He steps back to show me his T-shirt, which has a cartoon on it and the caption: ROCK N’ ROLL CAN SAVE THE WORLD IF YOU ARE NICE TO PEOPLE.
‘Hey, do they make that shirt for dudes?’ Tim asks.
‘What? This is a unisex shirt, isn’t it?’
‘Of course it’s not! Look at the tiny sleeves.’
Ben groans, defeated.
‘I think it’s a very nice shirt,’ I say. ‘And the short sleeves really show off your arms.’
‘See? Mandy likes it, because she has good taste. Anyway, it was nice meeting you, I’m going to go find my other friends.’
‘Other friends? Bullshit!’
‘Tim, you, sir, are a buffoon.’
‘I want to marry your eyelashes.’
‘You suck. Ha ha ha, I had the last word.’
Tim
The Hordern Pavilion is a funny venue. It can feel like an airport hangar, but now, packed with music fans and knowing that it’s just a matter of minutes until The Flaming Lips take the stage, there’s not anywhere in the world I’d rather be. As the support band plays we settle on a spot, but find we’re surrounded by people who seem to regard the band as a nuisance that they have to TALK OVER REALLY, REALLY LOUDLY. We manoeuvre our way to a better viewpoint, close enough so we have some chance of getting confetti sprayed on us or Wayne hitting a beach ball to us, but not so near the front that somebody is stepping on us every few seconds. Matt trails after us and offers us foam earplugs in cellophane packets. Mandy and I both turn them down. I’ve never seen the point of paying good money for a gig and then blocking out some of it. I’ll worry about hearing loss when I’m old.
‘Me and Matt sat up in the front row of those stands for The xx,’ I say to Mandy. ‘This spot is much better.’
‘Really? You were here for that show? Alice and I stood right over there.’
‘Were you here for The Pixies?’
‘Yep! Stood in pretty much the exact same spot. Were you here for Vampire Weekend?’
‘Of course. Did you go to see Springsteen at Olympic Stadium?’
‘Yep, the band looked like ants on stage, we were in the nosebleed seats.’
‘Still brilliant though.’
‘Yep, brilliant.’
‘It spins me out to think how many gigs we must have been to at the same time, but back then we were strangers, you know?’
‘I know what you mean. It’s strange to think, for example, that maybe one day you’ll be friends with that guy with a scooped-out watermelon on his head.’
‘Well, probably not that guy exactly.’
‘Or one day you’ll be friends with that guy who’s just spilled his beer on the floor, or one day you’ll be in a band with those guys.’
‘Or maybe one day we’ll have a threesome with that girl over there.’
She playfully pulls me by the ear.
‘Ow! What was that for? That was hell-funny.’
Mandy
Best.
Show.
Ever.
Tim hugs me from behind during ‘Do You Realize??’ as gorgeous purple sunsets, and footage of the band running along in the dark with naked women that somehow all makes perfect sense, are projected onto a massive screen. We’ve all got glitter and confetti in our hair. Complete strangers embrace each other and it doesn’t seem odd. It’s kind of like a cult gathering, but in a good way.
‘Did you enjoy it?’ Matt asks as we file out into a huge crowd moving through the car park.
I’d almost forgotten he was with us and I feel a bit guilty. He’s spent the last couple of hours almost completely motionless, his bearded face hidden under a black hoodie.
‘Yeah, it was wonderful. You?’
‘It was phenomenal. One of the best things I’ve ever seen.’
As people disperse across the street and spill from the car park into the cool night air, we end up running into yet another bunch of people Tim is friends with, and whose names and connections to Tim I instantly forget. It’s decided at some point we have to go to the pub across the road, which is like one of those nice beachside pubs with a patio except it overlooks an asphalt path instead of the ocean. I’m a little hazy on how we end up there, or who all these people are, and just when I think I might actually fall asleep in the pub, they decide to call last drinks, which is good because I don’t really want the enduring image of tonight being me asleep in a pot plant.
