to.  Elsewhere you've got the supremely catchy Ocean Man, which there's no reason shouldn't have been a huge hit.

  I really like the title track as well.  There's this little instrumental break in it that makes me picture a Sgt. Pepper-ish band of Sea Monkeys playing crazy psychedelic instruments.  In other words, cool stuff.  Mutilated Lips has a lengthy chorus of strange imagery, and I really like the higher vocal effect they use when they repeat it.  Buckingham Green is an epic, complex song that goes through multiple sections during it's just over 3 minute run-time.  There are a couple songs that if you examine closely appear to be leftovers from the country album like I'll Be Your Jonny On the Spot and Waving My Dick in the Wind, but they've applied cool synths to them and they fit right in.  I do notice that Waving My Dick in the Wind seems to be a little bit of a re-write melodically speaking of I Don't Want to Leave You on the Farm from the country album.  It's different enough though that I can let it slide pretty easily.

  Overall there does seem to be a prog feel to this album.  I wasn't into prog rock at all when this came out, and I still enjoyed the hell out of it.  That's one of the great things about Ween.  They're extremely knowledgeable about all sorts of music, and they're able to translate it in a way that makes their songs enjoyable even if you don't know the genre or band they're parodying at that particular moment.  If you do come to discover those genres or bands later it just adds another layer of enjoyment to it.

  I can understand if a certain subset of Ween fans misses the lo-fi rawness of some of their earlier albums, but this is far from a sellout.  I also think this is a decent enough entry point to the band for newbies.  If I could only recommend one Ween album, I'm pretty sure it would be this one.  It might not be a "perfect" album, but it's damn good and I can give it a full 10 score without feeling guilty about it.