Post? Boast! Pt. 3
Throwing a Wrench into the works.
First, an apology. This Post? Boast! series was supposed to be in three consecutive parts but last week I took a detour to report on my Vintage Garage Sale.
Now it’s time to give the late, lamented band Wrench its due.
Wrench came between my stints in Missing Foundation and Jungle Creeps. Featuring former Missing Foundation bandmate Vincent Prapeulonis on bass and Jim Moffit (RIP) on drums, our songs were very rhythmical, built around drum patterns, riffs, hooks and improvisation, and emerging only after many run-throughs. Like the Nihilistics, we were in perpetual search of a singer who could pull it all together. Nihilistics eventually found Ron… but for Wrench there was a revolving cast on the microphone, all whose names are lost to time (the dude in the picture above was third or fourth in a series but the only one who’d perform with his back to the audience, either from stage fright or as some Stu Sutcliffe tribute). At the end we were reduced to having me “vocalize.” You do not want that.
We played out fairly often, including at Sideshows By The Seashore in Coney Island, where we opened for Wonderama, Velvet Monkeys and Galaxie 500:
Here’s audio from a pre-Aerial View WFMU show where I tell the story of another opening slot, for Missing Foundation in Philadelphia, and the disaster that ensued on the way there:
Our most prominent gig was at the Bennington College Sunfest (Jim was from Vermont and had some connection to the school) in May, 1990, where we shared the bill with a pre-fame Goo Goo Dolls. I’ll never forget when their manager came and cajoled us into switching spots on the bill so his band could go on as the sun went down. We didn’t care. It’d been a long, lousy day and we all just wanted to head home, away from all the privileged hippies.
Wrench managed to record a bunch of songs (three are below) with Jim Waters (who also produced Missing Foundation) at his Water Music studio in the Meatpacking District. For one number we decided we needed it to sound like the singer was on the phone. Nowadays, you’d use an effect but back then we sent the singer (Jim? Tom? Ralph? Bill?) out to a payphone and had him call the studio (you can hear Jim Moffit harassing the guy as he starts the call).
Another Wrench song made it on to the 1991 WFMU Thomas Edison tribute album Edisongs, though it had nothing to do with the famous inventor (the lyrics were vague, something about a “man on fire,” and we renamed the song to “Dirt Nap Thomas” to shoehorn it in). We never put out a record of our own because singers would quit as soon as we built up any momentum.
Wrench kept at it a few years but the wheels finally fell off. It’s too bad: we were definitely on to something and with the right person out front on mic we could’ve been a contender, instead of getting that one-way ticket to Palookaville.
After Wrench went defunct, Jim ended up in Missing Foundation. His son Damien Moffitt is a drummer in the band Trip Villain. Vince, whose birthday is today (Happy Birthday, Vince!) put down his bass as far as I know. I gave the band thing one more try with Jungle Creeps and haven’t been in a band since.
Collaboration, especially musically, is hard. Judge for yourself. Here’s Wrench: