The Wrens

Feel like with Charles there is this weird mix of complacency ("it's ok to not be done yet, I still have ideas, people are used to the delay") and madness. I mean you could do this with any collection of songs you want. Work on them to perfection, drive them into the ground and burn out, then change the way you play them to whatever degree necessary until they sound fresh again, repeat.

it sounds like more pressure from the label & the rest of the band might have really helped rather than just leaving charles to his own devices to go mad over it

no shade but if charles did in fact take the position that he should be compensated for being the public face of the wrens, while simultaneously keeping them in release limbo, that's really hard to defend

yup

xps lolling at the idea of a smalltime label like Absolutely Kosher exerting "pressure."

they've been signed to sub pop since 2013! they announced they'd signed to a big indie then but it was never revealed who until now. someone from sub pop was even quoted in the article saying that maybe they should have put more pressure on them when charles backed out of releasing the album in 2013

from the article it sounded like he only wanted to renegotiate things after he was ready to release the album again in 2019, but those negotiations dragged out forever & delayed the album until kevin got sick of it & decided to put out his stuff on his own

haha serves me right for not even reading the article

That article is kind of sad, but really the Wrens have been a hobby band for ages. They all have big jobs and enough family stuff to deal with that the best possible outcome (besides one more album) was probably going to be some thoughtful indie documentary about middle aged family men making a final run at it.

well i personally could have gone for another tour because they were the real deal as a live band

Pretty ok…pretty ok: https://www.stereogum.com/2161316/aeon-station-queens/music/

but then greg plugs in

this is alright but the mix is pretty bad. feels like the pieces of a very good wrens song is there but it hasn't quite come together

Perhaps if someone could just tinker with it a few more years maybe

bissell twitter thred

Believe it or not, I only just finally read the NYT piece yesterday, ditto listened to Kevin's single (which admittedly, I have heard 100's of times, & worked on, over the last 10 years), annnnnd...I guess there is a lot to say. Or not.

— the wrens (@thewrens) October 6, 2021

https://soundcloud.com/thewrens/and-its-all-guns-arrows-v10-excerpt-only-as-of-101321

new song snippet from charles

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRrf8lL5f88

here's the studio "leaves" from kevin, it's good!

…but for the little it’s worth here too, Sub Pop never got an album handed in, not two years ago when it was done, let alone in 2013 or something (magically, before we’d even signed with them somehow - ha). But thanks, bmb!)

— the wrens (@thewrens) October 19, 2021

charles also claims there was never an album submitted to sub pop back in 2013

I’ve already been planning that when I announce my own, I’ll also put up the track listing for the now-deep-sixed wrens record and people could paste their own together.

— the wrens (@thewrens) October 19, 2021

& this will be nice to have

tbh the version of the meadowlands i listen to is pasted together too -- there was an initial mp3 version with a different tracklisting and different versions/titles for like half the songs iirc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6CXJV4LQG3s

that would be this, iirc it was an early unmastered version they'd sent out to critics & friends before tweaking it a little more for the actual release. the final tracklist is much better imo & the differences in mixes aren't enough for me to really care either way

like i might take the less blown-out early mixes of "per second second" and "everyone chooses sides" over the final versions but it's not a huge difference. iirc the only other difference is some minor things in "ex-girl collection"

i don't miss either of the cut tracks

ah, ty

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0DKl7aAKis8

decent

I really like this one, and it reminds me in a weird way of Clint Conley's non-Mission of Burma band Consonant.

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2021/nov/24/its-repulsive-to-me-the-bitter-feud-of-indie-rockers-the-wrens

Whelan showing some patient company exec vibes on something that I imagine would be driving him nuts were that band stuff taking place in his actual day job.

oof.

this doesn't really explain the conflict any further, the previous piece said the big issue was the album had been pretty much done since 2019 but charles wanted to renegotiate contracts or something which dragged everything out and caused conflicts and was the last straw etc.

