Rhain stood above all moral illusions. Words like “good” or “evil” held no meaning. They were purely relative terms expressing subjective values. So was killing an innocent person a “bad” thing? Not when labels like “innocent” held no value. No human life is more important than the power guiding Mourningstar. Not even the lives of its four most obvious representatives. The band and the dark forces behind it were all part of an agenda far greater than becoming rich or famous.
For the past two years, every determined ounce of Rhain’s misanthropic existence had been channeled into the band. Mourningstar served as the vessel for his bleak vision as well as his escape. The stage show and filthy leather attire and devilish makeup and bombastic music and flaming inverted pentagram logo had his bloody fingerprints smeared all over them. Wrath, Revile the bassist, and Ruin the drummer played the instruments, but make no mistake: Rhain was Mourningstar. Wrath and the others believed human happenstance put the four of them together—but Rhain knew better.
He willed it.
He channeled it.
He conjured it.
He made it happen.
But it wasn’t easy. Nothing ever was. The band paid their dues, suffering through the humiliation of opening shows for bands far inferior but somehow more successful. They worked steadfastly at their craft; putting in every available hour they could find to become unstoppable. It had paid off. Compared to their early rehearsals and gigs, the improvement now echoed thunderously whenever they played. Mourningstar could jam with any heavy metal band. If one need further proof, their latest demo, Cruelties in Black, was getting played on some of the top Internet radio stations. More importantly, it was receiving attention from Black Light Records.
Cruelties in Black personified a musical exploration of the dark side and was the band’s greatest accomplishment to date. They‘d done whatever was necessary to raise the money for studio time and the crushing results proved quite satisfactory. As far as a demo goes, it did its job presenting a fair representation of what could be achieved if they could get into a proper studio with a real producer.
Rhain intended the music to be a glimpse into a world where the illusions of flesh and light are absent; an aural assault of unearthly delights where chords of liberated fire rose up to become sinful exclamations. Cruelties in Black unleashed a sonic exploration, glorification, and adoration of the Devil—the eternal adversary and enemy of the world.
It was meant to be played loud.
Rhain’s ambition had always been to upset the status quo, and if he had to break the musical rules that others followed, then so mote it be. He strived toward complete artistic freedom, believing in his blackened heart that the only way to achieve this was though diabolical music. Darkness was its most important element; the sinister energies channeled and spread through their frequencies were what inspired Rhain. If he could introduce listeners to true darkness and let them experience the liberating potential that one can find deep within themselves, the black flame, then his existence would be one of unholy significance. He wanted to plant Satan’s seed in the listener’s mind, allowing it to slowly burn new holes of infernal insight in their collective consciousness.
Mourningstar was nothing more than an instrument for channeling the wrath of the ancient gods of darkness. If the lanky singer had to dig up cadavers in order to decorate a stage in human bones to momentarily open a portal to the dark side—break out the shovels. If violence offered a favorable outcome for band business—it was time to unleash merciless savagery upon anyone who stood in Mourningstar’s path.
Whenever Mourningstar performed live—not nearly often enough to satisfy the quartet—they underwent a transformation. No longer just longhaired rockers, Rhain, Wrath, Ruin, and Revile turned into demented heretics capable of unleashing inhuman fury and hellfire.
Rhain understood that visuals were as important as the music.
On stage, each musician sported at least one heavy necklace with an inverted cross or pentagram hanging from it. Their attire consisted of custom-made, dirty black leather. Leather sleeves covered in hooks and spikes ran from wrist to forearm. Chrome motorcycle chains and bullet belts with large demonic buckles adorned their slim waists.
Each member made his face up as a ghoulish corpse—pale white with black highlighting the eyes and lips serving as a foundation for further intricate makeup application—all to appear more intimidating than most black metal bands.
Rhain, Wrath, Revile, and Ruin could, no should, be the four horsemen of the heavy metal apocalypse. But now Mourningstar might be no more because some spoiled cocksucker with a perfect family and a promising future was thinking about jumping ship.
Rhain couldn’t believe it . . . yet he could. Guitarists were strange mercenaries. They always wanted to stand center stage, shamelessly waving their six-strings at anyone in the immediate vicinity. They cared more about tones and arpeggios than about honor. Besides being a phenomenally talented guitar slinger, Wrath understood the value of being in the spotlight so he learned how to spit fire just like Quorthon of Bathory and countless other black metallers. As long as he didn’t get too wasted beforehand, Wrath could easily blow flames of up to twenty feet.
