by Mark All
“Huh?”
“I’ll fucking do it, okay? God help me, but I’ll work with you on this goddamn album.”
“Real-ly.”
“Yes, really.” Mike paused. “I’ll add my parts, help you record and master. I’m worried about you. Maybe doing this album will jumpstart your creative engine.”
A wave of relief washed over David. He relaxed, feeling as if his nerves had been tied in a Gordian knot and Mike had cut it. His energy level surged again at the thought of having a partner in making the album.
“Mike?”
“Yeah?”
“So, how’s the kid?”
Mike laughed. “He’s pissed he can’t drive, what do you think? I have his car parked out in front of the store. It’s an eyesore, but that’s a small price to pay to keep the little bastard on the right track. At least I can keep an eye on that junk heap. It’s going no place till I say it does.”
“From the looks of that car, it might not go anywhere anyway. Especially after it sits for a few weeks.”
“I told him I’d give him a job in the store to pay for its maintenance. Besides, he needs to come up with the insurance payment. If the piece of shit dies before he tries to start it again, that fits right into my plan.”
“To keep him on the right track.”
“Bet your ass.”
“Not to be confused with the track you followed.”
“Exactly. Like I’m going to keep you on the path of righteousness yourself.”
“Mike?”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks, man.”
The pause wasn’t long, and a heavy sigh on the drummer’s end filled it. “You bet, Bro.”
David hung up, dumped out his coffee, which had cooled, poured another round, and headed for the basement studio. He had his hand on the doorknob when the phone rang again.
“FUCK.”
Chapter Thirteen
Saturday morning
Jessica had awakened with an ice pick planted in her skull, or so it felt. Sunlight glared through the narrow space between the blinds and the window frame, stinging her eyes. She groaned, sat up, then her stomach turned at the sour smell of vomit from the bathroom. She hadn’t cleaned up very well in her drunken state, apparently.
The most disturbing leftover from the night before was the nagging thought that she’d forgotten something, like a nightmare people recalled when they woke in the night, didn't remember in the morning, yet left a frisson of dread in its wake. Well, of course she’d had nightmares, she hadn’t gotten that drunk in years. The music business’s years-long protracted death had seemed to hit her in a single day with the threat to her job, and she’d just needed to drink herself into oblivion.
That asshole and his band had contributed to the demise of her sobriety. Detuned, screaming, rampaging like a malfunctioning metronome set to light-speed, the band’s furious, pneumatic odd-meter riffs had battered her psyche. Thinking back now, they’d looked not so much drunk as soul-sick, resigned to fulfilling the tropes of their musical genre like paint-by-numbers artists, their originality crushed under the weight of societal expectations. Black Chasm: her last, best hope.
“Wow, depressed much?” she asked herself.
She threw the covers back and shambled at the best speed she could manage into the kitchen, where coffee and whole wheat toast semi-revived her. She was drumming her fingers on the jewel case of Penumbra’s debut CD when she remembered she’d left it at work. It must have fallen into her bag—but how had it gotten to the breakfast table? How drunk had she been?
She popped it open and looked at the band photo on the little booklet wedged under the plastic tabs on the lid. The guitar player was definitely smokin’, and not just on his instrument. David Fairburn. Jessica kind of missed a man’s touch. She didn’t like to admit that her career was not enough, but the less fulfilling it became, the lonelier she got. She only seemed to meet jerks, users, and losers in the music business.
When she flipped the case shut one-handed, Penumbra’s business card slipped out to land in front of her. It listed David Fairburn’s number and email for the contact info.
Jessica picked the card up, her hand trembling slightly. She wasn’t sure if the shakes were from the hangover, the chance of finding a potentially great band and saving her career, or just finding a cute guy’s phone number.
If the number was even still good. Might have been a business line or cell he’d disconnected months ago. There was only one way to find out. She drained her coffee, got her phone, and returned to the kitchen table, grabbing a pad and pen from the counter. As she sat back down, she noticed what looked like a few crumbs of weed that had spilled out of the CD case. There were a few more inside. Must have fallen out with the card.
She didn’t smoke pot. Hadn’t for years. How had it gotten in the CD case? Surely the band hadn’t sent a little herbal gift with the CDs they shopped around to labels. She would’ve noticed it yesterday. She closed the case and turned it over in her hands, noticing now the scratches and smudges defacing it. The damn thing was beat up. On a hunch, she gave it a sniff. Stale beer.
This wasn’t her copy of the CD.
Had Bobby found a copy and given it to her, with the card in it so she could call? If so, she didn’t remember it. Maybe he’d slipped it into her bag during their conversation. She’d been shit-faced, so she supposed it was possible. Whatever. Here was the number, might as well use it. She thumbed in the digits and pressed the call button.
On the second ring, a gruff answered, “Now what?”
There was so much hostile energy in the voice that she jerked the phone away from her ear and made a face. Figuring after a second that he wasn’t going to yell at her, she put the phone to her face again. “Hi? Is this David Fairburn?”
There was a pause, as if the man were considering whether he wanted to be who she was looking for or not, then a cautious, “Yes?”