Matt tries earnestly to tell me something and I don’t really take it in, so he writes it down on a coaster and I fold it up and store it in my wallet to revisit when I’m more sober and less sleepy.
I have this theory that, for me at least, there’s two types of tired — the kind you feel when you stay up ridiculously late for no reason watching junk on TV or aimlessly messing about online, and the type you feel when you’ve actually had a good time but your body’s about to give up on you.
I’m thinking this as Tim and I are walking under the palm trees, the last of the crowd scattering and stumbling across the park …
‘My place or your place?’ he says.
‘Hmm, my place.’
Sleep can wait.
Tim
I’m still buzzing about the show when I get to school the next day and I know I’m on a roll when my least-favourite teacher is away and the substitute teacher, a young guy in a flat cap and a rockabilly shirt, decides to put on a DVD of School of Rock instead. At one point he decides the class is going well and he can be a bit more casual about the whole thing, so he literally puts his feet up on the desk and sits there watching the movie with the kind of contented grin of someone who can’t believe what they’re getting away with.
The next class, chemistry, is just as easy. One of the blessings of repeating a year at school is that sometimes the teachers are lazy and do the exact same thing they did last year. That’s what happens when we have to do a group exercise about the effect of mixing different chemicals together and, by some miracle, I’ve kept the worksheet from last year, stashed with my chemistry papers. I get put in a group with Kiera and Michael, a boy who’s a foot taller than everyone but doesn’t have the intimidating personality to go with his height and just comes across as a kind of a giant, lumbering teddy bear.
Turns out Michael was at The Flaming Lips as well, which is surprising, both because I wouldn’t have picked him as a fan and because I’m kind of surprised I didn’t see his giant head poking out above the crowd.
Some of chemistry does my head in, but there are cool moments when you put two chemicals together and they react in an unexpected way, like changing colour or smoking up. We kill it. I’m flying.
When I’m leaving school at the end of the day, I walk past a bunch of younger kids playing basketball on the asphalt courts. Their ball spills out of play and rolls towards me, and when they yell out to me to throw it back I don’t just toss it back, I hurl it towards the hoop as I walk away and, amazingly, ridiculously, it goes in.
Nothing but net. It’s been that kind of day.
Mandy
‘Amanda Macartney, you’re not going out looking like that.’
I don’t recognise my name for a second, and I don’t like how Sonya uses it — like a weapon, or like some reference to a familiarity we just don’t have any more. It’s like she’s seen on a TV show that this is how proper parents speak to their kids when they’re about to go out. I didn’t even know she was here. She is fond of an unannounced drop-in.
I’m about to head out on the road trip to Tim’s gig and I’m wearing my loved-to-death Hüsker Dü T-shirt, candy-heart necklace and skinny jeans. I think I see the issue. Most mothers scold their daughters for looking slutty when they go out. My part-time mum gets angry because I don’t look slutty enough.
‘I don’t see what’s wrong with it,’ I say.
‘Well, there’s nothing wrong with it, but can’t you put a little effort in?’
‘A lot of effort has gone into this outfit. I spent ages getting it right.’
‘I mean, really, what on earth is this Hüsker Dü business?’ She pronounces it wrong.
‘They were an eighties hardcore band. They’re only legendary.’
‘Hmm, yes, well, I hope they know more about making music than they do about designing T-shirts. That looks like a crayon drawing. And is that a necklace from the lolly shop?’
‘I only eat candy now. This is what I’m having for dinner.’
‘Oh please, edible jewellery? You’re not six any more. And why always with the jeans, Mandy? You wonder why boys don’t talk to you and then you get around looking like you work in a garage. You’ve got great pins, like I used to have — get them out once in a while! Have you seen the shorts girls are wearing these days? They’re so short they don’t even have legs. They’re like denim nappies! I’ll get you a pair if you want.’
