The Music of the Spheres

by Allister Thompson

  A crowd was already thronging the neon-bathed entrance of Elysian Fields, which was located in an old fish-packing plant. It was an ugly box of a building. Wreathed in the greenish mist and pot smoke, the leather-jacketed and bell-bottomed young people gathered around the doorway looked like ghosts released from a murky hell. They had even started a couple of bonfires to keep warm in the unseasonably cold early fall temperatures. Hastings smiled; this had easily been one of the band’s most successful stands since moving to New York from London. Television appearances had helped raise their profile in the colonies to the point where they were verging on stardom. The recent appearance on Virginian Concerthall had been of particular benefit; Guy had sounded off with pretentious certitude in the interview portion about the youth movement’s hatred of the mannered musical classicism of their parents’ generation. Guy had no doubts whatsoever about his self-proclaimed position as the spokesman/prophet of this new generation. The band members had decided to wear some extremely colorful Chinese silks for the occasion.

  The short-back-and-sides, tweet-clad interviewer, Philip Crump-Henderson, one of the pillars of the Empire’s intellectual establishment, had shown a great deal of snide condescension toward The Spheres’ musical efforts.

  “Mr. Calvert, I will come directly to the point, and I must ask you whether you really believe that this thing you call your music, which to the trained and sensitive ear seems to be nothing but a deafeningly loud static, with one or two recognizable chords popping up out of that horrible mire now and again, is as artistically and spiritually satisfying as the timeless work of, say, a Salieri, Gregorovich, or a Humperdinck? Some might say, including perhaps myself, that the claims of the new pop groups to artistic legitimacy are not only unfounded, but actually laughable.” He leaned back in his seat with an appropriately derisory chuckle, twitching his dyed mustache, adjusting his cravat, and looking very satisfied.

  Guy, however, lived for this sort of argument and for the shock caused by the erudition coming from his scruffy exterior. “The world of classical composers,” he replied, sucking demurely on a Silk Cut, “reflects accurately the purpose for which it was created, purposes which are thankfully now becoming obsolete. The pieces composed by your beloved Humperdinck were largely commissioned by rich patrons, the aristocracy, to provide courtly entertainment for the fellow members of the oppressor class. They weren’t even likely intended to be great works of art, so it’s ironically amusing to observe the veneration that people like you show them. Meanwhile, the vast majority of humanity lived short and brutish lives outside the gates. This upper-class music has no soul, no artistry. It was created with neither love nor passion.

  “It’s only time, Mr. Crump, that has afforded this music its fame. That’s why bloated old windbags like yourself worship at the altar of a time when people like yourself, or at least you imagine so, had the rest of us under control, although I personally doubt you have a single drop of aristocratic blood in your veins.”

  Crump made a spluttering noise, but Guy talked right over him. “Now, our music is a direct, emphatic rejection of values such as yours and an embrace of freedom and beauty. It requires a completely new mindset to appreciate. It’s no surprise at all that you and I can’t agree on the artistic merit of my works.” He sat back, fluttered his long eyelashes, and smiled.

  The Spheres were not invited back to Virginian Concerthall.

  The cab pulled around the rear of the club, where Hastings tipped the driver handsomely and autographed his hot dog wrapper. Jerzy, the band’s hulking Polish roadie/bodyguard, was guarding the back door. With a swagger in his step, Hastings entered the murky depths of Elysian Fields.

  TWO

  Aside from a one-sided brawl between some of The Asparagus Stalks and Muttonchop Killers, resulting in a couple of puffy lips and black eyes, the early sound checks were uneventful, and all was ready for the evening’s extravaganza. While Jerzy laboriously tuned up the guitars and laid out the items that Electron Z would strike throughout the set, the lighting crew tested their gear and made sure that nothing would be set alight. The Spheres relaxed at a corner table. Asparagus Stalks plus a twelve-hippie-girl entourage, all dressed in white robes, were meditating en masse in another corner, trying to regain their composure; The Spheres respectfully ignored them. A faint, chanted “om” floated across the room every now and then.

