We rode the wave of art rock through the early seventies, even touring with King Crimson in America. But it ended in 1975 with Christopher’s death, and though we toured once more with Alan, a bloke who sounded more like Christopher than Christopher did some days, the true era of art rock had passed. Punk had taken hold and disco was all the radio played.
So we went on with our lives. Nigel recorded intense, bluesy solo albums, but had little commercial success. When it became clear his only solid fan base was in Japan, he moved there in 1980. Devon took a few years off, but came back and formed the band Brigade, which had two multi-platinum albums and five hit singles during the eighties. Our drummer Ian joined a jazz quartet and began teaching at university.
I, the tempestuous Paul Rutherford, moved on as well. I cut my first solo album, which demonstrated to fans why I hadn’t sung lead for The Eidolons. Then I cut a second album with another singer, which sold even worse than my first. I was beginning to think about following my father into finance when a filmmaker and Eidolons fan called me in 1979 and asked me to score his film. Since then, I’ve earned a fulfilling, if quiet, living scoring art house films and television shows.
We have Christopher to thank for our comfortable lives. Without his untimely death and subsequent legendary rock star status, the band’s royalties would be substantially diminished, closing doors and forcing us to make desperate choices.
Though I was the band’s official legal representative and managed our remaining interests, it was Devon, with his mainstream success with Brigade, who took over the mantle of spokesman for The Eidolons. The specter of Christopher was always with him. “How did you meet Christopher?” “What was he really like?” “What do you think he’d say about This Topic or That Fad?” Devon answered the same questions tirelessly, and over the years, his answers grew more outrageous and his admiration more ostensible.
Deep down, I think Devon hated Christopher. We all did. But in his shadow, we flourished.
* * *
It was Devon’s idea to buy the Black Bitch. Genesis was selling their Mark II Mellotron, and with the success of bands like King Crimson, it seemed like the thing to do. She was a beast of an instrument, with two sets of keys side by side and filled with the tapes that played any noise or sound we could loop into her. Ian was the one to name her, after he threw his back out while helping me heave her into the truck. The Bitch required four grown men to move her. She broke down, it seemed, every other show. Never during the show, mind, but just after, as if out of exhaustion. But when she sang, in those days before the mini-moog, the Bitch was truly a wonder. She originally had a mahogany finish, but some roadie had ladled dull black paint all over her in an uneven sheen, perhaps in an attempt to add seriousness. Or maybe ambiance? Still, we picked her up for a proverbial song, along with all three tape sets, and soon we were working her into our arrangements. I arrogantly fit in solos anywhere I could.
Christopher hated the Bitch. He hated anything that took attention away from him. It was with some irony that he was found sprawled next to her, before our last concert in 1975. He was late and had been drinking. The police figured that he must have stumbled as he crossed the green room on his way to the stage. Thus ended our tour and, though we didn’t understand it at the time, The Eidolons. We told the press that we would continue, that Christopher would have wanted us to continue. We hired Alan as our vocalist and he sang our material spot on. Our last album was our most grandiose, our most complex, and featured a thirty minute musical adaptation of Antigone, featuring lyrics by Christopher.
We told the press that The Eidolons was not Christopher’s backup band. The Eidolons is not Christopher, we said. But in the end, the public decided that he was. Near the end, Rolling Stone called us, “nothing more than a tribute band.” We played only four dates in the US and cancelled our European tour. We sold everything, paid our debts and moved on.
One drunken misstep had cost Christopher his life. He was twenty-seven.
* * *
Twenty-five years since I thought about the Black Bitch and thirty years since I had seen her, the dreams began. On those rare occasions I granted an interview, someone would usually ask what it was like to play in the era of Hammond organs and electric pianos, and I told them, but I didn’t mention the Black Bitch, and they rarely asked. I didn’t remember what it felt like to play her, how the notes poured from her in an unearthly waterfall of sound, how it could raise the tiny hairs on the back of your neck and fill your soul with a cosmic awe. Not until the dreams.
