by Mark All
Time to polish this gem. “Fire It Up” would make the perfect demo-slash-single for the record label rep. He blinked, took a deep breath, and willed himself to find the energy to edit and master the song.
The energy came.
He’d played so well on the rhythm, lead, and fills, there was little editing to do. What seemed an unbelievably short time later, he had the song edited, mixed, and mastered. He created an MP3, copied it to a flash drive, and uploaded it to a file-sharing site for Jessica Chandler. David got to his feet, stretched, and yawned. He felt utterly exhausted, yet still exhilarated. He’d just done the best work of his life. If the rest of his parts were anywhere near as good as those on “Fire It Up,” he wouldn’t have much more guitar work to do, just get the others to record their parts, then edit, mix, and master the album. He hauled himself back up to the main level, stumbling as he made his way to the stairs. Coffee would be good, even though he felt logy and a desire for sleep was stealing over him.
In the kitchen, David realized with a start that it was night outside, the window above the counter a black mirror. He’d been down there longer than he thought.
On the counter, the phone’s red message light was blinking impatiently. He stared stupidly at it for a minute, then decided it would have to wait.
He was rinsing out the coffee carafe, feeling more drained and spacey by the minute and reconsidering the wisdom of caffeine, when the phone rang. He saw it was Mike’s number and reluctantly picked up.
“Hunh?”
“Dude, where the fuck have you been?”
“Mikey,” he said thickly. “You sound pissed.”
“You missed all your lessons Saturday and today! What the fuck, dude? I’ve been calling all weekend. I would’ve come over there to kick your ass Sunday if we hadn’t spent the day with the in-laws.”
David’s brain was numb. “Sorry man, I went into the studio and didn’t realize—wait a minute.” He went cold. “Saturday, Sunday, today? It’s Saturday, man.”
“Check your calendar, dumbass. It’s effing Monday.”
“That can’t be.” His hand fell limply from his ear and he was dimly aware of Mike jabbering from the phone as he set it on the counter. He went to the coffee maker, where he’d left his watch before going to the studio—he never wanted to be cognizant of time when he was working in the magic kingdom.
He picked up the watch and stared dully at it. It was a digital model, hard to find in anything but plastic now that most people used their phones as timepieces, and featured the day and date at the top of the readout, over the time. It read eight o’clock Monday evening.
He’d been in the studio two-and-a-half days.
Chapter Fifteen
Tuesday evening
Burrr-burrr.
When the phone rang, John Emory jumped and screamed. It not only startled him, it flooded his mind with a visual and auditory hallucination, plunged him into a nightmare world, and battered his nerves with a heavy metal soundtrack: the new Penumbra music and the vision he’d seen when he heard it.
Burrr-burrr.
He stared at the phone as it continued to ring, his reality slowing down, creating a lifetime between each bleat of the ring-tone. Lifetimes of horror. John had drifted away from the Southern Baptist faith he’d been raised in, “backslided” was the evangelical term, but its roots had sunk deep into his psyche and taken hold when he was young and impressionable, and the visions he now experienced were filtered through that religion; he feared for his mortal soul.
Burrr-burrr.
When he’d gone to David’s and heard that infernal music, he’d become ensnared and would never be loosed, unless he could put an end to it.
Hand shaking, he answered the phone.
“Yeah.” His voice sounded almost steady. Testament to the courage instilled in him by his strict but loving parents, along with the fear of the Lord.
“Hey, it’s David.” The guitar player’s voice sounded oddly tinny. “We’re on the speakerphone.” Aha. “Mike and Alan are here.”
“Yo,” and “’S’up, bro,” the drummer and bass player chimed in, their voices equally artificial sounding.
“We finished the first song,” David said excitedly. “You won’t believe it, it’s totally awesome.” The guitarist pronounced awesome “ah-some,” a hip affectation that always annoyed the snot out of John.
“Except for the bass part, of course,” David continued. “I’ve actually recorded all my parts—for the entire album. In one marathon session over three days. Can you believe it? I didn’t eat, I didn’t sleep, and I kicked ass. Best tracks I’ve ever done.”
“That was fast,” was all John could think of to say, in lieu of some rite of exorcism he felt was called for.
“No shit.” David sounded pretty happy with himself. “I slept for almost a day afterward. Then Mike and Alan came over and added their parts to the first song. Single takes, man. Everything we’ve done, we nailed in one take. We just finished listening to the mix-down and can’t believe it. Now we just need a real bass line.”
John’s hand began to shake and a coldness crept across his shoulders to his spine. “No way, David. Not going to happen.”
“Come on, man. It’ll only take an hour. I guarantee you’ll knock it out on the first pass. This project is like magic or something. I can feel it. We’ve never played like this in our lives.”
This “found” album had taken on a life of its own, was barreling ahead like a runaway freight train, and the best he could do was get out of its path—if he could. “What part of ‘No fucking way’ are you having a problem with?”
David was silent for a moment, then said in a more laid back, placating tone, “John, just do the one track for us. If you’re not blown away by this album, fine, we’ll get somebody else. Right now, we need a demo. John—we have record label interest.”
Oh, God, no, was his immediate thought. No, no, no, no, no.
David, evidently interpreting his silence as a sign of being intrigued, went on. “Seriously, Sage Records called me. This chick is looking for the ‘next big thing,’ and she thinks it might be us. When you hear this song, you’ll think so, too.”
Mike chimed in, “It is seriously impressive, dude.”
John’s throat was dry; he couldn’t speak. The vision of carnage, telescoping out to reveal horror and death on a global scale, overwhelmed him.
David continued, “We need to firm up her interest in us while we have her attention. Get a commitment. A contract.”
Contract. Lawyer.
“David, you can’t produce this album,” John managed to croak. “You’ve got to stop it. Destroy the files. You don’t know what you’re doing, or what you’re dealing with.”
Something caught his eye and he turned his head to see that the light in his studio had gone off, the open door a yawning chasm into the depths of Hell. For a moment he glimpsed twisted, nightmarish shapes wriggling within the darkness.
He squeezed his eyes shut, barely cognizant of David’s voice saying, “—the fuck are you talking about? This album could finally make our careers and take us to the big time.”
“I’ve got a fucking career.”
“John, come on. You know I suck out the ass on bass, and we can’t leave the synth bass in, it makes it sound like techno dance shit.”
John found the steadiness of purpose for one last try. “I’m calling my lawyer, David. I’m going to stop you. You’re not going to unleash this unholy cacophony on an unsuspecting world.”
That stopped David for a moment, then he asked in a hushed voice. “Is this one of your premonitions? Like…before the wreck? John?”
David’s voice seemed distant and irrelevant, dialogue from a mediocre drama playing on a television in another room. John opened his eyes again, careful not to look at the studio doorway. Somehow the entire room seemed to be in motion, with a restlessness that intensified although he could not see anything moving. He felt as if someone had slipped hi
m a tab of acid.
“It’ll be fine, John. Just the one song. Give us the Bassmeister one last time and I swear we’ll leave you alone.”
“Leave me alone now.” John thumbed the phone off.
The surreptitious movement in the room seemed to emanate from the window, then the closet door. John focused on the window. The crack where the sash met the sill seemed to thicken, gaining a deep reddish tint. A ruddy liquid began to well from it, then overflowed, painting bloody runnels across the sill and crimson drizzles down the wall beneath it. It seeped behind the baseboard, then overran it as well. He whirled away, only to see the neutral-colored carpet beneath the closet door soaked with an expanding red stain.
Shaking uncontrollably, John made an inarticulate guttural noise in his throat. The carpet before the closet was becoming more drenched by the second as the bloodstain spread with unreal speed. The visions of cutting, of rending and tearing, of murder, filled his mind and he screamed.
He dropped the phone and staggered backward toward the studio door, desperate to get out of the room.
“Where do you think you’re going, motherfucker?”
John screamed and spun to face his worst nightmare.
Vince Buckley stood in the doorway to the studio. He held an axe with both hands. As he hefted it over his shoulder and brought it down, John’s inner and outer worlds of agony, blood, and death melded and he realized that part of the very bad feeling he’d had, had in fact been a premonition.
Chapter Sixteen
Tuesday night
David slumped in his chair at the mixing console in the control room, staring glumly through the plate-glass window into the studio. He was upset after the call with John. He didn’t think the bass player had any legal standing to stop the project, but felt sure there was something John was not saying. The guy had demonstrated a small psychic talent on occasion, having premonitions about unimportant little events that had proven true. Had John seen something when they’d listened to Vince’s music? Something more than the rest of them? For David, the lyrics brought a fantastical world to life, but John had looked shaken after the listening session, and David had a nagging suspicion that the world the songs created was even more real for the bass player. Like John had actually gone to some other place. The impact the music had on David was profound, so what more effect might it have on someone sensitive to the supernatural?
Mike and Alan had gone home after John cut them off. It was pretty late anyway and they had real jobs to get up for in the morning. David understood, but the mania that had driven his marathon session over the weekend had not relinquished its hold over him. He was ready to get this album recorded if he had to do it all alone. Or just him and Vince. That was an ironic thought, considering what had caused Vince’s death.
David would just have to record the bass himself. He might as well prepare to play bass on the entire album, but right now all he had to do was this one song. He'd keep the bass part simple enough that he could make it sound pro, then get through it without fucking up. Once he sent the demo song to Jessica Chandler, he’d get his career back on track, along with his life, for the first time since the wreck.
Time to get to work. He retrieved the Fender Precision bass from its case, plugged in and tuned it, and hit record.
* * * *
It took him three takes and editing the best parts together on a comp track, but he had the bass done in an hour. The song seemed to mix itself, and he mastered it quickly, using his own presets with only minor tweaking.
A few minutes later he had it uploaded to his file sharing account on the web. He shared the folder, and emailed Jessica the password.
“Look out world, here comes Oblivion.”
Chapter Seventeen
Wednesday morning
Jessica had found her Killer Band, her Next Big Thing. “Fire It Up,” Penumbra’s single, had blown her away. From the opening drum intro, her mind had zoned in on the music to the exclusion of everything else in the world. She’d played the song over five times before she realized what she was doing. A rush of churning emotions filled her, charged her with what she could only think of as Soul Energy. Damn, if they could bottle this shit, they could sell it as some kind of psycho-pharmaceutical.