  The C-Enhancer had settled quite nicely into Hastings’ consciousness. He viewed the room through a rosy veil, and he could feel his synapses crackling with pleasurable thoughts. Puffing on a massive spliff, he laughed loudly at each and every joke that came to his ears. Guy had already managed to inject several different substances into his pockmarked left arm, but he had run out of juice early and was starting to get grumpy.

  “Yewd betta lay off her a woile anyways, Guy,” The Hammer advised with sleepy concern. “We don’t need yer goin’ wonky onstage agin, mate.” His six-foot-five frame was crammed under the table, and his deep-set eyes were hidden under his huge, frizzy mop of red hair. The Hammer preferred to stick to good, old-fashioned ale, being conservative in many respects — except where music and sex were concerned. In those areas he could be uncomfortably radical. The portion of the table in front of him was filled with empty pint glasses.

  “Edmund, would you kindly go and fuck yourself?” Guy disposed of his last needle with a flourish. “Christ, you’d think the stuff was still addictive, eh? Well, someone will come along with a fix soon enough, I daresay. One of our ‘fans’!”

  Even when speaking disparagingly, Guy Calvert could make a person feel very special. Though his charm and charisma were most certainly affected, the rock and roll masses of Virginia had thus far taken quite well to his exaggerated persona; he was the hero of the moment, the intellectual leader of a cultural revolution. The Wilson brothers could never compete with an image like Guy’s. His golden blond hair and trim beard were pinned to the bedroom walls of thousands of “delinquent” teenage girls who took the free-love message to heart. And almost anyone could see that under the top layer of bravado a very serious, concerned person held sway. The only chink in the armor in which he had enclosed himself was the fact that without a steady diet of new and unusual chemicals in his system, Guy became completely uninspired and couldn’t write or perform at all. Not all dependencies were physical in nature, after all.

  “Suit yerself. Yer me fuckin’ meal ticket, after all, ain’t ye? Oi wouldn’t want to lose me plum situation.” The Hammer was unusually surly tonight, even for him, Hastings thought as he guffawed lustily as this exhibition of rudeness.

  “Now, now, lads, let’s relax here,” Marty drawled. He was dressed in his usual full aviator’s uniform, complete with goggles. Marty was the band’s moderator, as well as #2 finalist in Four-String Enthusiast’s annual bass poll, just behind Jacques Bruce of La Crème. “We’re here to blow minds, not our cool. As long as Simon comes down from his lovely cloud sometime this week,” he added pointedly.

  They all stared at Hastings, who was trying to pull himself together. Maybe he should have turned down that last hit. “Don’t … orry … bt … me,” he managed to force out. His mumble was greeted by roars of laughter.

  “Excuse us, please, we’re trying to astral project over here, all right? Can we get some peace and quiet?” shouted an Asparagus Stalk from across the room, attempting to sound forceful, which only made The Spheres laugh louder. Hastings, who hadn’t even heard the complaint, had no idea what he was laughing at, but he practically fell out of his chair.

  “My apologies, my brothers and sisters,” Guy said gravely. “We would never interfere with your search for the direct path to bliss here in this slimy back room, would we, chaps?” His bandmates shook their heads, suppressing giggles.

  The tension was broken by the arrival of Billy Prestwick, the manager of both bands. His electric wheelchair burst suddenly through the back door. Waving cheerily at the Stalks, Prestwick zoomed over to The Spheres’ table. “Taunting tho
se poor buggers again, are we?” he screeched in his astonishingly high, gravelly voice, gesturing grandly. “I prefer that all the horses in my stable prance together. Go navel-gaze for a while with them, Hammer, make ’em happy.” Hastings started laughing again. “What the hell’s the matter with this one? Too much of the good stuff today, eh?”

  Billy put an arm around Hastings in a fatherly manner. “Don’t make us set you up with a downer, boyo. Won’t be much of a gig for you then.” He scratched his goatee and oversized sideburns. Despite being confined to this chair, Billy was a perpetual whirlwind of energy, truly the Svengali of the New York scene. The rumor around town was that he had once been a policeman before his injury, but it was unsubstantiated.

