Entry #676327, added on 11-15-09 @ 9:59 pm EST
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Band Wars day. Their first live performance ever, it was being held by Mountain Park, an amusement park just outside of town. That meant another early morning and a short road trip.
Braden and all the gear was riding with Uncle Razz in his van, and the others were with Matt in his Mustang. They would have an enormous following: the guys had formed a Facebook group and fanpage, and told every single student and grad of Sir Winston Churchill to be there. Even better, Braden’s parents had promised to take time out from their busy lives and attend. Razzamatazz’s debut performance would be sold out.
They had indeed been practicing, Braden mostly with the recording playing in his headset so he could lipsync along, but sometimes he practiced his singing, too, since they would be making more recordings.
There were six bands in the Band Wars, and the winners would go on to compete in the regional Band Wars held by Sony in October, plus play at the Mountain Park season closing ceremony at the end of September. Regional winners were competing for a recording contract with the local branch of Sony, who would cut a full-length CD and promo video. It was almost too much to bear.
Their single had been on their MySpace page all summer, and was getting quite a following of SWC students and grads, so they expected a very large turn-out at Mountain Park. Since the Band Wars winner was chosen by audience response, they were a sure thing. Braden’s popularity at school was the best boost their band career could have.
“After this show, we’re going to cut your CD,” Uncle Razz said.
“I thought we would wait until the regional championships, and sign with Sony?” Braden asked.
Uncle Razz smirked. “I like your confidence, kid,” he said, “but we need to get your CD out there. Plus, the single cost a lot of money to produce; don’t you want to start getting some money back?”
“Selling CDs?” Braden asked. He didn’t see how anyone could make any money selling music. One CD gets sold, and everyone else downloads it using Limewire.
“Yeah, and playing at events. Back in the day, we made quite a lot of money playing events. We didn’t have our parents’ money to pay for things, so we had to earn money to cut our record. And it was vinyl, sweet black vinyl, not this plastic CD crap they use these days. You should have seen our record sleeve…”
“You still have one?” Braden asked.
“Of course, on my wall. And a box of them in the basement. They didn’t all get sold.”
Uncle Razz was dressed almost like a normal person today. He had his ripped jeans on, but his hair was tied back instead of frizzed out, and he was wearing a normal if faded Van Halen t-shirt and a denim vest. Ok, a normal old guy who had a rock band in 1984, but at least he had left the spandex and mesh in his closet.
They pulled in at the main gate of Mountain Park and Uncle Razz went to speak to security to find out where they could load in the equipment. Matt parked the car and the rest of them trotted up to the van.
The park wasn’t even open yet. One of the guards told Matt to leave his car in the parking lot and follow him, and the other showed Uncle Razz where to take the van.
Braden stayed in the van and watched his friends disappear through the park gates, high-stepping like geldings in their exuberance.
Uncle Razz said, “After this show, you’ll get some radio play, I’ll bet.”
“We’re already getting lots of fans just from MySpace,” Braden said.
“Yeah, of kids who already know and admire you,” Uncle Razz said. “This show’s going to introduce you to other people. And they’re gonna love you too!”
Braden smiled in sheer pleasure at the idea of doubling or even tripling his fan base in one afternoon. They had the perfect songs. They had the perfect faces. They were unstoppable.
There was a drum kit set up on the Mountain Park main stage. They were instructed to take the rest of their equipment into the back room, which was under and behind the stage. They would set up between bands, just before their turn. Other bands were there, and others were arriving. One group looked like your typical heavy metal band, four guys with long black hair, black eyeliner, and black studded clothing. Another group was all girls, but they didn’t look like one of those typical Spice Girls pop groups; these were bad girls. They had even more eyeliner than the heavy metal group. They were sexy, but in a kind of scary way. A couple of the bands looked like pretty normal people, dressed in normal clothes with normal hair and no make-up, except for a couple of normal girls in one of the bands, who had normal make-up and seemed quite pretty and nice.
One girl was wearing a knit toque, even though it was late August and a high of 25 was expected. She was really cute, and Josh moved in on her immediately. Braden followed Josh, in case the girl needed to be rescued from the lady-killer.
“’S’up?” Josh asked.
The girl, leaning against the stage and holding a bottled water, smiled at him. Girls always smiled at Josh. He was just so damn cute, like a teddy bear or a puppy dog, that people always felt warm and cuddly in his presence. This was an excellent effect to have on girls.
The other girl came over, too. She was cute, with long, straight brown hair and glasses. She had a subtle green streak in her hair, just off to the left side, and wore a forest green t-shirt which completely brought out her forest-green eyes despite the glasses.
