by Wesley Stace
The trilogy was heavy on the Christian allegory (lauded by none other than the Archbishop of Canterbury, attacked by no less than Richard Dawkins), and even seemed to include—to the distress of rationalists everywhere—a subliminal course in self-realization, combining Christian philosophy with elements of those weird books like The Secret, which sell a million copies but no one really knows what they’re about or why anyone is reading them. There was a whole lot of Lion, plenty of Witch, and shelf upon shelf of Wardrobe, and certainly no need for me to read them. You just picked up on them by osmosis.
I do remember thinking one specific thing however, one night on public transport going home. There were thirty people in the carriage, and six of them—20 percent!—were reading one or other volume of The fucking Dark-Headed Clock. And what I remember thinking, knowing whatever it was that I knew of these books: Blake would have absolutely hated them.
Well, of course, Blake did hate them. Unfortunate, really, since he wrote them.
I mean, that’s a bush I can’t beat about, and you’ve probably figured it out, if you didn’t already know. By the time Blake did announce his authorship to the world at large, the moment had passed; the clock had tick-tocked its last and would never be wound again. There were six separate volumes by the end; Blake had made all the money there was to be made, and would be making that money for most of the rest of his life. I’d been wondering if he was skating by on whatever Wonderkids royalties trickled his way, along with the poster revenue, but no, he had another source of income we knew nothing about.
We knew nothing about it because he wasn’t proud of it. He didn’t like it. The books had hardly been his idea. They started life as a joke. Greg’s mate, Kirk, the wordsmith behind many hastily-remaindered rock biographies, at whose house they occasionally gathered after last call to smoke pot and listen to Johnny Cash, had started, one stoned night, to muse aloud: “You know what someone should do? A Christian twist on those Harry Potter books. That would be huge.”
It was one of those conversational gambits that open the door on many silly suggestions and puns. The books could have died then and there, stillborn, in a lengthy stoned sketch, but, it was agreed between toke and exhalation that such a series, if written, would clean up. Blake stayed up that night and wrote the synopsis for the first three—based on a silly idea he’d had years before, a silly idea for which I had rescued the doodled blueprints from the WonderBus—and, over a subsequent drink, told Kirk he’d found a plot: it was something he could do, and he needed something to do. Kirk, only mildly miffed (he didn’t envy Blake the epic task, though he would always take credit), explained that he’d recently had a meeting with a children’s book editor who had expressed the desire for something to capitalize on Harry Potter, which had set him thinking in the first place. Not his bag, obviously, kids and all that. Why didn’t Blake meet with the editor?
That is apparently how books are sold, not actually by writing them in dignified solitude at a distance: who knew? A three-book deal was put into place by an agent delighted to oversee this relatively sure thing (she hadn’t remembered a rejection letter she wrote Blake for How Pleasant to Know Mr. Lear: “the contemporary marketplace is not forgiving enough for this kind of book”) and Blake found himself with a signed contract, a decent advance against a very good percentage, and some fairly tight deadlines. He didn’t want them under his own name, James Lewis, because he wasn’t sure of their merit; no one suggested the books be published under the name Blake Lear. Blake suggested a mysteriously Christian looking pseudonym: a Christian name, as it were. He didn’t want to do any promotion for them at all, in the unlikely event that any was required, and it was generally agreed that a Pynchon-esque air of mystery with regards to the author would be appropriate. “Judith Esther” it was: two consecutive books in the Catholic Old Testament.
The first copy I ever saw, Blake finally reminded me, was on one of my rare trips to his place.
“What’s this bootleg-looking book?” I asked.
“Some crap someone sent me,” he replied, shelving it. It was the advance reading copy of the first volume. He cleaned his desk up better after that. Certainly I never saw, as you do on authors’ shelves, the spines of every first edition, including translations into various dialects of Chinese.
How did I finally find out?