Finally, I called my personal assistant, Stewart Cresswell. “Stu,” I said. “I need you to do me a favor.”
“You name it.”
“I need you to find the Black Bitch for me.”
“You need a black who?” Stu was a bright lad, about my son’s age. He dressed well, had a good eye for women and Italian restaurants, but he was not a fan of The Eidolons. Never had been.
“It’s not a who, it’s a what. The Black Bitch was a mellotron we had in the old days. We bought it off of Genesis. Massive thing. It took four—“
“Mellotron. Is that a guitar?”
I gritted my teeth. “No, she looked like an organ but sounded like a synthesizer. She was filled with miniature tape players, and when you hit the keys—”
“So a keyboard.”
“Yes. Do you remember the introduction to “Demos” from Songs for a Red Planet?”
“Oh, yes,” he said, but I could tell he really didn’t. “You want me to find out what happened to it?”
“Yes. We couldn’t take her with us when we went on tour with Alan. We must have sold her. I’m not sure.”
I must have sounded a trifle desperate or agitated, because he asked, “Why the interest now?”
“I…I’ve been dreaming about her.”
A pause. “Dreaming?”
“Yes,” I covered, “about playing her. It would be fun to play her after all these years.” I swallowed hard. “Maybe for our induction.” The Eidolons had been nominated for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame that year, and our induction was, as the Americans say, a “done deal.”
“Okay. The Black Bitch. Right, I’ll get right on it.”
“Thank you, Stewart.” I hung up the phone and ran both hands through my thinning hair. I showered, and then went downstairs to breakfast.
* * *
Los Angeles, California. I sat before the Steinway grand piano in Sony Studios, hands at the ready as the conductor nodded to me. The orchestra grew quiet as I played the theme of my newest film score. The orchestra followed me in, but my piano, my melody, stayed at the forefront. I felt the notes inside of me, filling me with a simple joy. I still write and play music, after all these years, just for these moments, when every note is golden, and the music flows from your mind to your fingers, filling the air with a divine magic. It is not always this way. Film composition can be a boring, ugly chore, and with each passing year, those grandiose and arrogant Eidolons arrangements make me cringe with shame. But that moment, playing with the fabulously talented Los Angeles Symphony Orchestra, I cherished my good music. Then something changed. My hands kept playing the same notes but the theme switched keys, and the orchestra followed suit. Although my body assured me, through the physical memory that any musician knows well, that I am playing the correct notes, the sound has changed to something sinister, something brooding in a minor key. I can’t stop. The conductor ignores my desperate glances for help, the orchestra raising its volume to an ear-splitting shriek. I recognize the song. My perfect theme has twisted itself into the solo section from “The Revenge of the Corpseflower,” a track from The Eidolons’ third album, Kaleidoscope. I cringe, ashamed, because I have cheated. I have stolen music from the band and passed it off as something new. The keys of the Steinway change from cool ivory to grimy plastic, and now I am playing the Black Bitch. The lights die down, and I am alone with her in the dark as her keys move under my fingers like a player piano. The sound that issue
s from her is fowl, unclean, tainted, yet I cannot stop playing. When the song ends, and at last I pull my hands away, my fingers are bloody stumps, and I scream.
The flight attendant was right there and I released my grip on her arm before I knew why I was clutching it. The rest of the passengers looked at me. Someone muttered one word, “disturbed.” My face reddened and I slumped down in my chair. I asked the stewardess to bring me a whiskey and soda. Both were gone when the captain announced that we would be landing at LAX directly.
