cause every win on this record's hard won

i was thinking about how much i love the wrens today, and i remembered there's a pre-album version of "this boy is exhausted" -- so, it's history lesson time. take a seat.

pre-album version came out on a drive-thru records comp in 1999. this was a mere 2-3 years after they'd been screwed over, but a stunningly short 3 years from when silver came out (when they used to put records out, you know, pretty frequently). so it's kind of punk rock sounding and wonderful, and some of the lyrics were different, but the main difference between this and what ended up on the meadowlands in 2003 was the chorus: the 1999 version features charles singing "i will never give up / this boy is exhausted," whereas the meadowlands version just has a guitar playing the melody followed by them singing "this boy is exhausted." that and there are a few painful new lines: "a VP's faith is one single long;" "the woven strap wins the galloway girls;" "every win on this record's hard won." yeah, this is a pretty autobiographical song.

check out the difference (ignore the shitty usermade video). 1999:



and 2003:

and, if you dare, remember that THIS BAND HAS BEEN AROUND FOR 20 YEARS. let me repost a great picture of them from 1991 plus the band commentary, from their website:

"Now, we don’t usually condone the zestier language here, but just look at this fucking mess. There are airline disasters less grisly.

Charles has given new meaning to the old sexist phrase ‘nice knobs’. It now means ‘knees’. He’s also going a little heavy on the “She Blinded Me with Rest-stop Sunglasses and Short-Pants” and looks, not so much further back in the photo, as he does much, much smaller than everyone else.
As if Kevin’s imagining him.

Kev has shed the top half of his exoskeleton to reveal the world’s tightest wristwatch and a surprising commitment to ‘Lite’ beer. But that’s all to distract us from a more sinister truth – Kevin Whelan…is a Centaur and the folded jumpsuit hides his bottom horsey half.

Jerry is mulling over an especially tough call on the last corner kick while moonlighting as the most intensely motivated salesperson at Foot Locker.

He in turn, is wearing the Pope Gregory hat – a stunning 28” likeness of Greg rendered in felt and beaver fur.
Water-repellent. Reversible. Sleeveless.
Beautiful.

Good thing there was a camera there at the exact moment the four of us beamed in to lay claim to Least Cool Band in the Universe."

yes. so wonderful. i am going to move to new york so i can take guitar/recording/awesomeness lessons from them.

three people who are way more awesome than we have any right to expect them to be

first: shaq's twitter. seriously it is genius. scroll down to the ones he did before christmas about portland, and just enjoy his overall mastery of misspelled hilarity.




second: tom ricks' blog on ForeignPolicy.com. tom ricks was the military affairs correspondent for the Washington Post for eight years, wrote Fiasco (which you should read), took a buyout last year, and now has this blog. dry, right? nope! check out a few selected moments of greatness: tom ricks pissing on harold pinter's grave; calling out blog censorship, linking to a hilarious rebuttal, and daring nyt publisher pinch sulzberger (not his editor, i was wrong) to try it on him; not trusting monkeys. in between these gems are also serious, insightful gems about foreign policy like this one, about how the panda-basher's tendency to get the vapours every time china talks about getting an aircraft carrier is sort of irrelevant. maginot line, zing!!


third: teri garr. best known for work in tootsie and as inga in Young Frankenstein ("What knockers! -- "Vy zank you, Doctor!"). her interview is THE BEST. she is THE BEST. she would probably ask why she's third on this list and call me sexist and then go "oh i'm so bad!" but you're SO GOOD, TERI GARR.