Subject:       Australia Melbourne 8th and rumours of the 5th at Manly Leagues
  From:         "Mike Harris" (  Livistona@classic.msn.com  )


Hi I'm Dave Harris,  The rumours of the night of the 5th at the Manly 
Warringah Leagues club comes from a friend of mine who went on a whim, taken 
by a Jason, without prior knowledge of Ween's Sydney presence.  Basicly, my 
heresay consists of two things, Ween played a way twisted set; this place they 
played at is one of the havens for Australia's ugliest.  Football and beer 
consist as the mental diet for many of the patrons which made for a strange 
and interesting venue.  My friend Matthew (who can be seen at the page 
http://minyos.its.rmit.edu.au/~davris/ass (which stands for associates)) said 
that Ween picked up on the brutal and doltish vibes which eminated from this 
place and used it to their advantage.  They began to bate their drummer 
Claude, taunting him and hanging shit on him until the whole band ganged up on 
him and circled him chanting and barking like dogs.  

For ten minutes.

Matt just sed apart from that they were siq (sic).  That is all.  


Prince of Wales gig, Melbourne, Wednesday the 8th.

I had been excited for weeks after seeing the poster on a wall, too well 
adhered to be removed.  I got myself a ticket for Wednesday (Thursday was 
already sold out) then asked a girl to come but tickets were already sold out 
by the time I got back.  Shamed, I resolved to go alone.  Dressed in suited 
finery with a red pockerchief, I ate at Miyoshi, Swan St. Richmond (if you're 
in town, the best Japanese anywhere)  had a lager and two acid trips at The 
Corner Hotel, to discover it was only ten minutes til 8:30! (A time sighted on 
the ticket, little did I know this was when the doors opened)  Raced to the 
venue by train and cab, pelted up the stairs, to find a (nearly) empty venue.  
I was eyed curiously by the doorstaff.  Sweaty and relieved, I got a 
pot(Melbournese for a glass of beer) and sat in the centre of the floor to 
watch the room slowly fill.  Here I pondered the meaning of the Mollusc, was 
it a life-theory, a way to approach and understand the complexities of our 
existence?  I was presented with the mental image of the cross section of the 
spine of a fish, and it suggested that we are each a part of that shape and 
through our life's would pass along the spiny bones and towards the marrow 
centre.  Then these two girls sat beside me on the rim of a step facing the 
stage.  They were real band groupies, each with they're allocated passion.  
They asked me who I was here to see, I sed Ween, they asked which albums I 
had, I sed none, and was instantly flooded with the pinkness of imposed shame. 
 They asked why I was there and I sed cause I heard Ween were "cool".  Stripey 
Socks was a Fauves fan, and her friend was the Weener.  She looked at me in 
disgust and asked if I even knew the name of the last album.  I shrugged and 
they glowered at me, then turned away (thank god).  You should have seen the 
Weener, she was what I could only describe as the kind of genetic product 
equal with the kind of shit Gene and Dean pull; she was a real Ween chick.

It was like a kind of time-lapse nature documentary watching the house fill 
with people.  They would tentatively approach the diminishing open praries of 
dancefloor.  I went out for cigarettes and came back to find my same spot, 
which seemed to have become the spot people walked through.  Having plugged 
the walkway, I had sat next to a guy called Rowan Goffin, we had tenuous 
conections through uni and he was a jeweler.  The Fauves came on and they 
sucked.  The lead singer guitarist looked like he was playing with himself all 
the way through it, and hence I had this bizarre image of these three guys on 
stage, stroking their incredibly ornate peni(?).  It was horrible.  But at one 
point the lead wanker allowed the short Sting-with-AIDS other guitarist to 
take the show for a bit and he ripped!  He was for some reason doing something 
extrodinary with the band that the previous lead hadn't, he joined the band as 
a team instead of using it as a vehicle for self gratification.  Yeah, so the 
Fauves finally got off and Ween began to set up.  

        After waiting ages, all five came out.  There were no lights really for the 
Fauves but Ween were resplendant in greens and blues, Molluscing it for all it 
was worth.  Gene started off with "Dancing in the Show Tonight".  There may or 
not have been some type of flange filter/effect on the vocals, but either way, 
Gener was doing some exraordinary things with the shape of his mouth and the 
resultant sound was exquisitely warped.  His grimmacesmile and misshapen baby 
head were wriggling in front of me, I broke into a smile of my own which 
threatened to seperate the top half of my head from my lower jaw.  His genuine 
enthusiasm and animation were invading the whole crowd with that same feeling 
of glee at being here at this show.

        The next track was "Golden Eel" which had all the Majesty, Magnificence and 
Glory of a Rock Song.  It was as if we were all at sea, rocking in the bowels 
of this vessel.  The lights on the players contrasted heavily with the colours 
on the background which gave them an eerie, other-worldly vibe.

        I was way too out of it to take notes on the songs but they played the 
"Stallion Pt. 3" with mystic space seeping out of every note.  Everyone bopped 
to "The AIDS song" and warpbled (sic) along to "Pony", Deaner slayed 'em with 
"Piss up a rope" and "Blarney Stone".  They played a lot of songs I wasn't 
familiar with then like "Dr. Rock" and "Captain Fantasy".  The heads that 
Deaner pulls, whoah!  He's a fucking cock-rocker, man!  Fucking Spinal Tap and 
Man O' War and pansies when compared to the moves Deaner pulled that night.  I 
can't remember if they played "Sketches of Winkle" but it's there in my mind, 
Deaner with his flickering tongue and the corners of his mouth jerked beneath 
the bottom of his jaw, every time I hear that song.

        I was blown away by how much they put into it, it was such a stark contrast 
with (much of) the Fauves, who seemed greedy and ate up the crowd's energy, 
instead of spewing it back over the hungry hoards in generous waves.  I had 
never seen a band who had such awesome albums but smashed them in comparison 
with the live shit.

        After the finale of "Buenos Tardes, Amigos", they bailed after killing a 
bottle of Black Jack between them.  It must have been the suit, cause I 
slickly scammed past the bouncers to get into the twisted labyrinth of 
backstage.  Finally walked in to the room which housed two couches, buckets of 
melted ice and beer, and Gener and Deaner.  Of course, instead of eloquence 
and conversation, I just gushed with the kind of scary wide eyed obsessive fan 
shit that only our rare breed can pull.  All they could say was "That's 
great," to anything I said.  The only other thing I said was I was gonna send 
them my film of this year and to that they said "We'd love to see your film,"  
As other obsessives arrived, I pulled Deaner aside and told him my grand plan. 
 I said to Deaner [Manuscript mangled at this point]

        I left before I really fucked up and got a cab home.  I fell over and threw 
up on the pavement outside home and ran up the 99 steps to tell whoever was 
awake what had happened.  And that was how I spent my summer vacation.

        Despite no tickets left, broke into the Thursday performance with Gusto, but 
it wasn't as good.