Getting in Tune

by Roger L. Trott

“Sorry.” I put a remorseful look on my face. “But, look, we can set up fast.”

  That didn’t satisfy Beeber. “Who the hell do you think you are? My sound guys have been waiting around for an hour.”

  “Beeb,” Kitten broke in, “give the kid a break. They had to deal with some unexpected shit in town, O.K.? They’re here now.”

  Beeber’s beady eyes shifted to Kitten’s face, dropped to her half-unbuttoned shiny black polyester blouse, and then rotated back to me. “Look, buster,” he said, poking a finger at my chest, “I’d flush you guys down the toilet right now if Kitten wasn’t your manager. You fuckin’ missed your sound-check, and we’re opening the doors in a few minutes, so you’ll be mixed on the fly. But that’s your problem. You got thirty minutes of stuff?”

  I shoved down my rising anger. “Yeah.”

  “Well, keep it at thirty. These kids are here to see Heart, not you.”

  “Got it.”

  A bespectacled kid with a clipboard came out of nowhere and grabbed Beeber’s arm. “Heart’s wondering where their food is.”

  “Shit!” Beeber spun and waddled off with the kid toward a dressing room door at the rear of the stage.

  “See, kid,” Kitten said, squinting one eye at me, “it pays to be a bitch sometimes. You’d be shit outta luck without me.”

  I faked a grin. “You’re still a bitch.”

  “Still pissed off about last night, huh?”

  “Could be.”

  “Well, just cool off, kiddo. You and me, we’re goin’ places, and that chick would just be baggage.”

  I ignored her and pointedly turned my attention to the loading door, where Beanie and Cecil were hauling in what looked to be the last of Yogi’s cymbal stands. “I need to get back out front.”

  She held out the papers. “You need to sign these first.”

  “Sign what?”

  “It’s a contract for tonight. Beeb says you gotta sign it.”

  I took the papers and flipped through the four pages of tightly packed print. “Why so long?”

  “It’s the usual bullshit.” She pulled a Bic pen from a rear pocket of her jeans. “Just sign it.”

  “Hold on.” I glanced at the first page. Just the expected stuff about the date, location, fee, etc. Everything looked O.K.. Pages two and three seemed to have canned verbiage about liability, copyright issues, the promoter’s right to withhold payment for nonperformance. I turned to the last page and took the pen from her, positioning the signature line over the flattened palm of my left hand. I was about to sign when a dollar figure in the middle of the page caught my attention. I raised the page to my eyes.

  “Hurry up,” Kitten said. “You don’t have time to fuck around.”

  “Wait a second.” I read the line and the rest of the paragraph.

  Upon payment for the stipulated performance, the undersigned, as sole representative of the musical group known as the Killjoys, agrees to pay Kitten Wertz a sum in the amount of $60 per her prior oral management agreement with the undersigned. Furthermore, the undersigned agrees to a one-year management contract with Wertz, providing her with exclusive booking and promotional rights for the Killjoys....

  I looked up at her. “You get your buddy Beeber to put all this in here?”

  “Jesus, kid, it just puts into writing what we’ve already talked about.” Kitten’s hands went to her slender hips. “What’s the big deal?”

  Bells went off in my head. But what was the big deal? Kitten had come through on the Heart gig, just like she said she would, and Nita was already gone. So what was I worried about? But I looked at the contract again and saw the future with Kitten stretching out in front of me, and it didn’t include Rob and Sam. Deep down, I now knew that Kitten’s fifteen percent management fee wouldn’t include the true price of any success she could bring us. I had already paid part of the price last night when Nita shut the door on me. What other hidden costs would be included in this deal? I’d felt that the four parts of my quadrophenic self had been coming back together again, but I knew that Kitten could blow them apart in a second.

  I shook my head. “I’m not signing this now.”

  She pointed at the signature line. “Sign it. You ain’t playin’ tonight unless you do. Beeber’ll pull the plug on you if I tell him to.”

  I thought quickly. “Look, I’ll sign it after we get paid. I don’t trust Beeber. And why should I trust you after what you did last night?”

  She crossed her arms and stared at me. “Don’t you learn, kid? Last night was about something else.”

  “Yeah? Well, how will it help you if Beeber pulls us?” I glared at her. “Then you’d have nothing.”