“This is Jessica Chandler, of Sage Records.”
“Hunh.”
Not the reception she’d hoped for. Musicians usually got kind of excited when a major record label called them.
“Bit of a misnomer these days, isn’t it?” David said. “‘Records’? You mostly make CDs. Maybe downloads if the light is belatedly dawning there at Sage ‘Records.’ Sage ‘Media’ might be more twenty-first century.”
She frowned, annoyed. “We do vinyl, too. Whatever. I’m an A&R rep. You sent us a CD a couple of years ago. Penumbra. Eponymous debut. That’s you, right?”
“You’re calling back now? Maybe you missed the news. About the wreck.”
Someone was touchy. She could only imagine how the death of a band member had devastated the band, and his life, but she got a strong feeling she’d interrupted him from something he’d rather be doing. Something more important than interest from a label?
She liked David Fairburn’s voice, though. It was masculine, sexy, and had a beautiful tone to it. She opened the jewel case and checked his picture again. He looked smart, thoughtful, almost gentle. She’d just caught him at a bad time. Maybe she was reopening a wound that hadn’t yet healed.
“No,” she said, “I know about that. I’m sorry for your loss. I was just wondering…if you’ve done anything since that first CD? Any new material in the pipeline.”
The silence that followed was so long she thought he’d gone off and left the phone. Finally, he said, “Funny you should ask. I’m…we’re working on a new album. Nothing’s ready yet though.”
Jessica felt a tingling in the soul of her being. She’d known it. This was the one. This band would be her salvation. “When?”
“Pardon?”
“When will you have something ready?”
Another long pause. “Most of the writing’s done, and some of the recording, but a lot of it’s scratch tracks that need to be replaced. There’s new tracking to be done. Then mixing and mastering.”
Jessica was thrilled, and her headache even seemed less intense. S
he was certain without hearing a note that this album would be Penumbra’s breakout, the Next Big Thing, and it would make her career. She was also troubled. Albums could take a long time to make. It took dozens or hundreds of hours in the studio, and these guys probably had day jobs. She wasn’t sure her employment would outlast their recording sessions and post-production. “How about one song?” she asked. “Something I can take to my boss. Now. Well, soon. Soon-ish.”
David—she was thinking of him as just David now—sighed. “Some of the songs are more complete than others. We’ve had a few in the can for—a while. I can go through them and find the one I think would be the best demo out of the ones we could finish quickly. Some of the better songs are pretty long and involved.”
Unconsciously bobbing her head, she said, “Great! Do that. It doesn’t have to be a ‘single’ per se, but something catchy would be good.” Something that wasn’t an apoplectic funeral dirge, like half of Black Chasm’s music.
“You know this is progressive rock, right?”
“I know, that’s fine. I don’t do Pop. I need something like Dream Theater meets 3 Doors Down or The Killers. Accessible, but edgy, with street cred.”
“Okay. Just know that I’m not going to get my hopes up too high for commercial success, and neither should you,” David said.
Jessica calmed herself. She was sounding way too eager. That was no way to drive a bargain to get someone in her stable, especially since she hadn’t yet heard a note. It could be shit.
Except she knew it wasn’t. It was going to shake the world. It was totally insane that she thought that, but she still thought that.
“Right, of course not,” she said. “We’ll see what we see.”
“Miss—what did you say your name was again?”
“Jessica Chandler.”
“Jessica. If you don’t mind me asking, why did you call? Why me? Why now? What made you think we had anything you want? I can’t imagine you’re so hard up for submissions that you cold call bands you haven’t heard from in years.”
That was a damn good question, but she didn’t care for it, and not just because it indicated he might suspect her desperation for a new act, which would weaken her bargaining position. It raised too many other questions of her own. All the impossible occurrences of the word Penumbra in her life in an unbelievable parade within a day. Just when she needed a new band. Best not to go there. Best not to look a gift horse—or was this a dragon?—in the mouth.
“I just ran across your CD,” she replied. “Then I heard ‘Ass Over Teakettle’ last night at a club.”
“Okay.” The tone of his voice seemed to indicate that it was not okay, not any more than it was for her, but that on the other hand, it sort of was okay. Inevitable, maybe. “So you want me to send you a CD? Or should I just email you a file?”
“No, use a password-protected file sharing site,” she said quickly. She didn’t want that material getting pirated right under her nose—or have the band start giving their product away free. She gave him her contact information and hung up, after he’d promised to let her know when the demo song was ready.
Jessica held the phone over her head like a sword of victory and whooped. “Woooo-hooo! Fuckin’ A!” She knew she shouldn’t put all her eggs in one basket. She should go into the office, despite it being Saturday, and start going through her contact list for bands with CDs already completed. Yes, David, I am that desperate. But instead she began sketching out her marketing plan for the new Penumbra CD. She was going to make this shit happen big time.
She tamped down the nagging worry in the back of her mind about the eerie way she’d been led to this band, and just when they’d come up with a new album.
