I first heard The Wrens back in the fall of 2003, when a friend turned me on to The Meadowlands, which apparently took the band 4 or 5 years to record and release. (I, and everyone else who follows the band, is still waiting for the follow-up.) The record was, and still is, kind of amazing. It feels homemade, both over- and under-produced at the same time. The songs themselves are about failure, resignation, and a life you could've had, but, because of the choices you've made, don't. You have to admire these guys. They still have day jobs. They're 10 years older than most everyone else playing in the scene or even listening to their music. And supposedly, they're writing another record. I hope to god they finish.
Anyway, I went out to the Bell House with some friends on Friday night, mostly to drink, since I didn't get tickets to see the show. About 5 songs from the end, the bouncers started letting folks from the bar in to the main room, which was a really lucky coincidence, so I got to catch the end of the set. "Happy," "Faster Gun," "This is Not What You Had Planned," and of course, "She Sends Kisses." Reminded me of that first show I saw at T. T. The Bears in Cambridge back in the spring of 2004. It was a nice bookend, in a way. Five years ago I was about to graduate from college and move to New York to be in a rock band. So much has changed, but seeing these Wrens play with the same who-knows-where-they-get-it intensity that they did back then reminds me that not everything has changed. And I guess that's not all bad.
www.wrens.com
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