  Raised voices at the other end of the room saved Hastings from having to attempt a reply and be subject to further ridicule. A small, olive-skinned man with longish, greasy black hair and dressed in a white zoot suit was arguing with Jerzy, trying to gain entrance to the room. He certainly didn’t look like the average hippie punter. The man was carrying a large rucksack. Billy wheeled over to check out the situation.

  “Listen, my friend, I only want to offer my wares to these nice gentlemen. I’ve got only the best licensed Colombian pharmaceuticals.” His esses were sibilant, and he drew out the word “pharmaceuticals” for an uncomfortably long time. There was something persuasive in his Latin accent.

  Jerzy loomed menacingly over him, the veins of his forehead popping and his crew cut bristling. “I don’t care what you selling, scumbag. No one comes in here before doors open, you got that? Scram!”

  But Guy’s ears had pricked up, having caught the magic p-word. “I say, bring the chap on over here, Billy! Let’s see what he’s got!” he called, his eyes sparkling.

  “As you like, Dionysius! Off you go, then,” Billy said to the little man. “More fuel for the fire, eh, boys? What a night this will be!”

  The Asparagus Stalks had by now left the room in a huff, and the light and sound crew had finished their testing and gone to dinner, so The Spheres were the only potential customers in the room. The little man slid over to their table.

  “You’ll like what I have here, my friends! The latest new products from South America, only recently approved by the authorities and ready for testing by connoisseurs! Brought to you at only slightly higher prices.” He unfastened his bag and began to pull out sachets and bottles. Guy gaily rubbed his hands in anticipation, but the rest of the band looked skeptical.

  The labels did look official — all Colombian Cartels products.

  “Oi don’t fink this is a very good idear,” The Hammer rumbled. “You can get perfectly good stuff at the bar when it opens, or at the chemist’s. We don’t know if this stuff is the real deal, or where ’e got it.”

  The dealer shifted his weight a little at this but otherwise remained deadpan. But the rest of the band rolled their eyes at The Hammer’s characteristic hand-wringing; Guy actually seemed irritated, a rather rare occurrence.

  “For God’s sake, man, haven’t got any bloody spirit in you? It’s not like the chap’s going to poison us, is it? Wouldn’t be good for business. I don’t have time to run to the chemist’s, and the pharmaceutical bar won’t be open for ages. Do you want to see how I’ll perform with empty veins?”

  “Bloody drummers, all the same,” Marty put in tiredly. Hastings’ head was starting to clear a bit, and he too regarded the drugs spread out on the table with interest. Electron Z, who had little regard for drugs, conversation, and human company in general, had wandered over to the stage to reinspect his props and shape his pompadour.

  Muttering something about it being their own fucking lives, The Hammer stormed off to the booze bar in the front room to get another bitter, and the rest of the band began examining the wares.

  “What’s this?” Guy had picked up vial of attractive golden liquid. “Haven’t seen this one before.”

  “Ah, that is the very finest new product of the Colombian Cartels group: Cortezuma #1,” the dapper salesman pronounced with a flourish. “Guaranteed to produce a beautiful high, accompanied not only by feelings of elation but also great strength. Like cocaine, but much, much better.” His sibilants really were very … reptilian, Hastings thought. “And those tablets you hold in your hand there, sir,” gesturing at Marty, “are a crystallized peyote product, a recipe borrowed from the Navajo. An ancient recipe for a modern age.”

  “Smashing!” cried Guy. “Navajo! I’ll take two of each. Any for you, Billy, Simon, Marty?”

  “None for me,” Billy said. “I’ve got a lot of people to talk to, all on your behalf, of course, and I’ve got to be on my best behavior. You chaps’d best get backstage. The doors’ll be opening soon. Take your little pills and potions with you.”

  “I’ll pass too,” Hastings said, adding, “thanks, anyway,” with his usual politeness. His mum, God rest her, had raised him to be nice. “Still coming down from the CVE, and I don’t go for mixing.” Truth be told, something was nagging at him, telling him not to partake, but he was still feeling too muddled to analyze the feeling.

  “Suit yourself, love,” Marty said, handing a few bills to the dealer, who was still wearing his smile but had fixed his rat-like eyes on Hastings with disturbing intensity. “Something new and special for after the show.”