Greg, of course. The man couldn’t keep a secret. The publishers managed to keep the pseudonymous author’s identity strictly under wraps—it was a contractual obligation on the part of both house and author—going so far as to put a picture of a middle-aged woman on the inside back cover, with a fake biography. She lived in Tuscany where she wrote in peace and seclusion. As the books got more traction, people presumably thought it peculiar that Ms. Esther didn’t court the limelight at the Hay Festival, but I don’t know that her identity was a mystery people were dying to solve. If anyone had been, all he would have to do was hang out at the Coachy and talk to Greg for five seconds. The man simply couldn’t be quiet about knowing famous people, even fictional ones.
So we’re at our table, just by the general knowledge machine, and in shambles Blake. I’m fresh off a big summer festival badly timed against the European Championships, there’s conversation to be made, Greg is temporarily mute for some reason, and I remark, quite innocently, that there was a moment in the bus on my last tour with the Britpop band when every single person was reading one of the Dark-Headed Clocks. This was around the publication of the third volume, when all of London was bracing itself to queue at Tower Records at midnight to buy Midnight in the Dark-Headed Clock. At its mention, Greg looked particularly pleased with himself.
“Do you want to tell him or shall I?” he asked Blake.
“About the football tickets?” Blake answered vaguely.
“No. About the . . . you know . . .”
Blake sighed. “Greg, we love you because you’re Greg, and you are Greg, but how can you be so unfailingly Greggy all the time? Doesn’t it tire you, playing yourself?”
“I haven’t told him anything, not a word,” said Greg in his own defense. “He brought it up.”
“So what?” said Blake.
“Well, then it’s like lying and I never lie.”
“We know you never lie.”
“What?” I asked. “You’ve got to tell me now.”
“Look,” said Blake. “It has to be a secret, right?” I liked the sound of it, whatever it was.
“But Greg knows it,” I pointed out. “It can’t be a secret.”
“Unfortunately,” said Blake, “Greg was there when it happened. But he’s sworn to secrecy, and so are you. I mean, you really are. Money depends on it.”
“Mum’s the word,” said Greg.
“I’m Judith Esther,” said Blake, under his breath.
“How do you mean?” I asked.
“I’m Judith Esther. Judith Esther am I.”
“You wrote the Dark-Headed Clock?”
“Yes.”
“Under the name Judith Esther?”
“Yes.”
“And you’ve ghostwritten the books for a real person called Judith Esther. She makes all the money.”
“No. Judith Esther doesn’t exist. I make the dough.”
“So you’re rich.”
“I stand to be.”
“Right.” I said. “Who knows?”
“Greg and everyone he’s ever met, though somehow it’s still under wraps, probably because no one believes him.”
“Yeah, he did once say he knew Madonna.”
“I didn’t,” said Greg. “I said I’d met Madonna.”
“But you hadn’t.”
“Yes, but I only missed her by a few moments.”
“Anyway,” continued Blake, “apart from Greg, there are no other threats to my security apart from my agent, my publisher, Jack, my dad; oh and Kirk, who came up with the idea originally.”
“And that old lady on the back cover of the book.”
“That’s
my mum,” said Greg.
“Mum’s literally the word,” Blake confirmed.
“She’s no longer with us. Probably turning in her grave.”
“Blake, you wrote this best-selling book?”
“I wrote that best-selling book.”
“You couldn’t get your last book published and you are now a best-selling author under the name Judith Esther.”
“In one.”
“Jesus Christ,” said Greg in exasperation. “It’s not rocket science.”
“I understand, Greg,” I said. “I get it! I’m just trying to take it in.”
“Look,” said Blake. “The books are what they are. There was a niche to be filled, and I filled it. I’m quite fond of Ed and Bill, and some of the baddies, but I’m not big on the overall message.”
“Which is that Science is bad and Christianity is good.”
“That,” said Blake with a smile, “is a grotesque simplification of the Dark-Headed Clock Trilogy.” There was an element of pride in his voice.
“Is that a yes?”
“Yes.”
“And you don’t believe that.”
“Not at all. Which is why it’s very important that no one knows anything about Judith Esther, because, basically, the books originated in a cynical marketing ploy.”
“People think they’re sincere, right? Everyone assumes Judith Esther is Christian. This isn’t all part of some lengthy religious conversion you’ve had that started in jail?”