while this one just makes it seem like kevin was frustrated with charles for taking too long without getting into whatever the contracts dispute was actually about

https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/music/features/aeon-station-interview-kevin-whelan-b1959977.html

a bit more insightful

kevin gave charles an ultimatum (that he'd quit, but no mention of a solo album, piecing their stories together?) if the album wasn't ready for release by march & then followed through

charles says it was pretty much done by 2019 but then in preparing for release the band fell apart (due to his attempts to renegotiate contracts as mentioned elsewhere) & thus the album was still not ready to be released & now feels very betrayed that kevin recorded a solo album without telling him after quitting

but without the details of what the actual contractual shit that they fell out over it's hard to have much idea of who's in the right or anything

just a very depressing end, hope charles gets his act together & his album is out before long too (lol)

Charles seems quite clearly to be the problem, from the available info.

idk it's hard for me to take the side of a big pharma exec, a career of evil

Ⓓⓡ. (Johnny Fever) at 10:28 16 Nov 21

I really like this one, and it reminds me in a weird way of Clint Conley's non-Mission of Burma band Consonant.

I love that band!

i'm just so fucking bummed about about this. the long Independent piece says the best Bissell tracks are "astounding" and it just sucks that it all came to this. the most fucking wrens ass shit.

kevin's album is out tomorrow and the latest track from it is excellent

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uaGZMXKWwP8

charles better come through with his own album before too long lol.

I feel like in many years we’ll someday somehow get the “lost album” as it should have been.

probably in like, two decades given the time scales they operate on

charles has promised to release the intended tracklist too so people can frankenstein it out of his solo album & kevin's for the time being

I listened to some of The Meadowlands again - feels even more bittersweet than ever before. Not sure if this is good or bad, as bittersweetness is the essential character of the record. Probably a good thing to not get too nostalgic about anything.

Everyone Choose Sides still slams extremely hard.

aeon station album is really good but you can very much tell it was recorded in two parts 7 years apart lol

I enjoy it very much!

this was posted https://www.stereogum.com/2171393/the-wrens-next-album-wont-actually-be-released-as-a-wrens-album/news/ but also charles is in the comments

still haven't been able to bring myself to listen to the aeon station as yet

^^ the wrens performance mentioned in the comments of above article https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVhtnCNZgAk

I never really enjoyed this band's music until earlier this year when I listened on headphones

The hard-panned dual guitar thing is really awesome

No big official announcey thing until Oct. buuuut…did return from a wonderful family vacation to find test pressings, my first in 40+ years of bands&music, in the mailbox… pic.twitter.com/CBa3jxvSX0

— the wrens (@thewrens) August 31, 2023

the charles solo album is finally complete after all this time

It's been a crazy day, so no Meadowlands-20th-Anniversary-Stuff-You-Prob.-Didn't-Know post until tomorrow, but 'good' crazy - even though album/label/new project is nearing announcement (oct. 6th), even though vinyl is at a pressing plant, etc...

— the wrens (@thewrens) September 15, 2023

proper announcement coming october 6...

he's also posting some interesting trivia about the making of the meadowlands to celebrate its 20th anniversary

meadowlands 20th-anniversary crap you didn't know #3: the twelfth-and-a-half song. Coming out of 13 Months In 6 Minutes, there's this other song that briefly pops up, settles in & immediately begins fading out. It doesn't have a name and there's obv. no start ID/track number.

— the wrens (@thewrens) September 12, 2023

meadowlands 20th-anniversary behind-the-scenes trivia story #2: The preacher dialogue that comes in at the very end of Ex-Girl Collection, is actually not a sample dropped in there as you might assume (super common in say,the '90s, less so by the time this record was finished).

— the wrens (@thewrens) September 11, 2023

additionally, an in-progress version of the unreleased 4th album from 2014 recently leaked, or something like that anyway, idk exactly what the context of it is. the files i have are labelled 'album 4.5 demo'.

lol holy shit these versions are rough sure but it is basically the album

ok sub pop/the rest of the band really should have just insisted on bringing in a producer to sift through all of this and give charles some perspective because this is brilliant even if the mixes are really rough

should have just insisted on bringing in a producer

maybe kevin shields?

i'm pretty sure bissell has already spent more time going mad over these songs than shields did with m b v

certainly looking forward to his solo album for the finished versions of most of these tracks & more but it's absolutely tragic it's never coming out in this form. the the versions of some of kevin's songs here are better than the versions on the aeon station album

but still holy shit!!! the 4th wrens album, which i thought we'd never hear, is fantastic and totally lives up to expectations even in this slightly rough form.