Page 5 of Backstage

“I love that song,” I say, still sipping from my cup of cappuccino and remembering what a wonderful feeling it gives me when I play it alone in my room with the acoustic guitar.

“They’ll wish they never wrote it.” He’s amused by that idea and somehow it puts me in a good mood.

“Do you really think they’ll do it? I don’t think they spend their lives watching videos when they can be out with a different woman every night.” I smile.

“Probably, but I guess the selection of the hundred bands that will pass the first round they will watch it too. I mean, they’ll have to go on tour with whoever wins, I trust they have more say than we can imagine. I guess they don’t want to ruin their image by showing up with a band that’s not up to it.”

I’m following his reasoning, and it’s a good point. At that level of fame, they can’t afford to mess up, especially when they’re competing with other bands that are almost as famous as they are on the charts. We live in the age of the internet and a thousand opportunities. If they don’t work continuously to stay on the crest of the wave, someone will come along and kick them off into oblivion. Years ago, it was harder to make your way in the music business, but once you got to the top, you could enjoy lasting fame. Today all you need is a YouTube channel and the right equipment to get noticed; but once you get to the top, you have to fight to make sure that the latest idol doesn’t knock you down.

“So now all we have to do is make a video of ‘Jude’?” I ask him after a silence that seems endless.

Luke turns to look at me with his lips arched upwards. “Are you sure? I don’t want you to do this because you feel guilty.”

I nod and smile at him in return. I’m not sure, but I can always try. “Like you said, there are going to be thousands of bands in it, and I can do a video with no problem...and then if they choose us...I don’t know, I don’t want to think about it, or I lose my nerve.” I can give them a video. At least I owe them that much.

“That’s my girl,” he whispers in my hair before giving me a light kiss on the head.

*

If I could go back to the moment when I said, “shooting a video isn’t that difficult,” I’d like to slap myself on the back of the head like my grandfather used to do when I was a teenager after doing something stupid. Maybe it’s because I’m nervous, knowing that our version of the song will be heard by the same people who wrote it and sang it perfectly, maybe it’s because I’m afraid of the consequences of our participation.

Still, we find ourselves filming it for the seventeenth time in a row. Once, Martin is too far away and out of shot, another time Luke turns around and drops the microphone, yet another time we realize that when he dropped the mic, the cable got slightly detached, so Luke’s voice was dropping out. We can’t get a decent take that doesn’t make us look like fools. You can’t enter a competition for a tour with the most famous band in the world without showing you can stand on stage and do a little show.

“If it doesn’t go well this time, I’ll hang myself with the guitar strings, I’m warning you,” says Martin, the drama queen of this band, sitting in front of the computer and downloading the footage from the camera.

“You’re always so overdramatic. My hands are bleeding from tapping my sticks on the fucking drum kit! Don’t complain.” Taylor gives him a light shove.

Martin shows him the blood coming out of his fingertips. I feel sorry for them. It’s my fault that we haven’t been able to make a decent recording for hours, because apart from the initial inconveniences, most of the videos we’ve deleted because we could only see my back. I look down at my shattered fingertips as severely as theirs and put my hands in my pockets. I have no right to complain.

Luke starts the recording and, this time, our sound isn’t bad. We even manage to channel the desperation of the song how we wanted to, maybe because we really are desperate playing it for the umpteenth time.

“Look, we can see Lilly’s face at least a couple of times. It’s a big achievement.” Martin jokes, giving me a bear hug and almost crushing me. He never does things halfway, and ever since he started going to the gym and getting in shape for the girls, when he hugs me it’s become a problem.

“Moore, you’re choking me,” I cry out with a grimace of pain.

“Look, we’re not going anywhere without a bass player,” Taylor comes in and winks at me.

Martin lets me go, and, as the song comes to an end, we look at each other questioningly, ready to hear what the others think.

Luke speaks first: “We’re between great and almost perfect. It was worth investing in a decent mixer and microphones that don’t sound like empty cans. At least on this video we don’t sound like amateurs, not like the first ones we recorded. I’d say we can upload this one to their website,” he says convincingly.

A chorus of “yes, definitely” and “upload that video” and “let’s not think about it anymore” fills the room, expressing all our frustration at the mere idea of reshooting it. Luke cuts the start and end piece where we turn the camera on and off and then clicks on the link that allows us to upload to the site.

“It’s going to take a while before we upload it. The site is slow, probably clogged with all the files they’re throwing in...beer?” he asks, turning to us.

We grab the cans from Martin’s backpack, the ones his older brother gets him since we still have a year left before we can drink legally. We climb up to the roof tucked into our heavy jackets, the cold air whipping our faces as darkness descends on the New York City skyline.

We sit on the worn-out chairs we brought here years ago. The terrace is a flat expanse of concrete that covers the three-story building of the basement where we rehearse. Nobody ever comes up here. It’s bare, there’s not a shred of shade in the summer when the scorching sun hits this concrete slab in the early morning, and there are no walls to protect us from the icy air that scourges this weathered place in winter. The view, however, is priceless. In front of us stands the Manhattan skyline with its lights and silhouettes of skyscrapers. The fancy lifestyle we experienced only a few times, and for too little, when we went to concerts in clubs that cost us months of savings.

“I wonder where the Jailbirds are now,” Martin whispers, more of a consideration than a question. His empty gaze makes me think he didn’t realize he’d said it out loud.

“Fucking models,” laughs Taylor.

Only a river divides us, but our lives couldn’t be more different. Them with luxury apartments on top of some Manhattan skyscrapers, us still living at home with our parents in the hive-like housing projects. Them in a life of luxury and glitz, us with ninety-cent beers from the supermarket. Them, super famous with a different girl every night, us having difficulty finding someone who wants to be with losers.

“Can you imagine if we win? We could have a different model every night too.”

“Don’t let it go to your head, Moore. You’re a loser, you’ll be on the other side of the East River too. With that ugly mug you’ve got.” Luke makes us all laugh.

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