* * *
Rock musicians have a reputation for fast living. Not The Eidolons. While other bands went on stage high, played their sets high, then got high in the green room before the encore and once again after the show ended, that was not our style. The lyrics we wrote and the arrangements we played were too difficult to be played with the slightest impairment. Yes, drugs and booze were available when we wanted them. But we didn’t really think of ourselves as rock musicians. I certainly didn’t. Christopher once famously told a reporter, “I am not a rock star, I am a showman.” Nobody knew about his problem, then. In fact, I never drank until Christopher died. Not that I blamed him for that, but I could have. After the funeral, whenever the band sat down together, we did so over drinks. It was the ultimate irony, but it kept the tension between us at arm’s length. It was as if we could not risk being tense with one another.
Nigel was waiting at Sony Studios when I arrived. The newest film score I had written was orchestral, with certain sections calling for a strong electric guitar. The director had booked Trevor Rabin from Yes for the job, but when he backed out with other commitments, he asked me for suggestions. I volunteered Nigel without thinking, not sure if he’d entertain the idea, or even take my call. The director thought he was a great choice, so I called him and he surprised me by being both interested and friendly.
“Konnichiwa, most honorable Sensei Paul.” Nigel grinned broadly and bowed to me. I put my hand out but he waved it aside and he hugged me instead. I smelled liquor on him. “It’s been an age.”
“Good flight?” I asked.
“Long,” he said, drawing out the vowel in mock exasperation. “But now I’m here. Thank you again for thinking of me.” His whole face smiled at me.
“Of course,” I said, and forced a smile of my own. It wasn’t long, though, before it was genuine.
The recording session went swimmingly, and I loved knowing that it was my idea to bring him here, weeks before our planned reunion for the induction. I had forgotten the effortlessness with which Nigel and I got on. It was so good to see him.
“Are you ready for it?” Nigel asked. We were alone in the studio lounge. He was drinking American beer, and it was whiskey again for me.
“You mean our glorious reunion? Yes. No. Does it matter?”
“Hell yes it matters. All of us together again, on stage? It’s a big deal. It’ll mean a lot to the fans.”
The fans. I bit my lip at the mention of them. The fans who bought our albums, concert tickets and tour t-shirts in the seventies had kids who downloaded our music for free, created website shrines to Christopher, maligned the rest of us in chatrooms, and posted pirated concert footage on the internet. Granted, it was because of all of them that I wasn’t sweating in some brokerage in London with a mortgage, a boring life and an ordinary family. And yet, I could not help but hold myself above them, all of them. They were stupid to focus all their energy on Christopher, and his “genius.” There was so much more to The Eidolons. Being here with Nigel was proof of that.
“Ah yes, the fans. We can’t forget them.”
“Oh, don’t be so glum, old friend. If I, on vacation from my self-imposed exile, can get through it, the mighty Paul Rutherford can too.”
I laughed again, but only on the outside. On the inside, I was washing my hands, trying to scrub away the smell of spilt liquor and remove the paint flakes from under my fingernails, black paint from the Black Bitch.
* * *
I’m in the cage of words again, being forced down a corridor to the eventual end. They are of such large proportions that I cannot see them all, but the ones I recognize—nebulous, eldritch, speculum—fill my stomach with an unknown dread. Once I recognize them, I am forced to read them over and over and search my brain for rhyming words. Closing my eyes does no good because they are imprinted on my brain, taking up residence there and crushing out all other thoughts with their enormity. I reach a room with thirty-two doors. I don’t have to count them, I just know this as an incontrovertible fact, and somehow it is horrible. At the center of the room is the Black Bitch. I don’t want to move forward, but I am filled with a sickening compulsion, like the urge to pick at a scab. She waits for me, a blind oracle, piercing my soul with cold judgment. The keys are coated with chalky fingerprinting dust and I smudge them as I play. I hear that the choral tapes are loaded into her, except it is not her voice, it is Christopher’s voice. I look beneath her and watch crimson blood leak from her base. I know Christopher is inside, poor Christopher, folded over and writhing with agony, but my hands are on the keys, continuing to play as he howls and cries and laments.
I awaken in a hotel room, bolting upright and then falling prone after a moment. I don’t want to smile, but I do.