  “It was a pleasure serving you, gentlemen. Until next time.” He gave Hastings another odd, hateful look and then slithered across the room and out the door, followed by Jerzy’s suspicious gaze.

  “All right, lads, let’s go back. Immediately! Do what you need to do there! Come on, Hammer.” Billy led the procession backstage to the green room, The Hammer trailing reluctantly with a pint of bitter in each hand.

  *

  By nine thirty, the room was packed to the rafters, and the doormen were turning away unhappy punters. The leading lights of the scene were all hanging out by the bar: Ricky California was there, known as the “White Hendricks,” and Buckley and Drake, the star folk duo. Lenny Lurch was hanging out in a corner with Twink the mad drummer, Ludwig Froese of synth band Orange Soma, Rick Taggert of The Kidney Stones, and a few beat poets. Exotic-looking short-haired girls with sparkles on their faces and spliffs in their fingers and preening long-haired men engaged in idle banter while The Pretty Things’ latest LP blared over the loudspeakers. The alcohol bar was doing a roaring trade, as was the now-open pharmaceutical counter. There was barely room to move in Elysian Fields, a massive rectangular space, the back wall of which was taken up entirely by the mixing set-up and lighting equipment, with even a few newfangled lasers awaiting their deployment.

  Backstage, Guy was already scaling the heights of drug-induced ecstasy, and his bandmates were becoming a little concerned that he had prematurely shot his proverbial load. He was talking rapidly, tripping over his own words, had already managed to insult Ned Loogeant’s rabid (supposed) right-wing views several times (never a good idea if you liked your teeth), and was presently involved in a somewhat nonsensical philosophical discourse with Frank Smith, a.k.a. Baba Yogi, leader of The Asparagus Stalks. Hastings sat quietly with Electron Z and Marty at the minibar, injecting a quick hit of No-Catch Cocaine from the legitimate pharma bar to try to restore his energy by set time.

  “Listen, old chap,” Guy declaimed heartily, “I am totally simpatico with your musical and spiritual goals, much more so than those of that Neanderthal over here.” He gestured at Loogeant, who glared back. “The purpose of music isn’t to enrage people in some superficially cathartic way — it’s to peel back the layers of untruth and materialism in which we cloak ourselves, thus revealing the naked truth of what we are. Only then can we feel true empathy.”

  Baba Yogi bowed slightly. “Thank you, my son.”

  “Frankie, don’t ‘my son’ me. I know you’re only twenty-five. You’re younger than me!” Guy threw an arm around the baba and raised his bottle to the ceiling. “Ah, if only we could truly mirror the beauty we see when we gaze into the night sky, eh?
I’m serious! To capture the essence of the infinite … the immortal significance of the universe in a couple of chords and a few verses of doggerel. To connect with, to contact that something…” He trailed off for a few seconds and became sober. “Do you feel it sometimes? That you’re nothing, but that state of nothingness is so beautiful, so perfect, and that you’re channeling the beyond, that you’ve been chosen to mirror this infinite perfection?”

  “All the time,” Baba Frank said placidly, his hands folded across his bosom.

  “Bollocks!” yelled The Hammer. He was already completely soused and was deliberately hanging out with the Muttonchop Killers faction.

  Hastings smiled. He was not unappreciative of mysticism and often attempted to take refuge in its mild but muddy waters, but he was a natural cynic, unable feel the same naïve enthusiasm as Guy. Hastings suffered from a kind of permanent existentialist morbidity that affected his life every day. Until he understood how and why he, a mere collection of atoms, could perceive the fact of his own existence but not its meaning, he would never be happy. Guy snidely called this “adolescent melancholy,” but hell, it had made for a few good lyrics.

  Guy continued to stare up at the plastic yellow stars glued haphazardly to the cobwebbed ceiling. “I feel that tonight is going to be very special, Simon, Marty … I think we’re going to break through. I can make these people fly! The drugs aren’t enough. We have to provide the release through our music! This could be the night I’ve always waited for. Mind you, I always say that, don’t I? We have to — ow!”