She walked to her boss's office so fast she nearly tripped in her heels, but recovered her balance without breaking stride. She burst into his office without knocking.
“Ben, I’ve got it. The Next Honkin’ Big Thing.”
Ben Westfeldt looked up from his computer with a hilarious startled expression.
“Black Chasm?” he asked incredulously. “They were good?”
“Hell, no! Penumbra!”
“What’s a Penumbra?”
She rounded his desk, nudged her perplexed boss out of the way, and commandeered his computer, opening the browser and typing in the URL of David Fairburn’s file sharing site. She entered her password, downloaded the song, and double-clicked it.
The song began, but too quietly. “Turn it up!” she yelled, reaching across him and twisting the volume knob on his desktop speakers. The band came in after the drums at concert level.
Ben grimaced and turned it down, but not by much. She stood beside him, bouncing up and down in place, while he listened, a thoughtful expression on his face.
When it ended, he looked up at her blankly, then his face brightened and his mouth widened in a smile. He moved to restart the song but she grabbed his arm.
“Hold off. We’ll be listening to it all day if you start it again.” She’d built up a mild tolerance to the seductive effect of the music. “So what do you think? This is it, right? I’ve found our saviors!”
Ben reached for the mouse again and she slapped his hand.
“Ben! What do you think? Can I sign them? Can I?” She was about to explode with a euphoria she hadn’t felt in a long time. Maybe ever.
He looked longingly at the mouse for a second, then faced her. “It is good.”
“You think?” She wanted to dope slap him. “Come on, give me the go ahead, I’ve got to sign these guys before somebody else does. He could’ve shotgunned the password to the file to all the major labels for all we know. I would.”
Ben’s face twisted. “Jessie… It’s good. It’s, well, it’s stunning.” He frowned, glancing at the mouse again. “A little too stunning. It’s kind of esoteric, too, you know?”
She stared at him uncomprehendingly. “Esoteric? Dream Theater is esoteric. This song is heroin.”
“Yeah, that might be what’s bothering me.”
“Are you insane? You said we were going under. We needed something remarkable, a band that could break out in big way.”
“Yeah…”
“And this song is addictive. What the hell do you want, a big arrow sign descending from Heaven pointing to the file and saying, ‘SAVE YOUR COMPANY HERE’?”
“It’s progressive metal, Jessie. You know the numbers as well as I do. That kind of band is never going to sell at the volume we need to pull our ass out of bankruptcy.”
“Yeah, until one does. This one. Because you can’t stop playing the damn song. It’s an Earwig From Hell. It’s not just catchy, it grabs you by the throat and demands your attention. You want to play it again now, don’t you?”
Ben eyed the file on his monitor again. “It’s true, I’ve never felt like this, listening to music before. Even that time I saw Miles Davis live.”
“Then what are you waiting for?” she screamed at him. “Let’s sign them up! Skip the bullshit negotiating and give them a decent contract to begin with, one they won’t have to hire a lawyer to wrangle points over with us. Before somebody else does.”
Taking a deep breath, he looked her in the eyes. “Here’s the thing…”
Jessica held her own breath, unconsciously leaning toward him.
“You’re right,” he continued. “Despite the genre, it has some quality, some je ne sais quoi, that hooks you. It could be big, it could be Thriller big. Ma
ybe even Beatles big.”
“Okay, you’re saying that like it’s a bad thing.”
Ben frowned. “It… It kind of…scares me, sweetie. It gives me the feeling I might just keep playing it over and over like one of those white rats that keeps pushing the button to stimulate the pleasure centers of its brain till it starves. Except it’s not pleasure I’m feeling, it’s…I don’t know what it is.”
She rolled her eyes. “Again, you’re saying that like it’s a bad thing. We sell music. We’ll sell lots of downloads of just the single. Imagine what the album will do if the rest of it’s like this.”
Looking unconvinced, Ben watched his right hand, as if it might creep toward the mouse again on its own.
Jessica grabbed him by his shoulders and shook him gently. “You said we were going under. We’ve got to do this. I don’t know what’s bothering you about it, but I don’t think we have any choice.”
He frowned slightly.
“Ben, who’s the Cool Hunter? Who’s the Musician Whisperer?”
“You are.”
“That’s right, I am. And I say jump on this like a sailor on a two-dollar whore.”
For a moment, he looked like he was about to give in. His frown deepened and he looked briefly at the monitor, then tore his gaze away and directed it toward the window.
Exasperated at his perplexing reluctance, Jessica let go of him. “Okay, look. Let’s put the single on our web site for free download. Gauge the reaction and its potential. Then decide.” She was pretty sure what the reaction would be and had an even better idea of the music’s potential.
Ben gritted his teeth. “Free? What part of ‘going under’ do you not understand?”
“I understand it as well as you understand the value of giving digital shit away free. Take another whiff of the twenty-first century coffee. What do you say, Ben? Fly it up the old flagpole and see if anybody salutes it. Then we can drop it or offer them a contract—a good one—depending on the number of downloads.”