The advice Dean Ween gives to new guitarists
If you want to learn how to play the guitar, there are a million different avenues to start at. You could take lessons, learn from online tutorials, or try your hand at teaching yourself. No matter what approach you choose to take on, you’ll probably want to learn the tricks that your favourite musicians do. When it comes to eclectic approaches to the electric guitar, few modern guitar players can match the wide scope of Mickey Melchiondo, better known by his Ween stage name Dean Ween.
Deaner has played just about every genre of music with Ween. There are his Prince-infused funk freakouts, his signature “brown sound” from albums like The Pod, and even a traditional old-school country approach on 12 Golden Country Greats. There’s never been a style that Melchiondo couldn’t play, which makes it all the more remarkable that Deaner was mostly self-taught.
While sitting down with fellow guitarist Matt Sweeney for the Noisey YouTube series ‘Guitar Moves’, Deaner shared some of the tips that he learned when he first started on the guitar. Melchiondo acknowledged that he himself tried to give lessons while recording the classic Ween album Chocolate and Cheese, but he was ill-equipped to handle a full tutoring session.
“I actually tried to give guitar lessons in 1995,” Ween explained. “There was a local music store that just opened up in New Hope [Pennsylvania], Ween was already happening, and I didn’t know if I could do it, so it was about the challenge of seeing just because you can play a little bit doesn’t mean you can teach necessarily”.
“The most valuable lesson that I learned, the guy who taught me was a friend of mine. He wasn’t really a teacher,” Ween added. “He taught me that the guitar, when you wear the guitar, it either goes below your dick or over your dick, like George Harrison, but never on your dick. But that only takes like ten seconds to teach, so I had to fill the other hour with information.”
Melchiondo revealed that former Ministry guitarist Billy Tucker was the one who taught him that particular lesson. Tucker also gave Ween one more important piece of advice. “The other thing that he taught me was to miss big, which I’ve never forgotten,” Ween chuckles. “It’s like if you’re going to go for something, and you’re gonna blow it, there’s at least a 50 per cent chance, miss big. It’s like golf: if you’re going to swing and you suck, swing as hard as you possibly can so if on the off chance you get lucky and it goes straight, you look much cooler.”
Check out some of Dean Ween’s invaluable advice down below.
