Stereogum has a great feature today on The Wrens' 2003 album, The Meadowlands, which turns 10 years old today. I'm not going to improve on that piece, but I did want to acknowledge what has probably been one of the most meaningful records to me over that time.
I was in my 30's in 2003, and we'd recently had CoolDaughter #1. As I commuted to Manhattan by train each morning, The Meadowlands was one of the albums I had in heavy rotation on my iPod (Or it may have been some other long since extinct brand of MP3 player. I can't really recall.). Something about the story of the band and the record appealed to me on a personal level: A bunch of Jersey guys, nearing middle age, seven years removed from their last record, for whom things hadn't necessarily turned out exactly as planned.
And it's not that I wasn't happy with where I was in life at that time. My wife and daughters are unequivocally the greatest things that have ever happened to me. But, sometimes, at 6 AM, when you're on your almost 2-hour trip to a job from which you won't be returning for over 12 hours and that -- let's face it -- is probably the farthest thing from exciting one could possibly imagine, lyrics like "And I'm nowhere near where I dreamed I'd be / I can't believe what life's done to me" from album opener "The House That Guilt Built" can hold some resonance.
On "Everyone Chooses Sides," we get the line "I'm the best 17 year old ever." I like to think that I've matured a bit since I was 17, but I've spent a good part of the last 10 years, bitching, moaning, and railing against authority like a teenager. Ask CoolMom.
Also on that song: "I've walked away from more than you imagine, and I sleep just fine." It's an allusion to the band's flirtation with a major label and their ultimate decision to stay independent and not compromise their sound. It was the type of decision that comes with significant costs; but it's reassuring to know that -- after deciding to turn down the money and make the music they wanted -- The Wrens' world didn't end.
Also reassuring was that, at a point in life when choices have narrowed, there are still moments -- like whenever The Wrens take the stage on "This Boy Is Exhausted" -- that give everything meaning.
The band's fidelity to lo-fidelity, home recording gives The Meadowlands a unique patina. Songs like "Happy," "Hopeless," "Boys, You Won't" or "Per Second Second" would have been very different animals, I think, with some major studio polish. Without the fuzz or the sometimes muted vocals, things would have felt less personal and, probably, not spoken to me on the same level.
And the record holds up. It doesn't sound as much like a product of its time as, say, Interpol's Turn on the Bright Lights. It's an album that I've come back to over the last 10 years again, again, and again; and it's lost nothing for me. It says something, I think, that The Meadowlands speaks to me in much the same way as it did 10 years ago.
We're all still waiting for the next big move from The Wrens. I'll cut them some slack, though. I understand that, at a certain point in life, big moves don't happen overnight.
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