Happy Birthday Gene Ween: Ween Covers ‘Purple Rain’ In San Francisco

On this date in 1970 guitarist/vocalist Aaron Freeman was born. Freeman is best known for his Gene Ween persona as a founding member of seminal rock band Ween. Gener, Mickey “Dean Ween” Melchiondo, Dave Dreiwitz, Glenn McClelland and Claude Coleman, Jr. recently reunited the band for a series of 2016 shows after Gener broke up Ween in 2012. Freeman has been in fine form over the course of Ween’s first four performances which featured three nights in Colorado and an appearance at the inaugural Okeechobee Festival.

Gener and Deaner formed Ween in their hometown of New Hope, Pennsylvania back in 1984. Ween has released nine official studio albums with the most recent, La Cucaracha, issued in 2007. The band played hundreds of concerts across the world between their formation and New Year’s Eve 2011-2012, which was their last performance ahead of the breakup. Aaron followed the 2012 breakup with a pair of solo albums, 2012’s Marvelous Clouds and 2014’s Freeman. In honor of Gener’s birthday, watch his emotional vocal delivery on Ween’s cover of “Purple Rain” from a 1994 show in San Francisco: