The Boiling of the Bones

24. Big Break

One of the clubs was run by mafia guys as a front organization for drug dealing and money laundering. We overheard a guy threaten to break somebody's legs and bury him alive. But he never bothered us. He had a very cool club and always paid on time. Once we got bigger, we could play better clubs and be pickier about our venues.

One night Mike from the record label came to one of our shows. Afterward he came up on stage and offered us a contract. Everyone was excited. We all agreed. It was unanimous.

"Cool guys I'm excited to work with you. Do you guys have any original stuff?"

Jerry spoke up.

"Not yet. I've been working on some stuff."

I nodded.

"I've got a few ideas too."

"Great. Write some songs and work on some original material. I think you should work some of them into your shows, and as soon as you have something you're proud of, let's get together and talk again. I'm anxious to get something recorded."

I spent every spare minute I had over the next few months revising and putting together song ideas. I had three I felt good about. When I presented one about falling rain to the band, the guys hated them. It was frustrating. Nobody else was even trying. I was spending lots of extra time and putting more energy into the band's success than any of the other members.

I went back to the drawing board and wrote some more stuff. I hastily cobbled together some cheesy stuff that was raw and edgy about fast living, women and cars. They loved it.

Finally, we were getting somewhere. We put the lyrics to music and modified it and practiced, and when we were ready, we took it to the recording studio. We had to do twenty takes to get it right. We spent an entire day in the studio—about eighteen hours. Eventually we got something down on tape we were all proud of. We sent a copy to the record label guys and they hated it. It was so frustrating.

But we were playing lots of shows and the crowds loved our covers of ZZ Top, AC/DC, Metallica and a whole line up of classic rock. These guys were all super talented musicians. Our drummer Cooper, really wanted to cover, Come With Me Now, by the Kongos, so he learned to play the accordion in like two weeks. Not to be outdone, I purchased an electromatic jet baritone guitar, and we added that song to our repertoire.

Playing shows was fun. The crowds were getting bigger and more enthusiastic, so in some ways life was getting better. We started playing clubs farther and farther from home. We travelled as far as Philly and Boston and moved up to better venues, but we played mostly in bars popular with college kids.

The rest of my bandmates loved the rock star lifestyle. They drank heavily during and after shows. On a Monday morning we got back from a trip to Baltimore where we played three shows in a weekend. We played Friday, Saturday and Sunday night, all to packed crowds. Once we unpacked up our gear from the van, I asked about my cut of the money. We divvied it up and they gave me thirty-seven dollars. I was expecting ten times that much. But they said after hotels, food, gas, and everything, all the money was gone.

"I thought we were charging two thousand dollars per show?"

"Yeah, we did man. We brought in six grand."

"We couldn't have spent that much on food and stuff."

He chuckled.

"Well, we went through a lot of alcohol."

I didn't think it was fair, because I didn't have a drop of it. I looked over the receipts. Sure enough, they'd spent three thousand dollars at the liquor store. They were drinking Cristal champagne, and Hennessey cognac, dropping two hundred dollars per bottle on some of the stuff.

"Why can't you guys just drink beer or cheap wine instead of all this expensive stuff?"

"We're rock stars man. We don't drink that monkey piss. We drink the best."

The other guys smiled and nodded. They gave a few high fives. I was disgusted. It was unfair I had to chip in for their alcohol. They were living like we'd made it and were huge stars, but we still didn't even have a song of our own. It's not like we got any radio play. I felt like they were getting ahead of themselves, too big for their britches.

In frustration, I took my gear and walked off toward the subway to go home. A week later, two of the guys got in a big argument. It was over the silliest thing too. They both thought the other wasn't pulling his weight. Neither was doing half the work I was. Others jumped in with additional points of contention and pretty soon everyone was yelling at everyone else like a bunch of spoiled two-year-old's having a temper tantrum meltdown. They refused to play. So, we broke up and wouldn't talk to each other. We cancelled a couple shows we had lined up. Then three weeks later, they patched things up over drinks, and just like that, we were back together again.