I think it’s testament to how much I want this conversation to end that I agree to her offer to buy me shorts that, sigh, look like denim nappies. The night can only get better from here.
Tim
‘What do you mean you’re not coming?’ I say to Sebastian.
I’ve just got to his place and I’m talking to him through the door to the bathroom, where he’s getting ready for a night at some random’s party instead of our epic road trip. He didn’t even have the nerve to tell me directly that he was piking at the last minute. He got his sister to do that, the dick.
‘Oh, come on, Tim, you’ve ditched me for girls before. Eleni’s throwing this party and I’ve been wanting to tap that for ages. And anyway, you’ll play other shows. It’s not like I’ll never get a chance to see you play again.’
‘I’d never even heard of this party until now.’
‘Nah, it’s just a last-minute thing.’
‘You’re meant to be my manager. You’re supposed to be passionate about getting my music out there and be really committed and everything.’
‘I dunno, Tim, what can I say?’
‘Well, you’re not getting commission for this gig.’
‘Wow, so I miss out on ten per cent of nothing.’
‘Go fuck yourself.’
He comes out of the bathroom, his hair full of product, and shrugs at me.
I seethe.
You’re meant to be my manager, I think. And yeah, you’re meant to be my best friend.
Mandy
I’d been looking forward to this road trip, but the best intentions have come to nothing. Tim is in a bad mood for the whole drive down to the gig and barely says anything to Alice or me. I realise this is about the longest we’ve ever spent together and I worry that I’m running out of stories and things to say, that I can’t pull off being interesting for much longer.
I think things will get better when we get to the venue and get a feel for the place, but as soon as we get to the pub it’s bad-vibe city. The plinky-plink drone of poker machines churns away in the background, and there’s quite a few people who don’t seem to have all their teeth clustered around the bar and glaring randomly at people in the hope of getting a glare back. Other middle-aged men are drinking by themselves. One of them is swearing and writing weird messages on cardboard drinks coasters.
There’s nowhere to store the instruments so we just kind of stand around in a dark corner and put up with people knocking into Tim’s guitar and his case of pedals every couple of minutes. I wonder if we should go and check into the hotel Tim’s booked for us before the gig starts. I wonder if there’s some way we can be anywhere but here.
Things don’t improve much as we eat soggy fish and chips and Alice tries to make conversation. But then Tim gets the nod to go up on stage and I give him an encouraging kiss and he brightens for a second. I think he’s going to be OK.
One song in and there’s trouble. Apathy from the people at the poker machines. Apathy from people who raise their voices so their friends can hear them over the music. Hecklers. Alice and I glance at each other at our little table by the bar, powerless to turn the tide, the odd ones out here, pilgrims in an unholy land.
I always thought Cold Chisel were this terrible bogan band, the kind of music I associated with people doing burnouts in car parks and every guy that’s ever yelled ‘Show us your tits’ at me as I’ve walked past a gross pub. But then I heard Sarah Blasko singing ‘Flame Trees’ and I pretty much had to eat my words. So sad, and panoramic and just flat-out beautiful. It feels more like a hymn than a rock song, and when Tim sings it tonight I feel this sense of calm that is partly, you know, the windswept splendour of this song being played by this dishy young boy and partly the relief that he isn’t going to be smashed over the head by a bottle from one of the many people who have been heckling him through the first few songs.
But then Tim’s back to one of his own songs, and I only catch one line about learning Spanish over the din. This is the wrong crowd and the wrong place for these songs, and I get the feeling things are about to get even worse.
Tim
‘You suck!’ someone yells at the end of the song I wrote for Mandy, which I don’t think she even heard.
‘Yeah, well, why don’t you go play some of your songs somewhere and I’ll turn up and yell at you about how shit your stuff is?’ I say, looking straight at the heckler.
People are laughing and booing. I can’t tell which group’s winning.
‘Get off the stage, you poof!’
‘You’re a fucking wanker,’ I yell.
‘You’re the wanker!’
