International You Day

One of my favorite punk bands growing up was No Use For a Name. They were a part of the Fat Wreck Chords music label, which is a pretty close knit community. The front man, Tony Sly, was known within their circles as being one of the better songwriters and just about everyone's favorite song is International You Day, a song that he wrote for his wife.

Last July Tony died in his sleep, next to his wife. He also has two daughters. The outpouring of grief was touching and recently the Fat Wreck Chords community assembled to put together a tribute album of his band's songs. I bought it and I kind of love it.

I mean, I still prefer most of the originals, but it's cool to hear your favorite band cover a song from another band you love, or to hear what Bad Religion does with one of their songs. It's all pretty neat.

What really touched me, and very unexpectedly so, was that they included a version that Tony had done of International You Day. It's toned down from the original and very sentimental. But what really got me was the last few lines of the song. Following are the lyrics of the last verse:

I'm coming home today
to wipe the tears right from your eyes
I'm totally enamored by your life
nothing that I've done
has ever been for one

But without you
my life is incomplete
my days are absolutely gray
and so I'll try
let your heart know for sure
that I have so much more to tell you
every single day

My life is incomplete
my rights are absolutely gone
so wake me up
before you leave today
something I need to say
cause they'll be nothing when you're gone.


Take a listen for yourself. I'm pretty sure that the cheering at the end is dubbed in, but it's just how I'd expected a bunch of hardened 40 year old punk rockers to pay tribute to their lost friend. It really kind of got to me this morning. I just loved it.