Gang Of Losers
Chapter Seven
Theo didn't get hangovers. He woke up at ten o'clock the next morning perfectly refreshed and went downstairs to the living room. Both parents were reading sections of The Observer, and he could hear low-level music coming from Jon's room: Stevie Wonder's Songs in the Key of Life.
He made himself a breakfast of cornflakes followed by toast with marmalade and a cup of tea. So; on the agenda today was a lunchtime gig for Blues Train, followed by a wander down into Box valley to scope it out as a possible location for his art A-level coursework. In the meantime, he had Sunday morning to get through. This was his least favourite part of the weekend. Time seemed to stand still. And it was so... quiet.
When he had finished his breakfast he took the colour supplement of The Observer back to his room. He sat at his desk sipping his tea and leafing through the magazine. There was an article on women's volleyball. The article featured lots of photographs of women in their outfits. One photo was an action shot of a woman smashing the volleyball over the net. Her short skirt was raised up revealing muscly tanned legs and black knickers. The girl was stocky but pretty. She reminded him of the chewing gum girl from last night. He took the magazine to the bathroom and thought about her some more.
Shortly after, the phone rang. It was Mark Heritage. He wanted to give Theo a tape of the Steal Guitars set list for the upcoming gig at Moles. They arranged to meet at the White Hart later - Mark would come along and watch Blues Train and then hand over the cassette. The gig at Moles was on a Thursday four weeks from now. The band intended to practice twice-weekly until then, to get the set list as tight as possible. Steal Guitars were using this gig as a calling card to get a record deal - they had arranged for a film crew to record the gig (made up of students from the nearby art school) and had sent sent out invites to A&R men from all the major and minor record labels they could think of. The gig was being fly-postered heavily around Bath, Bristol, Chippenham, Lyncombe and the surrounding area.
At noon, Roger gave Theo a lift to the White Hart and helped him unload the drum kit from the car to the pub's stage. Theo always enjoyed being in the pub before 'the general public'- it gave him an enormous feeling of importance. He set up the kit the way he liked it - with each drum as far apart from the next as it could be. Theo felt that this offered more of a spectacle for the audience - to see Theo's sticks whizz from one drum to the next and then smashing into the too-high cymbals. He hated it when drummers just sat there immobile; with only the occasional cymbal wobble to remind you that they were there. Far better for the drummer to be a blaze of activity, spurring the other musicians and the crowd to move along with the music.
Once the kit was in place, he watched as the other musicians set about tuning their instruments. Drinks were ordered at the bar but Theo declined - he only liked to drink if he didn't have anything else to do for the rest of the day, and drumming required all his concentration. He treated himself to a Consulate though, watching the white smoke (much whiter than the smoke from regular cigarettes) waft up to the White Hart's darkly stained ceiling.
The Blues Train set list consisted of standards from blues greats like Stevie Ray Vaughan, BB King and Buddy Guy, as well as more accessible songs from Derek & The Dominoes, Led Zep and Steely Dan
Like most blues bands, the standard of musicianship was high, and each song had long complex solos from either Tim on lead guitar, Bob on keyboards or Geoff on bass. Theo had resisted all calls for him to do his own solos though - he found drum solos to be rather tedious and besides, he often got muddled and lost his footing when he tried them. Instead he made do with complex fills and rolls that broke at key moments in the other musicians' solos. At the end of the gig he always got a pleasingly loud cheer from the crowd when he was introduced.
But Theo had a problem, and it was one that was worrying him now. Although he knew himself to be an excellent drummer, he often had difficulty knowing exactly when to stop drumming. Especially in the long, meandering numbers that Blues Train specialized in. When Theo had first joined the band, he would keep the beat going when all the other players were slowing down towards the song's end. So a system had to be devised: Geoff, the bass player, would turn to look at Theo and nod at him as the final couple of bars began. Theo could then begin to wind the song down. Clearly he didn't want to keep the beat going when Mark Heritage was watching, so he double-checked with Geoff to be sure to nod his way when the songs were ending.
By 1pm the pub had started to fill nicely. The gig began with the traditional opener - Dust My Broom by Elmore James. Theo could see the odd disgruntled punter annoyed at having his peace shattered, but by and large the audience was appreciative. He played at half power, knowing that if he were to hit the drums at full whack there would be complaints to the landlord. But as the set progressed, the band got steadily louder until by encore time, they were blaring on all cylinders.
Another good thing about playing the drums was that you could sit there and just people-watch. As he played, Theo stared out at the scene in front of him: the lunchtime booze-hounds at the bar, the couples and their Sunday roasts, the loners nodding along, and of course his bandmates. He marvelled at their middle-aged forms: the paunchy stomachs, the balding heads, the scruffy facial hair. All wrapped up in corduroy trousers and short-sleeved shirts from Marks and Sparks. No way would he ever let this happen to him.
About half way through the gig, Theo spotted a leather-jacketed figure arrive and make its way towards the bar. Mark Heritage. He was holding hands with a girl in a flowing white dress and long blonde hair. The girl seemed quite hippy-ish, which surprised him.