Rhain put so much time and effort into convincing Wrath that Mourningstar was more than just a band. For Wrath to intentionally extinguish that flame before it had the opportunity to burn brightly was an unforgivable act of treason. Rhain yearned to bash Wrath’s pretty little face in . . . pummel him the same way he’d been pounded on numerous occasions . . . kick and stomp him until blood spewed out from his broken mouth.
To feel flesh splitting under the force of his fists would bring about some sense of retribution but that would not be enough. Wrath’s treachery crossed a line that could not be avenged by a mere ass whipping. His suffering had to be permanent. The scars of such a betrayal, much like the wounds from a curved dagger, must never fade. If Wrath was about to destroy Mourningstar before they could be carved into public memory, then his suffering had to be epic.
After thorough introspective meditation and consultation with the Ancient Ones, the singer hatched a scheme.
As part of Mourningstar’s biggest show to date, a slot at the Whisky A Go-Go, Rhain invited Wrath’s sister to be a part of the live spectacle. Ann Marie wanted—no, jumped at—the opportunity to be the “victim” who gets crucified and stabbed during the song Bloodletting. If the Whisky show was going to be their final performance, the singer would make it a communion between this world and the dark that no one in attendance would ever forget.
Scorched earth rock ’n’ roll.
Wrath suspected Rhain knew he was being courted by The Arbitrators, a four-piece heavy metal band that could sell out any club in Southern California. Step one to getting signed mandated developing a following. It doesn’t matter what genre of music a band plays; as long as they could consistently pack in the crowds the record companies would eventually come sniffing around. The Arbitrators currently owned the Sunset Strip so naturally several major labels wanted to sign them to a recording contract.
Wrath wasn’t keen on the brand of rock music The Arbitrators excelled at. It played a bit too “chick friendly” and not heavy enough. Music was supposed to be powerfully accelerated and crushing enough to make one’s ear bleed tiny droplets of sonic bliss. Black fucking metal reverberated the sounds of war, squealed like the tones of choke fucking, and climaxed into the deafening timbre of the heavens collapsing. At least when Mourningstar performed it did. Just ask their loyal following of about fifty friends and hangers on.
For the past two years, Wrath tried his best to mold his dysfunctional band mates into his musical peers. Ruin showed the most improvement and now was a lightning-fast drummer who could hold his own with anybody. Revile, though, had four large bass strings and usually only hammered one or two at a time. Despite all of the drama surrounding their daily lives, the unstable drummer with a pregnant girlfriend and the meth-dealing bassist pounded adequately
as a rhythm section. But if Ruin and Revile weren’t fucked up enough, Rhain embodied the most complex person Wrath had ever met.
That’s why he loved him . . . and hated him.
Rhain possessed talent but it wasn’t the conventional singer-with-a-great-vocal-range or strutting-around-onstage types of appeal. Hell, there wasn’t anything conventional about Rhain. Wrath could remember taking him to his parent’s house and Rhain—who as far as Wrath knew, had no formal musical training—sat down at the piano and started playing a shadowy melody in the key of D flat. He instinctively knew what to play . . . until he realized that people were watching. Then he became embarrassed and immediately brought the somber melody to a halt.
Later that night, Wrath’s mother warned him that Rhain was a “weirdo.”
Weirdo was too kind a description. The singer whose dream in life was to “eclipse the sun and rape the moon” was downright dangerous.
Throughout the history of music, there have always been crazed geniuses. If one wanted to romanticize it, madness represented a gift as well as a curse. From Ludwig Van Beethoven, Brian Wilson, and Syd Barrett to Richard Wagner, Al Jourgensen, and Ian Curtis—magic and psychosis went hand in hand. Not only did Rhain have his own undiagnosed—thus untreated—issues to contend with, but in an attempt to get closer to Satan he welcomed even more insanity into his existence. How many singers fasted for days in order to be in the right state to record? How many singers conjured demons in an attempt to become a conduit between this world and the dark side?
And the most fucked up part about everything is Rhain believes that Lucifer is guiding the band’s fortune.
No, if anything was guiding their recent good fortune, it was Wrath’s skilled fingers. Just ask record producer extraordinaire Michael Mallory.