Blood rushes to my face. The crowd’s turning against me. I can’t make out Mandy and Alice any more, everyone’s bleeding into a mess of colour. I’m losing control. I hate what I’m feeling — this wild anger. I hate that it’s a part of me.
I try to remember which song I was going to play next and glance down at my set list. I wonder if it’s worth bothering.
‘Play some rock, you fag!’
‘Come down the front and say it,’ I yell back.
I’m just using bad lines from movies now, not knowing what the hell I’m doing.
Mandy
I’m so confused by what’s going on that I’m stunned into complete inaction. What is this? What is happening?
A guy’s pushing his way to the front and for a terrible second I think he’s going to hit Tim and I feel like I can’t breathe, but then I realise he’s the man in charge of the bar. He’s handing Tim his guitar case and patting him on the back.
‘That’s it,’ Tim says into the microphone, his face flushed with anger. ‘Thanks for nothing, you tossers.’
He drops his guitar to the floor and feedback pierces through the venue.
Alice and I get up. I instinctively grab Tim’s hand. Alice picks up his abandoned guitar. She takes the lead and pulls me through the shocked people now gathered at the edge of the small stage. Tim is still talking to the manager, his hair wet with sweat and his eyes wild with rage. He looks at us like he hardly recognises us.
We hear him asking the man for his money.
‘What money? You used up all your payment when you got that round of drinks at the start. In fact you were a couple of dollars short, but I didn’t make you pay it.’
‘Wow, you’re such a great guy,’ Tim says. ‘I thought those drinks were complimentary.’
‘Free drinks! Who do you think you are? Robbie Williams? You’ve got to be joking, mate.’
‘Tim, let’s just go. Don’t worry about it,’ I say.
I can sense people are watching what’s going on, waiting for their chance to get involved. Alice starts to pull Tim gently towards the door and a guy lurches at her and grabs her by the sleeve of her dress.
‘C’mon, love, I don’t have a problem with you. It’s just your mate here who’s the weak prick.’
Tim spins around and snatches the guy’s hand away from her arm. ‘If you touch her, I’ll destroy you.’
‘Come at me, son. I’m right here.’
And we are right out of here.
I clutch the guitar case to my chest and we almost run out the front door, Alice grabbing Tim’s hand, his eyes darting about wildly.
‘Let him go,’ I hear someone say in the background. ‘Not even worth bashing a little shit like that.’
Out the front, we see a group of young guys standing around, but none of them seem to have seen what went on, which is a relief.
Alice tells a security guard to make sure nobody follows us and he waves us away, not looking overly concerned. We see a taxi down the other end of the hotel and stumble towards it with all Tim’s gear, only to find the cabbie sitting on the bonnet having a smoke.
‘We need to leave straight away,’ Alice says, and this time she’s taken seriously.
He nods, stamps out his cigarette efficiently and unlocks the doors for us. Escape. I don’t look back as we speed away into the piercing cold night air and I feel my heartbeat readjust and return to something like normal.
We get to the hotel and it’s classically dodgy, all peeling paint and flickering fluorescent lights. The cigarette-vending machine is almost empty and I have to settle for Camels. When we get to the room, it stinks of smoke and smacks of desperation and loneliness, of travelling salesmen watching late-night porn. A dirty hotel in a dirty old town.
I’m still shaken as we watch TV on the double bed. There’s a double and two singles. Tim says they told him it had four single beds when he booked it for us and his friend. We joke that he’s full of shit, but nobody’s laughing. But who knows? I suddenly feel like I don’t know him as well as I thought.
Alice goes to the bathroom to change into her vintage pyjamas and we both laugh at her when she emerges. I instantly feel bad when I see her face crumple for a second. I’ve never bothered buying pyjamas, let alone extravagant and old-fashioned ones like hers. I always just sleep naked or in clothes I don’t like any more.
You’re the Kind of Girl I Write Songs About Page 12