  Her chin jerked up, and the vein running along the side of her throat tightened. After a long pause, she reached out and snatched the contract out of my hand. “Still think you’re a smart guy, huh, Daniel? O.K. After the show then. But if you don’t come through, you’re history with Astley and every other promoter who books this circuit. Got it?”

  She spun on the heels of her white cowboy boots and stomped off. I realized I’d been holding my breath and sucked in a gulp of air.

  HEART GOT THE big dressing room at the rear of the auditorium. None of us ever saw it, but we assumed it was huge based on the platters of cold cuts and cartons of booze being carted in and out of the room. People came and went through the door to the dressing room, but we never saw the sisters Wilson.

  We Killjoys got five pink molded plastic chairs in the wings, where the roadies and sound men tromped around us, taping down stray cords and checking connections. The chairs were circled and we had our instruments out, empty cases on the floor within the circle. We were going through the motions of tuning, but what we were really doing was sweating collective bullets.

  Ten minutes till showtime. I’d tossed back a couple of cross-tops, and they were kicking in. I already had that twisty feeling of way-too-high optimism and out-of-control terror. Evangeline had shown up a few minutes earlier and disappeared into the crowd at the foot of the stage with Beanie and Cecil. Balancing my guitar on my lap, I lit a cigarette, my last until our set was over, and peered out into the narrow slice of the auditorium visible from my chair. The floor area was packed with people sitting cross-legged on coats and blankets. Some spaces remained in the bleachers, but they were filling up fast. Kitten had told me that the place held 1,200 people, but it looked like way more than that were already packed into the auditorium. A haze of tobacco and marijuana smoke hung in a misty layer above the audience. Led Zeppelin’s Immigrant Song blasted from the PA. speakers, and the stage vibrated to the rhythm of John Paul Jones’s thumping bass line.

  Sitting across from me, wearing his thick glasses and studying our seven-song set list with a pen in his hand, Mick was hunched over, his foot tapping away much faster than the tempo of the Zeppelin song. Beside me, Rob was plugged into our small battery-operated tuner and was making adjustments to his bass. On the other side of him, Sam sat slumped down in his chair, nervously opening and closing valves on his tenor sax. Sitting next to Mick, a barefooted Yogi was staring vacantly up at the ceiling, whapping a drumstick against his thigh with one hand and clutching a half-eaten Big Hunk bar with the other.

  Mick looked up from the set list. “This bleedin’ thing needs to be changed.”

  “What?” I breathed out a lungful of cigarette smoke. “Now?”

  “Why not?” He held the list out for me to see. “Look. Here in the middle. Radar Love. Doesn’t work.”

  I glanced at the list. Except for my songs, which we weren’t doing, we had no original material, so our idea was to play lesser-known covers, hoping that we could pass ourselves off as something other than a straight covers band. The one exception was All Along the Watchtower, which we were doing as a set opener in tribute to native son Jimi Hendrix. After that, things got more obscure, with the New York Dolls’ It’s Too Late, Bowie’s Rebel Rebel, the Velvet’s Sweet Jane, and Roxy Music’s Both Ends Burning. We’d decided
to end with an amped-up version of the Monkeys’ Steppin’ Stone, which sounded nothing like the original. But Mick was on to something. Right in the middle, between Rebel Rebel and Sweet Jane, we had the way-too-predictable Radar Love.

  “Maybe you’re right,” I said. “But it’s crazy to make changes now. And what would we do instead?”

  Mick’s eyes brightened. “Let’s put in that song of yours. The first one you did last night, right?”

  My heart began strumming against my sternum. “No way.”

  “C’mon, man, it kicks bloody arse. And we could really use an original in the set, see.”

  The pounding in my chest increased. “I thought you hated that punk stuff, and, anyhow, how do you know? You were passed out when we did it.”

  “I heard it,” Mick said. “And maybe I’m changing me mind about the punk stuff.”

  “Yeah, let’s do it.” Yogi stopped tapping. “That song was a blast.”

  “See?” Mick said.

  “You want me to sing it? What’ll you do?”

  “Play tambourine and shake me little bum for the birds.” He smiled. “What else?”