Chapter Fourteen
Saturday morning
David opened the window over the kitchen counter and breathed deeply, taking in the heady scent and saturated brightness of the perfect summer Saturday morning. He loved to fill his soul with the spiritual energy of a beautiful day before plunging into the basement dungeon and staying there like an industrious mushroom till a project was done.
So now Mike was with him, and he had major record label interest. If that wasn’t a rush that could power a great recording session, he didn’t know what was. He considered telling Mike about the call from Jessica Chandler but decided against it, fearing he would dilute his own energy—although he had plenty to burn.
He grabbed his coffee and went downstairs into the control room. Most of his amps were out in the studio itself, but he kept his Marshall Vintage JCM800 2203 amp and a two-twelve cabinet in the control room. They were always miked up and ready to go for when he had to record himself, which he reflected was most of the time now. He’d used the old workhorse for most of his recordings.
He took the 1959 Goldtop Les Paul from its case, started up the Pro Tools multi-track recording app, and looked at the recent file list, with all the songs from Oblivion sorted at the top.
He opened at random, or by instinct, the track “Fire It Up,” which seemed like a good opening title for the session and maybe the album. Without even listening to the track, he set his recording levels, turned on a two measure preroll count, and clicked the Record button.
* * * *
After what felt like an hour, he took a break to get a bottled water from the dorm fridge in the corner. He was still chock full of energy and hadn’t yet progressed into the drained state of mental exhaustion and ear and eye fatigue that set in after several hours of recording. Nowhere near. He felt more powerful now than when he’d started.
He had almost no memory of what he’d done. Perhaps that was a sign of being in the zone, in the flow, and having a strong connection with his unconscious. He was moving through the endless present moment.
He also felt a peculiar buzz beyond the excitement of a good session, like being stoned, but without the tendency for his thoughts to wander off on tangents. He was clear-headed, but had a sense of unreality, as if he were moving in some alternate dimension where the very air felt and smelled different. A feeling of lightness suffused his gut and limbs and he felt as if he were floating, barely tethered to the Earth. He looked down to make sure the carpet didn’t appear to be breathing, which would indicate he was actually doing a serious hallucinogen, like somebody had slipped LSD in his coffee for a joke, but no, the carpet lay still.
Maybe this was just the euphoria of once more embarking on a journey into the undiscovered country of the future, his whole life ahead of him again, rather than having ended a year ago.
At any rate, David was rocking, and loving it. For a welcome change.
He checked the Recording Log document he used to keep track of each step of the project and took stock of his progress.
Holy shit.
He’d recorded the guitar parts for more than half the songs. This included adding two new sections of his own to one song. He’d copied, pasted, and customized drum parts for them, and added a software synthesizer bass.
How the hell could he have done all that? He’d only been down here an hour or so. Maybe longer than he thought, then. He realized he’d been doing everything in one take. That meant they’d all suck and only serve as scratch tracks. He’d have to use them as a basis to write better parts and rerecord. Although, he felt like some might be good enough as he’d recorded them.
What a rush. He was on fire.
More coffee would be good, but he didn’t want to stop while he was on a roll. Time to get back to it.
* * * *
Some time later, David sat back in his chair, his mind a total fog. His mouth dry and sticky, he went for another bottled water.
“Ow!” His arms and legs were stiff and he had to stretch out his calves. He was seriously tired. No surprise there, since he must have been down here for three or four hours.
Odd, he should’ve had to pee by now, but not only was there no urgency in his bladder, he felt almost dehydrated. He drained the bottle, set it down, and looked at his log. He blinked.
He ran over his notes again.
He’d completed the entire album. All ten songs. Several of them being of epic length.
“No fucking way.”
He sat still for a moment, taking in the fact that he’d just done a week’s worth of recording in a few hours. A sinking feeling grew in the pit of his stomach. It would all be total shit. Had to be.
At least he had a starting point to work from. Might as well check one out and see what it sounded like. He opened “Fire It Up” and thumped the space bar to start playback.
A brief cannonade of a drum intro assaulted him, then the main song came in and pinned him to his chair for the duration. At the end of the song, he started it over and sat through it again, stunned.
It was fucking brilliant. The best guitar playing of his life. Not only was there near-perfect technique, but the phrasing and structure of his solos were musical, emotional, tasteful. It was more inspired than anything he’d ever recorded.
Was the rest of the work this good?
That could wait. He wanted to do a quick edit and master for just this song and give it to Mike. He’d also send it to the record label chick, whose name he struggled to remember, as if he’d been introduced to her at a hectic party weeks ago. Jessica? Yes, Jessica. Handler. No, Jessica Chandler. This was going to blow Jessica Chandler away. He might be looking at a record deal. After all these years of trying, after the tragedy, the epic fail, the giving up. Vince had given him his life back.
He shivered at the thought that a dead man had given him this music, this opportunity. Where the hell had Vince recorded it? When, how? David’s mind shied away from this line of thought. He’d always been an agnostic, yet the revelation that the afterlife existed, and had been established for him beyond doubt, seemed inconsequential compared to the stunning art that had come to life in this room.
Which he mustn’t lose on any account. David checked the settings of his backup program, then of the online app that stored his backups in the cloud. Good, all the modified files were replicated in both places.