“Might be,” said Blake, and he winked. “None of your business.” He was joking, being serious, and joking. “But the important thing is: no one ever knows. The deal depends on it. My job depends on it. My pension depends on it. I was going to kill them off at the end of Volume Three but that became, literally, and contractually, impossible. They’re bizarrely immortal. So we’re going for three more.”
“But the third one isn’t even out yet.”
“Sweet, I’m on the fifth.”
“How’s it going?”
“I cannot legally tell you.”
“And isn’t there a film of the first one about to come out?” He nodded. “All I can say, Blake, is congratulations.”
“I’m really happy for their success. My bank manager is very happy. My father is for once proud of me, though he keeps on about whether I’ll ever have success under my true colors, like he fears the name Lewis will disappear off the planet. It’s lucky Jackie’s got some kids. But please, please, just forget you ever knew it.”
“It’s not a joke, right, Judith?”
“I never lie,” said Blake. “As sure as my name is Judith Esther. And Blake Lear.”
He could still surprise you: perhaps there was life in the old dog yet.
Blake’s circle of acquaintance was small, and he traveled often, always alone. His secret success was easily forgotten; he had everything he wanted, but he didn’t want much. He bought a house, bequeathed me the apartment, went through a girlfriend here and there, sisterly figures with whom he shared space for a time, rode the Dark-Headed Clock wave as long as he was able and, as far as I knew, played no music at all. He didn’t approve of my chosen profession, thought it a waste, and, as any father would, encouraged me to do anything but. He liked me to play the guitar for him, though—it was the only workout his old Takamine got.
There was another pseudonymous trilogy after the Dark-Headed Clock, but, because he couldn’t legally write it under the same name, he was back to square one; it never caught on. Years passed. Middle-age spread. He went about his business and I went about mine—“Road Scholar Tour Management” (I know). I even persuaded Mitchell to start up the American chapter—now there was always a chart, a schedule, an itinerary. Without wishing to bore you, and believe me, Blake never wanted to know a thing about it, we were the first vertical touring company: we offered it all, from driver (of buses we owned), merch management, tour management, all the way to therapy and AA meetings. We got good. Our motto was: “Hands On! Hands Off!” You know, I’ll even teach a band to take a look out of the window, go for a walk. I see Road Scholar like one of those universities that takes on promising athletes: you’ve got to educate them too. Every now and then I think of Clement’s; we’re in loco parentis. Mitchell was a bit that way for me. Blake was just loco.
17
“It’s all one song.”
AND THAT’S HOW THE STORY WOULD HAVE ENDED, WERE IT NOT FOR something called the Kidology Conference—or KidCon—at which I found myself one morning four years ago.
The venue was a grim, satanically black Brooklyn concert hall that reeked of beer and disinfectant. The stage was lit, an expectant crowd loitered, but there’d be no live music until the evening. The barman would have served you booze, but most of those milling around happily stuck to coffee. Not me, of course. I had a Diet Coke, like when I choose wheat over white, or low-fat cream cheese: very grown-up.
People were politely advertising their bands (in one case, by means of attention-grabbing propeller hats) and unself-consciously glad-handing sampler CDs and stickers. Others idly swung swag bags from their fingers as they took advantage of the “unique networking opportunities.” I happened to be talking to a guy called Niall. He was in charge—I could tell by the two gold stars on his nametag.
KidCon existed, he explained, because there were now so many people making Family Music—that was the preferred designation—and such a bewildering array of outlets for its distribution that it was easy to get lost. At KidCon, registrants got a chance to hear from successful artists, publicists, agents, and other “industry insiders”: the conference’s mission, to embrace today’s market in all its diversity, to offer a blueprint for success. “It’s a place to see and be seen,” Niall said. It was, in other words, South by Southwest for people who write hello songs, goodbye songs, and when-do-we-get-there songs.
My initial silent thought was “if only there’d been a blueprint for the Wonderkids . . . ” swiftly followed by: “If only they’d had any guidance at all . . .” But, I equally swiftly concluded, even if both those things, the outcome wouldn’t have been any different: they’d still have fucked it up. They’d have found a way.