  I glanced at Rob for help, but he shrugged. “I’m with Mick on this one. It’s better than Radar Love.”

  “Bloody right.” Mick scratched out RADAR LOVE and wrote THRILL in big block letters.

  I started to protest again, but a huge roadie lugging a thick bundle of cords plodded past us and called out, “Five minutes, dudes. Be ready to go.”

  My bowels suddenly churned again. Was there time to use the john? I stood and took a step in that direction, but the door to Heart’s dressing room suddenly swung open. Two women, one dark haired, the other dishwater blonde, came through the door and looked in our direction. My bowels froze up, but my pulse took off at a gallop. They were coming right at me. Ann and Nancy Wilson.

  I managed to grunt out a warning to the other guys. The chairs behind me squeaked and slid and suddenly they were beside me. I couldn’t take my eyes off the two women.

  Ann Wilson, wearing a flowing black blouse, open at the throat and belted at the waist, reached us first. Her hair, cut in a long shag, feathered along the edges of her neck, was impossibly black and silky. “You must be the Killjoys,” she said in a throaty voice, her hooded eyes smoky cool.

  Nancy Wilson came up beside her and stopped with hands on boyish hips, waiting for one of us to say something. In the high cheek bones and rounded chins, I could see the resemblance between the two sisters, but Nancy was younger, lither, somehow looser. And where Ann’s persona, her aura, was darkness, Nancy was all light, from her blondish hair and pale eyes to her long-sleeved pearl-white blouse and faded jeans. She looked relaxed, ready to strap on a guitar and jam.

  Among the five of us, only Mick, who had slipped off his glasses, had the presence of mind to speak. “Aye, that’s us,” he said, grinning, “the Killjoys. And we know who you are.”

  Nancy frowned and glanced at Ann. “I thought Beeber said they were from California.”

  “The rest of us are,” I said, pushing my heart back down into my chest. “We don’t know where he’s from.” I tilted my head toward Mick and then shut my mouth. Christ, a lame joke. I didn’t know why I had said it.

  A look bounced between the sisters, and a smoldering half-smile appeared on Ann’s face. “Well, wherever you’re from,” she said, “thanks for opening for us. We heard you stepped in at the last minute.”

  “Yeah,” Nancy said, “we know it’s a tough gig opening for a name act. We were doing the same thing a year ago.”

  “Oh, please,” Mick said, going into an exaggerated bow, “it’s our pleasure.”

  I glanced at the other guys, and except for Yogi, who was staring at the sisters with a dazed expression, they appeared horrified by Mick’s cocky gesture. I looked back and noticed Kitten standing off to the side in the shadows. She was staring at me and frowning.

  But Nancy giggled at Mick’s gesture, long vertical dimple lines flashing below her fine cheek bones. “So what are you doing up here in Puente Harbor?”

  I angled my body between Mick and the Wilson sisters. “We just finished a week here at the Mai Tai Hotel.”

  One of Ann’s eyebrows arched high. “Oh, really? We know that place, don’t we, Nancy. Is Tom still there?”

  “Oh, yeah, he’s there.” I smiled, now knowing that Heart had played the Mai Tai.

  “Cheap as ever, I bet,” Nancy said. “Look, there’re better places to play around here. Check out the Aquarius Tavern in north Seattle or the Hatchcover in Bellevue.”

  “And Deeter’s,” Ann added.

  “And tell them we sent you.” Nancy dug into a pocket and pulled out a white guitar pick. Handing it to me, she said, “If they don’t believe you, show ’em this. They’ll treat you right.”

  The pick was embossed with a small heart encircling the initials NW I grinned. “Thanks. We’ll definitely check ’em out.” I glanced over at Kitten to make sure she had heard the offer. Her scowl told me she had.

  Beeber suddenly appeared at Ann’s elbow and glanced around at us with a sour expression indicating that he wasn’t too happy his stars were fraternizing with the likes of us. “Everything O.K., Ann?”

  Her eyes narrowed on him. “Sure, Bob. Just wishing the guys luck.”

  “Right.” Beeber glanced at his watch. “It’s about time for ’em to go on.”

  Nancy raised a fist of solidarity. “Knock ’em dead, guys.”

