the wrens - Keeping folks waiting...since 1989

Now you can tour like a middle-aged part-time band because...

Admin — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 13:51:02 +0000

..the Wrens' van for sale

with a new LOWERED PRICE! That's right, we eliminate the middle guy and pass the savings on to you

EDIT: This is a reposting of all the van-for-sale stuff below, a bit edited to cover everything and now with a lowered price of $5200 (down from an optimistic market high of $7000).

As the touring cycle for the Meadowlands winds down (kidding, it’s Aug. 2011 and that ended like over 18 hours ago. Don’t be ridiculous).

Anyway, we are selling our tour-modile. It’s in vey good condition (trying to be used-car accurate here) and we’re really only selling because even as touring picks back up again w/ a next record, we’ll still probably be mostly weekends, flying to some of those etc. And to keep it insured – at either preposterous New Jersey or Brooklyn rates – and moving it from one side of the street to the other per the game of alt. side parking, is something of a drain right now.

Here's a stock photo of the type of van (not the actual van) in case you aren't familiar with the model. We can send or post real pictures after Wednesday, Aug. 10th:

And here are the details off the top of my head:

• It’s a White, 2002 Ford Econoline E-350, 15-passenger van. It’s that kind you see every third vehicle on the drive into town for South By Southwest.

• We’re asking [EDIT:} $5,200 to which is [LESS THAN] bluebook value and a little extra to offset the new windshield, tie rods, inspection etc.

• It has about 124,000 miles on it but in fairness, those were almost all pretty easy highway miles (a show in Atlanta, a show in Chicago, that sort of thing).

• It just passed inspection with flying colors 

• It has a brand-new windshield

• Brand new front tie rods

• Pretty sure I have copies of all service records (mostly tune-ups)

• The CD player doesn't work and the radio has only two working preset buttons per ‘band’ (so FM1 has two, FM2 has two more, AM has two) 

• Living in Brooklyn, someone had stolen the bumper. Weird, I know. The replacement bumper is now bent from someone parking into it and a bit rusty but otherwise fine 

• It's in good shape and the body is in good shape, a trusty vehicle all-around   

• Comes w/ all seats installed so can be configured anywhere between a 14-passenger van and a straight-up band/equipment van.

It's currently in Clinton Hill / Bed-Stuy Brooklyn (a couple blocks from the G train; 10 minute walk from C or J/M/Z). And if you have any interest, further questions or wanna come kick the tires, feel free to drop us a line via the contact page, here.

And as always, thanks for your time and we hope everything's going great,

the wrens

Charles u-streaming live duo show with jazz guitarist Chris Crocco

Admin — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 18:13:54 +0000

Feeling the CMJ burn yet?

Feeling the CMJ burn yet? Tired of indie rock pushing you around? I actually am and I haven’t left the house in years.

Well, if you’ve ever seen us (wrens) play and thought, “wow, I wish the one on the right would just put aside those cloying songs of heartbreak and loss so that I could really take in the guitar work” – ok, the odds you’ve said that without actually being me, are probably slim - then friend, I’ve got a show for you.

Anyway, I (charles, the one on the right) am playing a duo with the amazing jazz guitarist Christopher Crocco and it won’t be standard wrens or solo or even indie rock fare. More somewhere between the 'out' end of straight-ahead jazz and the outright free variety, courtesy Chris, and from me, an attempt to hide behind as big a veil of pedalboard trickery as I can manage, with the occasional swung note.

Basically I’m just gonna try not to embarrass myself.

Put another way and with an eye toward Halloween, I’m dressing up as a jazz musician; Chris will be donning the super-convincing costume of Regret.

The Particulars…

The show itself is this Friday at 9:30pm in Chris’ midtown C2 studio where besides teaching hopefuls like me, he’s been hosting an ongoing series of loft shows this past year with really amazing musicians like Francisco Mela, George Garzone, Peter Slavov, etc. that harken back to Sam Rivers' Bond Street loft space performances of the ‘70s or even W. Eugene Smith’s loft recordings before that, now documented in the Jazz Loft Project.

C2 Studios
257 West 39th St., 10th floor
Friday, Oct. 21st
Two sets: 9:30 & 11:00

Seating is sort of limited to about 35 or so, so if you’re interested in hitting up the loft in-person maybe also hit up the Facebook event and leave a reply.

More conveniently, if you can’t attend in-person, you can watch via the comfort of your divan and the miracle of a still-neutral net. The show will stream live here on C2 Studios’ U-Stream page.

About his Eminence and me

Chris Crocco has been the long-running guitarist with – and former student / protégé of – Boston/NY sax legend, George Garzone, as well as leading his own groups. This makes him the leading exponent – certainly on guitar anyway – of Garzone’s famous-among-jazz-geeks Triadic Chromatic Approach. For me, it’s pretty cool, weirdly comforting even, to be fitting in some tiny way into a musical ‘school’ of some kind, or even just a teaching history a la classical music’s “so-and-so studied with ___, who was a pupil of ___, who studied with Czerny”. (it’s always Czerny).

