After nearly a decade and a half of slumber, the almighty Boognish rose from its chocolate-covered crypt to deliver the first Ween single in 14 years. At the stroke of midnight on Friday, disciples of Dean and Gene Ween (Mickey Melchiondo and Aaron Freeman, respectively) were blessed with the official studio release of “Junkie Boy”, an unused Ween demo from 1994’s Chocolate and Cheese sessions. The track will arrive as part of a fully loaded Chocolate and Cheese deluxe reissue set to arrive on August 2nd featuring 15 demos of previously unreleased songs and outtakes curated by Gener and Deaner.
Of course, “Junkie Boy” is not a brand-new Ween song. Online records place the composition on the Pandy Fackler Tape, allegedly leaked by Dean Ween in the late 1990s. The song was supposedly destined for Chocolate and Cheese but was axed from the final product in favor of cuts like the lounge-friendly “Take Me Away”, prog-rock medical PSA “Spinal Meningitis (Got Me Down)”, “A Tear For Eddie”, “Roses Are Free”, “Voodoo Lady”, and many more.
“Junkie Boy” carries the classic, early-1990s Ween sound. There’s Gener seemingly paying tribute to another great vocalist, this time David Bowie. There’s Deaner’s old, reliable, fuzzy guitar tone contrasted with clean production value. There’s the heavy distortion that is deliberately dirty.
The audio quality is also leaps and bounds above the leaked version, giving the song a feel closer to Ween’s 2000 studio coming-of-age album, White Pepper, than the band’s first time recording in a professional(ish) studio in 1994 for Chocolate and Cheese. It’s also reminiscent of Ween re-recording various demos for Shinola, Vol. 1. According to setlist tracker Brownbase, “Junkie Boy” has only been played live once, on 9/24/93. There is also a recording of the song that has circulated with the date 9/27/93, though it is widely believed to be a partial recording of 9/24 given the identical setlist and stage banter.
According to the band, the deluxe Chocolate and Cheese reissue will feature the original 16-track album plus an additional 15 demos and outtakes that have never before seen a wide release. New* tracks include such quintessential Ween titles as “Crappy Anniversary Jimmy”, “Belgian Stew”, “Smooth Mover”, “Church Fire”, “I Really Miss You (And I’m All Alone)”, and more, plus demos of classics “Voodoo Lady”, “Take Me Away”, “Roses Are Free”, and “Candi”. “Junkie Boy” marks Ween’s first single release since “DC Won’t Do You No Good”, a demo from 2007 with La Cucaracha.
“Keeping with Ween tradition, Aaron and I probably picked all the wrong songs, mixed them, and now here they are,” Deaner said.
This single release comes as Ween fans patiently await the return of their fearless Deaner, Mickey Melchiondo Jr., who back earlier this year shared a personal announcement that the band would scrap its March/April run through the Southeast so the guitarist could focus on his “mental and spiritual well being.” Mickey was recently spotted at his son Michael’s college graduation looking as jovial as ever. The band is set to resume touring in August for a run through the Western United States. Tickets for Ween’s 40th-anniversary summer tour are on sale here.
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