“You in the Wars?” the first girl asked.
“Oh, yes,” Josh said. “We’re Razzamatazz.”
The girl nodded. “Thought so. ‘Turn up the Radio’,” she said.
Braden and Josh were surprised. “You’ve heard of us?” Josh asked, awed that they had fans they’d never even seen.
“Of course,” the girl said, and her friend smiled. “Always check out the competition.”
“Know your enemy,” the other girl said, and they both giggled.
“Hey,” Braden said, both palms up in a submissive gesture, “no enemies here.”
“How about you?” Josh asked. “You chicks in Band Wars too?”
The chicks nodded. “T-Square,” glasses-chick said. “I’m Taylor, and she’s Tania.”
“I get it,” Braden said, pointing at the two guys they’d come with, who were milling about near an ice-cream stand, eyeing them. “And those are Timmy and Tommy?”
The girls giggled. All girls giggled around Braden; his face induced a sort of light-headed high. His chest and biceps helped, too, and today he was making use of them with a white tank top under an open short-sleeved button shirt.
Taylor, the girl with the glasses and a personality, said, “Close. That’s Ty, and that’s Andrew.”
“Heeey,” Braden said. “Andrew doesn’t start with T. What gives?”
More giggling. The other girl, Tania, said, “Andrew Turner. Anyway, most of the other guys call him Turner, since we know three Andrews.”
“Sweet,” Josh said. “So it’s like, your names all start with T, so you’re T-Squared.”
“That’s right,” Taylor said. You could tell she was thinking what most people thought within five minutes of meeting Josh: cute, but dumb.
Band order was picked out of a hat, and by the time the park opened at nine, the six bands were in order, with Razzamatazz playing fifth. Each band was going to play three songs, with a fifteen-minute limit on their set, and there would be at least another fifteen minutes between bands. The contest was starting at noon, so it would be mid afternoon before it came to their turn. Braden texted his dad to let him know.
That gave them three hours to hang around the park. Braden and Josh stuck with the two Ts, going on rides, eating junk food, and winning challenging athletic competitions such as ring toss and catch the duckie.
Noon finally came, and a very large audience had gathered in front of the stage. Band Wars was hosted by Mountain Park’s mascots, Mountain Dan and Buddy Bear. Mountain Dan was a dude in a dude costume, with a big spongy head sporting a long gray beard and a floppy hat, plus gold miner foam clothes. His cohort, Buddy Bear, was wearing a foam brown-bear-in-a-train-engineer-outfit costume.
Mountain Dan and Buddy Bear cavorted on stage, likely working up a nasty sweat in those foam costumes under the noon August sun, and being really dorky trying to get the audience excited. For some reason, it took over half an hour to get the first band set up, and Mountain Dan and Buddy Bear only had fifteen minutes worth of material, so they tried to ad lib the rest of it, with pathetic results. The occupants of the Mountain Dan and Buddy Bear costumes were clearly not born performers.
Finally, the first band, Hush, which was the all-girl group, was ready to do sound check. Their fans started cheering and whistling as soon as the first whine came out of the guitar. Eye-liner glinting in the midday sun, they fired off three very angry songs about things that make girls angry: chauvinism, breaking up, and breaking up with a chauvinist. Their music was good, but far too angry for a lovely afternoon in a sunny park. Knowing how much work it took to get to where they were, Braden and the rest of Razzamatazz gave it up for them, with grand enthusiasm and loud whistles.
Mountain Dan and Buddy Bear took back to the stage for another extended set-up, and it was past one p.m. by the time the next band started. It was Braden and Josh’s new friends, T-Square. They were very unusual and also very good. Ty played live electronica off a weird little black box, that housed zillions of electronic drum beats and musical sounds, many times those that Josh could produce with his two keyboards. The other guy played three different instruments: a twelve-string guitar, a harmonica, and a long piece of plastic pipe that Uncle Razz informed them was an Australian aboriginal instrument called a Didgeridoo. The two girls both sang, harmonizing with each other with two beautiful, haunting voices, and occasionally accompanied themselves with a small tambourine or hand drum. The music was amazing; mellow, evocative; the kind of music that makes you swing with your neighbours while you listen, and then think about the meaning of life and whether you’re going to reach nirvana. It was perhaps too intellectual for the Mountain Park Sunday afternoon crowd, and they received a lukewarm response, except from their dozen or so ecstatic fans and the members of Razzamatazz, who cheered, clapped, and whistled again.
