by El Topo

What a freakshow of a night it was. The band was totally lame. But that in itself had a certain charm. The appeal of mediocrity I guess.

Okay, so I showed up at Scotty’s at seven like I was supposed to. We were going to wait for the neighbours, who would be joining us on this night of contrived merriment. They were due at seven-thirty. How they could be late, coming all the way from across the street, was beyond me, but they were. A thoroughly uninteresting couple, by the way, so I can see why the Raffertys liked them.

The plan was we'd have dinner then go to the rehearsal studio. We get to Chili's, or maybe it was T.G.I. Fridays, and the hostess says, "It'll be about twenty minutes." That gave us a moment to get a drink at the bar. Of course, one drink turned into four, which was concurrent with the twenty minutes stretching into seventy before our table was actually ready.

Our waiter took an appetiser order and promised to be back in a minute once we'd browsed the menus. Thirty minutes after that, he showed up again "are you ready to order?" We all laughed hysterically, demanded our appetiser, and the check. He brought the tray of tepid Buffalo wings, the bill and disappeared again without a word.

We ended up at a 7-11 in an East Long Beach ghetto near the studio. Snoop-Dogg and the Eastsidaz panhandled (rather indignantly, I might add) in the parking lot. I went in and bought the cheapest, fattest, greasiest hot dog they had, covered it in relish and jammed it down my gullet. We chilled for a moment in the parking lot, which seemed the status quo, considering the neighbourhood, until the girls grew fairly frightened and demanded we leave.

Shortly thereafter we arrived at the studio. They played the same song about thirty times. Maybe it was a different song. I couldn't tell. I just kept drinking the MGD Scotty had picked up at the liquor store. I'm not going to go into how awful they really were. But let me say, the "band" consisted of a drummer (who, by the way, was so loud, one couldn't hear much else), a guitarist, the lead singer (and apparent mastermind), and a back-up singer. Of course, they played to mostly pre-recorded backing tracks, which, as I mentioned before, one couldn't really hear.

This din went on for hours, maybe even days. A couple times "guest vocalists" from various side-projects of the boy-genius lead singer appeared in the studio to give their 'star search' best behind the mic. Of course I use the term "boy-genius" only for lack of anything more appropriate, as he wasn't a boy so much as an ageing old queen in too-tight pants and an alleged $800 shirt. And what is it about would-be rock stars and their need to tell you the market value of their shirts?

Between songs, we were treated to little 'behind the music' moments as Mr. Tighty-Pants explained what all the songs were about, between continued thanks for the "audience" coming out to support him. Maybe he was rehearsing his on-stage patter too, as there was only a handful of bored (well, I was anyway) friends squinting in the dark. Things wound down and we all went out to the parking lot. At last, I could go and get some food, and maybe some sleep.