* * *
Nigel and I met Alan and Devon after their show at the Hollywood Bowl. They were fronting a charity concert with Bill Bruford, Gary Wright and Steve Hackett. Devon thundered the audience with his bass, and Alan proved he was still a good singer. Their set featured many art rock favorites, including songs from The Eidolons, Brigade, and even an unlikely Beatles cover. The Eidolons’ numbers—“Run Rabbit Run” and “Parallel Time”—were solid and by the numbers.
In their hotel suite, we traded compliments and swapped stories. Devon had arranged for all of us to travel together to Cleveland for our Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction concert. Ian, fresh from a jazz concert in upstate New York, would meet us there.
As we talked, Alan tried very hard to be one of us, as he had tried all those years ago. He was five years younger than us. When we recruited him, he was a bright lad with boundless enthusiasm, but just a boy. At first he tried to pull off Christopher’s costumed antics but soon gave it up. The fans took every opportunity to remind him that he was not Christopher and that no one could take his place. After The Eidolons, it was a decade before he set foot on stage again. He was now known primarily as a producer.
“Paul,” he said, when things settled down a bit, “you look like hell.”
“I haven’t been sleeping well,” I told him. “Bad dreams.”
“Bad dreams?”
“Of the olden days.”
He laughed until he saw the look on Devon’s face. Nigel strummed a guitar and stayed silent.
“You mean, the olden days of The Eidolons? From what you guys told me, things were pretty good before Christopher…died.”
I flinched as he said his name.
“That’s true,” Devon said. “But in the months leading up to his death…” He stopped and looked at me, gauging my reaction.
“Please,” I spat. “The boy doesn’t care.”
“The anniversary of his death is coming up.” Nigel stopped strumming and looked at Alan. “Paul always gets to be a prick around his time of year.”
Alan looked from Nigel to me. “It must have been hard on all of you.”
I rolled my eyes. “The press pounced on us. After that, anything we ever did was framed by his life, his death. You should know, you were there for that part.”
“Yes, I remember, but that’s not what I was talking about. He was your friend.” Alan put his hand on my shoulder, a simple gesture I’m sure he meant to be consoling. I cringed.
“The police grilled us like convicts that night,” Nigel said. “I was always a good kid. Never got into a scrape my whole life. None of us had. Then police and lawyers everywhere.” Nigel strummed gently. “And all for one misstep. A stupid drunken accident. All that temperame
nt, we never suspected he had a drinking problem.”
Alan sighed. “Things would have been very different for all of us had he not tripped and hit his head, all alone in the green room.”
“No, I don’t think so,” I said. “He would have left us eventually. He wanted to, I know.”
“How do you know?” pounced Devon. “I’ve never heard you say that before.”
“Oh, you know he would have.” I stood and paced. “He was bossy, independent, a narcissist. We were just there for him, to better his career. He regarded us as little more than his backup band, and the fans agreed. And you know it.”
Devon folded his arms. “We had our disagreements, sure, but you can’t think that, after all these years.”
“Now he’s a martyr, a cult icon,” I snapped. “What success we have, we owe to him. Everybody wants us to paint the best picture of him. Devon, you of all people know that. They love him. Well, the truth is, he was calculating, arrogant and cold. I can say these things because I knew him. Better than any of you, maybe.”
“You’re so angry at him,” Alan said.
“Paul’s always a prick this time of year,” Nigel said again as he strummed. I left very soon after that.
* * *
SoHo in the early seventies. We were setting up for a show. Ian’s drum kit was parked and ready, so when we learned that the venue didn’t have a piano as promised, I sent him in the van to pick up the old rehearsal upright we kept at Christopher’s house. Nigel and Devon were busy pushing their amps into place. God knows where Christopher was. Rehearsing? Fucking some groupie? He was seldom ever around before sound check. Truthfully, I was okay with this—he had a terrible knack of being in the way.
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