The heavy metal band surprised everyone with a sort of pop-metal sound, playing two original songs and a fairly funky Aerosmith cover. They also shook their cool black locks all over the place and put on quite a show, with the lead singer even doing a splits on stage at the end of their third song. They got the best audience response.
During the next break, Braden’s parents showed up, together. They were so excited, Braden’s dad had his arm around Braden’s mom’s waist, and they looked like they were on a first date. Josh and Matt’s families had already arrived, and Razz’s wife was not far behind. Jess’s mom had to work and couldn’t make it, but Matt’s dad promised to video their show for her.
The fourth band was a pretty ordinary-looking bunch of guys who played pretty ordinary music, with a large chunk of the audience there for them. They looked a bit older, maybe university students, and probably performed at university events pretty frequently. Their songs were bright, cheerful, with political lyrics calling attention to many of the issues at large in the world today. By the end of their set, Braden was all set to adopt an African child, buy fair-trade coffee, and invest in community building endeavors in South America. How could they compete with social conscience?
As Mountain Dan and Buddy Bear took the stage again, Uncle Razz shooed the four of them backstage. It was their turn.
“Break a leg, Brae!” Braden’s mom called, blowing him a kiss. The other parents shouted encouragement, too.
The massive SWC contingent started cheering as soon as Matt walked on to stage an plugged in his guitar, and went crazy when Braden, Josh, and Uncle Razz brought out the keyboards. Braden, Matt, and Josh had actually bought entrance tickets for dozens of their high-school friends. This Band Wars was probably a very big income-generator for an otherwise slow late-summer weekend at the park.
Uncle Razz was just off stage with the audio for Braden’s vocals all ready to go. The recorded vocals would be played over the speakers and into Braden’s headset, so he could lip sync along. He had control of the mic’s power, too, so he could ham it up live a bit at the beginning and end of their set.
Once the instruments were sound checked and warmed up, Braden strutted onto stage, his button-down shirt flapping open and his pecs flexing beneath. He raised his hands and did a slow turn so that everybody could check out his fantastic face, to the delight of his fans.
“Good afternoon, Calgary!” Braden said, clear and confident, into his mic, with a broad smile inviting cheers. “How’s everybody doing on this beautiful Sunday afternoon?” More cheers. Braden kept strutting around. He caught Razz’s eye backstage, and gave a nod to Jess. She tapped them in.
Their first song was the old standby, ‘Tainted Love’. Everybody knew ‘Tainted Love’, and the audience clapped and sang along, swaying and dancing to Matt’s edgy guitar and Jess’s thrumming beat. Braden kept the hype levels high with his performance, which rivaled the intro to any Chippendale’s performance. When he wasn’t “singing”, he stopped and shook the metal sign or clapped to the music, encouraging enthusiasm in the audience.
At the end of ‘Tainted Love’, Braden switched his mic back on and introduced the band. “This is my man Josh over here on keyboards; he loves you, too, ladies!” Feminine squeals for Josh as he raised both thumbs high over his head.
“This dude on the electric guitar is Matt,” Braden shouted over the cheers Matt generated, with a little twiddle on the strings, “and keeping us all together, the amazing, beautiful Jessica!” Jess thundered for them and the audience went crazy.
“And me, I’m Braden; we are Razzamatazz!”
When the cheering started to subside, Jess got them started on their next song, ‘Somebody’s Watching Me’, with Josh, who had a good singing voice, leaning forward and doing the MJ part on a mic that hung over the top of his keyboards, making eye contact with the girls in the audience each time, which made them scream. You just couldn’t keep girls off Josh.
Before the third song, Braden said, “I’d like to give a shout out to Churchill!” and “Thank you, everybody! We love you all!” He worked his flamboyant-frontman persona for all it was worth.
Their last song was, of course, ‘Turn up the Radio’, which was well-known enough from MySpace airplay that their fans went wild and sang along. It was pretty obvious who was winning this Band Wars.
The last band didn’t stand a chance, even though they were musically gifted and played excellent original songs. You just can’t compete with the innate ability to work an audience into frenzied adoration. Braden was like a blender, spinning the time-tested truth of hit songs into his existing and new fans’ brains until they could do nothing but scream in joy.
The winning band was obligated to indulge the audience with one more performance, so Razzamatazz gave them a special treat: Braden grinding his way through ‘I’m too Sexy’. This one had been the easiest for Braden to record, somewhere between rapping and singing, but he got a phenomenal response. His mom had tears in her eyes.
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© Copyright 2009 katt (UN: kattbee at Writing.Com). All rights reserved.
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