I’ve been studying with Chris off and on for the last couple of years which has fundamentally changed my guitar playing and even my approach to music. It’s also helped with focal dystonia - a whole ‘nother story but just watch my 3rd & 4th fingers fight it out some time. It’s a hoot.

And really, me playing jazz isn’t quite as out-of-nowhere as I make it out to be. Shocking as it may seem, especially if you’ve seen me play the guitar, I was actually a jazz major in school back when young Wyntons toured the Earth (remind me to tell you some sad-larious ‘worst player in the best school’ stories next time we share a beer).
More on that when I update the band bio (incl. Kevin’s own secret musical edu-tainment pedigree)…right after we redesign the website…right after we finish the new album…right after four horsemen or so ride roughshod over a burning Creation….

But I am humbly honored he asked me to play – truly. I’m also nervous as hell, fairly unprepared and pretty much in over my head. If I could figure a way to count this as my senior recital, 25 years late, at least I might actually finish my degree out of it.

Thanks as always and hope to see you there or waving from your computer.

Pitchfork's 15 writers / 15 songs

Admin — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 12:45:28 +0000

fashionably late to our own unfashionable…

…party, here’s a link for one of the list pieces that Pitchfork ran a week or so back celebrating their 15-year anniversary.

In this one, 15 different writers pick & write a bit about one song from each of the past 15 years. And super flatteringly, for 2003, Ian Cohen picked a chestnut from a demure, coquettish little band of fat balding New Jerseyans to write about. No, it was one of ours.

Again, just one of those weirdly and disproportionately cool things that sometimes happen being in music that make the spotty pay seem manageable. Always have been of a split mind about trumpeting this sorta stuff (notice we don’t have a Press page on our website) but we are irregular band geeks with families and jobs and this made our day. And we figure if you’re here reading this, you’re along on a similar ride so here’s our news of the day.

Thanks as always,

the wrens

Now you can tour like a middle-aged part-time band because...

Admin — Sun, 07 Aug 2011 16:55:01 +0000

..the Wrens' van for sale.

As the touring cycle for the Meadowlands winds down (kidding, it’s Aug. 2011 and that ended like over 18 hours ago. Don’t be ridiculous).

Here's a stock photo of the type of van (not the actual van) in case you aren't familiar with the model. We can send or post real pictures after Wednesday, Aug. 10th:

And here are the details off the top of my head:

• It’s a White, 2002 Ford Econoline E-350, 15-passenger van. It’s that kind you see every third vehicle on the drive into town for South By Southwest.

• We’re asking $7,000 to which is bluebook value and a little extra to offset the new windshield, tie rods, inspection etc.

• It has about 124,000 miles on it 

• It just passed inspection with flying colors 

• It has a brand-new windshield

• Brand new front tie rods

• Pretty sure I have copies of all service records (mostly tune-ups)

• The CD player doesn't work and the radio has only two working preset buttons per ‘band’ (so FM1 has two, FM2 has two more, AM has two) 

• The bumper is a bit bent and rusty but otherwise fine 

• It's in good shape and the body is in good shape, a trusty vehicle all-around   

• The rear-most bench seat is out rght now and is in Kev’s garage in NJ. But we we can get that if you want it  

And as always, thanks for your time and we hope everything's going great,

the wrens

I remember it like it was 20 years ago

Admin — Fri, 22 Jul 2011 22:05:54 +0000

Here we are now, Entertain us

Really nothing pressing here, just pointing, mockingly, to Kev & Charles in Spin, sharing their brief old-man reminiscences of the first time they heard Nirvana's Nevermind, which came out 20 years ago now. Which is pretty bonkers. Almost as bonkers as us in Spin.

Picture two old Muppets in the balcony grousing about "how it used to be", that sort of thing. They’re in pretty diverse & cool & frankly, un-wren-like company in the article (Ray Davies, John Waters, Flaming Lips, Deer Tick, some Sub Pop & Nirvana folks etc.) and some of what they share is even true. You can read it, here courtesy the nice folk at Spin…

Fassssscinating.

Bloom, Koester, and the Magnets in MAGNET

Admin — Sun, 03 Jul 2011 21:46:24 +0000

Hi, Steve...

Directly from our Betterlatethannever Dept., which is to say, directly from our Everythingwedo Dept., here’s a link to a piece we wrote that recently ran in MAGNET extolling the virtues of a song by Steve Koester (now Two Dark Birds) and a band you never heard of unless you grew up in the same 1980s south Jersey we did, the Magnets.

Advisory notice: with our recording in a slow-motion death-throes finish that makes Rasputin look like a pushover, and with our now-standard real-life & family shenanigans, there wasn’t a whole lot of time put into this. That would normally mean brevity. In our case it means unedited excess (sort of like the state of the current album).