  “Yeah, do that,” Ann said, pausing to give us one more of her Mona Lisa smiles, “but leave a few breathing for us.” Nancy’s laugh trailed her as she followed Ann back to their dressing room. Beeber watched them leave.

  When the door to their dressing room closed, Kitten came up out of the shadows and put a hand on Beeber’s shoulders. “Everything cool, Bob?” she said.

  “Yeah, fine.” His tone was detached, as if his mind had left with the Wilson sisters. One hand rubbed at the belly of the T-shirt. “Your guys ready?” he asked Kitten. We had apparently become invisible.

  “They’re ready.”

  “O.K. I’ll announce ’em, then they’re on. The Killbobs, right?”

  “Killjoys, Beeb,” Kitten answered. “And they’re gonna kick butt, right guys?”

  Her question went unanswered.

  Beeber turned away and signaled toward a technician wearing a pair of headphones at the edge of the stage. Without another word, Beeber walked off in that direction and Kitten went with him. We headed back toward the plastic chairs to retrieve our instruments. The recorded music and the houselights lowered, and as they did, the sound of a thousand voices rose up in a pulsing, expectant hum.

  27

  BEEBER STOOD in the middle of the stage, a single white spotlight trained on his permed hairball of a head. Even from the side of the stage, where I stood with the others, my Fender strapped on tight, I could see the sparkling lines of sweat running down the side of his face. As if taking a cue from Beeber’s free-flowing perspiration, my entire body went damp and my arms and legs grew heavy and numb. Only my heart seemed to be working properly, and it was trying to rip its way through my chest.

  Beeber had just said something about Heart, and the crowd was shrieking in response. He paused while the noise abated. Our name was coming up. I took one last look around. Mick was bouncing up and down on the balls of his Adidases, but the other guys looked like they were waiting to go to the gas chamber. Somehow their ghastly expressions made me feel better, but not much. My hands were shaking, and I wished that I hadn’t taken the uppers. Rob was right: They were making me a mess.

  Sweat pooled above my eyebrows. I ran a sleeve across my forehead and looked out into the crowd, picturing myself in front of that dark mass of buzzing bodies. A breathless panic hit me, squeezing my heart. What were we doing here? We were nobodies. A wave of dizziness washed over me. My head started to float away. Keep breathing, keep breathing, keep breathing. I tried to conjure up Pete Townshend’s voice
, straining to hear his assuring words—Just play these chords, mate—but instead the chords to The Real Me ripped through my brain. The Real Me. Maybe this really was it.

  And then I heard Beeber’s overamped voice start into our introduction:

  ... and straight from California, an up-and-coming band... some calling them the new Rolling Stones ... days away from recording their first album...

  Christ, the bastard was making up shit about us! My brain slid sideways.

  ... here to get you warmed up for Heart, as if you needed it ... hah hah hah ... the... the ...

  He paused and looked over at us. Fuck! He had forgotten our name! I started to yell it out, but Kitten’s voice came from somewhere on the far side of the stage. Beeber glanced in that direction and then back out at the crowd.

  ... Give ’em a big welcome... the Killjoys!

  And we were on. Before I could move, Mick was out in front of me, virtually skipping across the stage to the center mike. Rob went by, Yogi, Sam. In slow motion, I moved toward my amp on the near side of the stage. Lights blasted on from everywhere, overhead, from out in front, from the side, pulsing colors, sudden heat. Nearly blinded, I managed to find the jack end of my cord and plug in, vaguely aware that the crowd, waiting for us to start, had already gone quiet.

  I accidentally hit my strings. Sound rocketed out, came back at me, went out again. Shocked, I started to turn down, but a disembodied voice came from somewhere: Don’t, we’ll mix you. I looked up, squinted, and saw the dim light of the sound board straight out and elevated in the middle of the floor. One of the sound guys waved at me.

  I turned my head and saw Mick with a microphone in one hand, pointing out into the crowd with the other. He was twitching, loaded for action. “Hey, Puente Harbor! Ready to rock‘n’ roll, mates? You better, ’cause we’re gonna do it to ya!”

  A smattering of claps, a few hoots.

  He glanced back. Almost in reflex, I nodded at him. The click-click-click of Yogi’s countdown cut through, and Mick called out, “This one’s for Jimi, wherever he is.”