He watched as Mark ordered himself and his girlfriend a drink, at which point Geoff looked back at him with a stern look on his face - he had started to play faster without realizing it. Once he had recovered, he felt confident enough to try some even more daring fills than usual and was gratified when he saw Mark look his way and raise his pint glass in appreciation.
After the gig Theo made his way to the bar where Mark was waiting for him. His ethereal girlfriend seemingly gone, at least for the moment.
"Nice set man."
"Cheers" replied Theo.
"There were some great numbers in there. We should do more bluesy stuff really, but it's just not that popular at the moment. I mean among our fans, they want stuff you can pogo to."
Theo smiled and nodded in agreement but couldn't think of anything to say.
Mark sparked up a Marlboro and reached in his jacket pocket and brought out a couple of cassettes. He held up one: "This one has got our set list on. The other..." he held up the other tape, "just has the drum parts which we recorded at a four-track studio recently." Theo took the tapes and thanked him. Mark finished off his pint and told Theo again how much he enjoyed the gig. As he left he said "Thanks again for helping us out."
"No problem." Theo watched him all the way to the exit.
So the afternoon trip to Box valley would have to go on hold - he had some drumming to listen to. Theo took the two tapes home and played them on the Panasonic music centre. Some of the songs were cover versions (Kansas City, Get Off my Cloud, Brown Eyed Handsome Man) but most of them were original songs with names like Freight Train Blues, Denim Baby, Bar Room Brawlers and Rocket Girl. Par for the course for Rockabilly songs, Theo guessed. The music was straight-forward compared to the Blues Train set: each song had the same fast tempo and consisted of an intro, a verse, a chorus, a second verse, a second chorus, a middle-eight (usually a guitar solo), a third verse and then an outro. Most songs came in at just over two minutes.
Because the formula for these songs was so simple, Theo was certain that he'd be able to follow them through all the way to the end and know exactly when to stop. None the less, he listened to the songs several times throughout the afternoon until he knew each one back to front. He even learned (and wrote down) the lyrics so he'd know when the first and second verses were being sung. Although the musicianship was perhaps inferior to the Blues
Train standard, these guys certainly knew how to get the best out of their instruments: the double-bass had a wonderfully boingy sound to it, as if it were being played underwater; the guitars had a real clarity and there seemed to be no effect pedals of any type to embellish the sound (in fact the guitar playing reminded him of Eddie Cochran's style). The drumming seemed fairly workman-like; a train beat pounding away on bass drum, snare drum and the occasional ride cymbal.
Next Theo listened to the drum-only tape. It started with a metronome ticking away and then the drum beat began. It sounded strange just hearing the drumming alone - you kept expecting the other instruments to join in at any time, but none did. The beat kept going - thump-di-whack, thump-di-whack, thump-di-whack - regular as could be. Topper Headon would have been impressed. After eight bars a new sound joined the snare drum. At first Theo assumed it was a tambourine, as this would have been a standard embellishment when the chorus began, but the more he listened, the less convinced he became that it was a tambourine. The sound was familiar, but Theo was certain that it wasn't a standard percussion instrument. He listened to more of the drum-only tracks, and there again in pretty much every song was the same sound. Like a tambourine but not a tambourine.
He sat at his kit pondering the strange sound - Chink Chink - what was that? And then it came to him; so blindingly obvious! Any drummer would know that sound! It was a hand tapping loose change in a pocket! How many hours had Theo spent tapping out rhythms using coin-filled pockets as substitute snare drums? And now someone was actually using that sound on a record (or a demo at any rate). How cool! Theo was filled with admiration for the ex-Steal Guitars drummer, and wondered for the first time what had actually happened to him.
Given the Heritage's reputation for brawling, Theo wondered if there had been a fight that ended with the ex-drummer battered and bruised in a pub car park somewhere. Is that why Justin had asked why he wanted to drum for "those assholes"? Maybe everyone knew that Steal Guitars were notorious drummer beaters!
But even if this were the case, it didn't trouble Theo. He knew that he would never get into a fight, not with the Heritage brothers or anyone else for that matter. Trouble of that nature seemed to avoid him. His friends constantly told him of beatings by older kids, either at school or on the weekends, or scraps with youths from the various council estates peppered around Lyncombe. But Theo had never even seen a fight, let alone been involved in one. In fact, Theo almost believed that such things didn't happen. Once, a year ago, he'd been threatened by a notorious local youth with tattoos on his hands and face. The youth demanded money and Theo responded that he didn't have any, holding the youth's gaze as he did so. All his friends assumed that Theo would get a smack in the face but instead he just said "Well make sure you have some next time I see you". Theo said okay, turned his back and walked away. And that was that. Since then, Theo assumed that physical violence would simply pass him by.
Besides, Mark seemed to genuinely like him. He had been pally at their lunchtime meet - congratulating him on the gig and saying hi to the rest of the band. He was a charming young man. Lee was a little more aloof, but Theo imagined that some unspoken brotherly bond would mean that Lee wouldn't rough up someone that Mark liked.