“Are you making music yourself?” asked Niall, bracing himself to give the keynote.
“No,” I said, hoping it hadn’t come out dismissive.
“Oh, you have that look in your eye.”
“I do? No, I’m behind-the-scenes. You don’t want to let me too near a stage. Actually, I was asked to write about the conference.”
“A journalist?” He sized up my usefulness.
“Not so much,” I admitted. “Well, if you like. I mean, put it this way: I’m not about to write a song about socks.”
Why had I agreed to write the stupid article? Mostly because a friend, drunk backstage, desperate for copy, offered money and a plane ticket after he read a thing I wrote about some of the weirder Wonderkids concerts. Blake’s old apartment, which was still how everyone referred to it, was making me antsy. Might as well get back on the road.
The story of Family Music is basically this: the children of rock ’n’ roll grew up, had their own children, and needed options other than crappy Raffi. They wanted their kids to listen to music they could stand to listen to themselves, because, unlike their parents, who thought it was all rubbish anyway, they actually liked pop music, and could tell the difference between good and bad. They didn’t want to pollute their own kids’ minds with crap and certainly didn’t want to contaminate the stereos in their cars and kitchens. (I went to a three-year-old’s party the other day—the bespoke mixtape was Pixies, the Clash, and Ramones. I was actually aching for someone to sing a song about going to a zoo, zoo, zoo, and I bet the kids were, too.)
Then some of these parents, musicians who were themselves in rock ’n’ roll bands, found they couldn’t make a living—it’s not uncommon—and decided to take matters into their own hands, to provide music for their own kids, music that they, and other parents like them, w
ouldn’t mind listening to: music that was anti-Raffi, anti-Barney, not the Wiggles. And this music, some of it, totally reinvigorated the children’s music scene. Think punk, alternative comedy, that kind of thing.
Crucially, it was music for kids and adults alike—that was the trick—but when you sliced it right down, it had to be palatable to adults, at least initially, because they were the ones with the money. Disney worked this out years ago, but kindie (indie music for kids, right?) worked it out for rock ’n’ rollers. The secret is that rock ’n’ roll has always been for kids. A-wop-bop-a-loo-bop-a-wop-bam-boom. This music just made that slightly more explicit.
Now these guys had their own conference. And I was the ideal person to cover it.
Niall gave his introductory speech, the climax of which was the announcement of the first annual Jim-Jammies Awards, to be held later that year. It made sense: everyone’s got his own awards show—why not these guys? Why not us? Children’s literature, Kid Lit: the reverence with which memory turns those yellowed pages, the Oxford Companion to Children’s Literature, with its hearty essays on Beatrix Potter, Lewis Carroll, and Dr. Seuss. Think of those bookshelves of hallowed first editions of J. K. Rowling, Joan Aiken, and even Judith Esther. But children’s music? Carnival of the Animals, Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra or bust, innit?
And as for modern children’s music, consider the Grammys—where and when are the Family Music awards in that overstuffed celebration of entropy? Long before you tune in, is the answer. They’re somewhere between Best Historical Album, Worst Album Notes (Gospel), and whatever category it is in which Aerosmith still triumph. Sure you wouldn’t turn down a Grammy, but you’d be home in time to give Granny her medicine. The indie kids’ musicians deserved their own awards show. Of course they did, and the conference crowd agreed. Wholeheartedly.
The name of the first panel was tailor-made for the article I was destined not to write: “How to Succeed While Really Really Trying” (others, later on, would be franker: “Money: Where Is It?”). The first moderator, perhaps a children’s entertainer herself, could have done the panel all on her own; she opened by serenading the attendees to the tune of “Pop Goes the Weasel” (“Let’s all get out of the lobby / And come on into the panel . . . you’ve got three more minutes, then mercifully I’ll stop singing”) before coaxing answers from her panelists like a kindergarten teacher. Behind her, the KidCon banner peeled partway from the wall, an inexorable descent that looked likely to accelerate towards a tragic conclusion threatening to upstage the unwitting panelists, until Niall shuffled up to throw some gaffer tape about; everyone “Ah!”ed like when the couple kiss at the end of a romantic comedy.