So wrote one article – the Koester one – got bogged down and so whipped out another one, the Magnets one. Lost our way in the woods on that too. So gave up & handed both in and MAGNET was kind enough to mush them together into one Ramblin’ Man of an article, complete with Dickey Betts solo. So that’s a long way of saying it's a tad on the long side.

Get comfy and read on, here.

thanks as always for hanging around,
the wrens

Charles solo at Jennifer O'Connor's "Tower of Song" series

Admin — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 13:30:12 +0000

Charles will be playing a little differently solo (than the usual loop-happy set, hidden behind a veil of electronics and studio trickery), as part of the wonderful Jennifer O’Connor’s new monthly “Tower of Song” series at the Rock Shop in Brooklyn on Tues. Feb. 8th. Also on this one are the equally estimable Richard Baluyut (of Versus) and Kendall Meade (of Mascott).

It’s sort of a round-robin affair with all four onstage, each playing their songs in a row, maybe talking a bit about them etc…

Then there’s a homework assignment for each performer to write a new song based on a theme (this Tower of Song’s theme is an anti-Valentine’s Day or anti-love song, mostly due the early Feb. show date).

Additionally, each will be covering one of the other’s songs.

Yikes, Charles will probably be closer to a Tower of Unpreparedness and copying of the paper of the singer next to him.

the New Year has us all a-Twitter

Admin — Wed, 26 Jan 2011 13:59:33 +0000

which is to say that if you like wrens news peppered with old-man humor and 140 characters or less, we've got a new slightly streamlined Twitter page.

@thewrens

You can find us here, @thewrens.

If you're into that sort of thing.

More substantial 2010 wrap-up, where's the new album sort of stuff in the next few days...

MEADOWLANDS VINYL BACK IN STOCK!

Admin — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 15:50:39 +0000

With this, the coldest day in August that I can remember, another sign of the End of Days is made manifest in our webby store – Meadowlands, in vinyl, the record, the actual album…is back in stock!

Yep, the full double album complete with bonus songs. You can finger the goods here in our store.

Relatedly, Four Horsemen seen approaching the city, leading an army of souls.

Maxwell's

Admin — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 13:49:37 +0000

Charles solo show benefiting the Project Matters (w/ Cymbals Eat Guitars etc.)

Charles (with a probable Greg, and a possible Kevin) will be playing a solo show on Sunday, January 23rd (w/ old pals Cymbals Eat Guitars and Escape Directors, Carah Faye Charnow) to benefit The Project Matters.

Here’s the official Project Matters mission statement/general description, from their site:

******The Project Matters ( “TPM” ) has been established in the memory and honor of Benjamin High a young musician from Freehold, New Jersey and the founder of his band Green Arrows.

The Project Matters believes in the importance of music, music education and how the musical arts benefit all of society. The primary focus of TPM is to discover aspiring musicians 21 years of age and younger and provide them with, among other things: funding, business, legal, emotional support and educational opportunities. Currently, TPM is building a network of experienced musicians who can offer advice with touring, performance, production, post production and related subjects as the careers of our young musicians unfold.******

Why we’re playing…

The more personal backstory goes something like this, at least as well as I can remember it…a few years back, Oct. of ’06 to be exact, we got a super nice email from someone named Ben who wrote because his band, Green Arrows, and a friend’s band, Joseph Ferocious, had combined to cover our song Happy at a co-headlining show at the Stone Pony and he wanted to share along a link for us to - you can see it here:

…which of course, is really flattering, even putting aside that they played the song better than we did. Around the same time, his friend, Joseph began taking lessons from me – ostensibly guitar stuff, songwriting, recording etc. although when you see where this is going, you’d be right in thinking there wasn’t much I’d be teaching him.

By the next summer, Joe had started recording at our studio what eventually became his first album, also eventually settling on a band name of Cymbals Eat Guitars and Ben was onboard playing bass, while still working on his own Green Arrows music.

We were only just a few day into recording when – and I’ve written this a dozen times now and can’t seem to find the right way to say it – Ben died.

Besides the tragedy of someone passing so young, Ben was just one of the sweetest, most sincere, and wise-beyond-his-years folks I’d ever met. And talented. This show is also serving as the official release party of the posthumous debut for Green Arrows and the record, which I’ve now listened to in its entirety a dozen times, is heart-breakingly wonderful.
If there’s any fairness in the indie world, you’ll be reading about it on a few best-of-year lists next December.

Each band/performer, myself included, will be covering one of Ben’s Green Arrows songs from the album. I'll also be playing another new song with Joseph from Cymbals Eat Guitars.

So with apologies to Ben’s mom and brother, who started the Project Matters and are organizing the benefit/release show, for the very late announcement on all this, we hope to see you there…

the wrens