When Donnie Black and Duane Fresno, two members of The Arbitrators, came to Wrath’s house asking him to join them, the offer sounded far from appealing. Sure, the Arbitrators were a lot more successful than Mourningstar, but Wrath loved the type of music Mourningstar performed. He loved the theatrics and the power and the potential of his band . . . but Donnie and Duane had an ace up their mutual sleeve.
As far as producers go, Michael Mallory had received every award a knob-turner could achieve including several Grammys. Not every project he touched turned to platinum but it sure seemed that way. Mallory had been turning out hit record after hit record since the end of vinyl, all the way through CDs, and now in the digital download era. While the majority of the music industry fell upon the hardest of times, Mallory seemed unaffected by all of the changes and kept on doing what he did best; making smash records.
Mallory believed that The Arbitrators had potential but needed a better guitarist. Donnie and Duane told him about the most talented player on their radar. Someone they both attended high school with.
Once the producer started courting the young guitarist, taking him to expensive dinners and dangling the proverbial golden coke spoon of success under his nose, The Arbitrators suddenly didn’t seem so poseurish. If Wrath listened to and trusted Mallory, it would only be a matter of time before Robert “Wrath” Kincaid became a talent to be reckoned with.
It sounded sweet but he still wasn’t sold on The Arbitrators.
Wrath could handle all of the madness surrounding Mourningstar. The violence and narcotics and STDs and the occult and criminal activities bonded them into a feral brotherhood, but when the singer asked his kid sister to be part of their live show, Rhain crossed a line that could never be undone.
At the pool party barbeque for Ann Marie Kincaid’s sweet sixteen-birthday party, Rhain asked Ann if she would like to be a part of Mourningstar’s next show. Of course she jumped at the opportunity to be onstage with her big brother. With Ann and all of her friends pleading to allow her to do it, there was no way Wrath could say no without ruining her birthday. Rhain could pretend like he didn’t know what he was doing and that it was an innocent faux pas but that didn’t change matters or fix the goddamn problem. What Mourningstar did onstage was not something that Ann Marie should participate in.
Usually Revile’s stripper girlfriend, Andrea, played the role of the victim during the song Bloodletting. Dressed as a nun, or more often barely dressed, Andrea would be tied to a cross. With a real dagger in one hand, Rhain introduced the song and cut himself. The real knife and real blood is what sold the illusion of the singer stabbing the victim with a gimmick dagger. Simple Showmanship 101 where Rhain played his role with plenty of malevolent conviction and the audience usually ate it up.
During a heated argument in which the two almost came to blows, the singer claimed that Mourningstar needed Ann Marie for her “virginal purity.” It was their biggest show to date and with Black Light Records attending, Mourningstar needed as much magic symbolism as they can summon. A virgin dressed in white getting slaughtered would certainly hit deeper within the audience’s collective psyche than if they simply used a hot stripper.
Wrath could have made this all go away by letting Rhain know that Ann was not a virgin. What she did and with whom was nobody’s business and the last thing Wrath needed was for a poon hound like Revile thinking his sister was fair game.
Wrath’s personal business was nobody else’s business and in all likelihood, the Whiskey A Go-Go gig would be his final performance before he moved on to the better things.
In almost every storefront window along the Sunset Strip a Mourningstar poster had been taped in place. Mourningstar flyers had been stapled to every telephone pole in Hollywood. The striking image featured the band standing menacingly in front of tombstones and statues of remembrance with Wrath in the center blowing a giant fireball into the air.
The overkill of promotion inspired curiosity, especially among metalheads.
On the night of the concert the boulevard buzzed with rock ’n’ roll excitement. Many bands associated with Los Angeles—from The Doors and Van Halen to Mötley Crüe and Guns N’ Roses—paid their dues onstage at the Whiskey A Go-Go. Strange electricity in the air, something was happening that lured heavy metal fans the same way the Pied Piper summoned rats.
Metalheads, mostly Satanic Hispanics, packed the murky club. Drunk and unattractive, they sported band T-shirts and denim vests covered in patches. They guzzled plenty of beer in anticipation.
Inside the dressing room, Rhain, Wrath, Revile, and Ruin were made up and waiting to hit the stage. Modifications had been made to each member’s outfit. More spikes, more belts, more everything. Each member wore a new necklace—a skeletal finger dangling like a pendant.
Resembling a pair of rock ’n’ roll demons, Rhain and Wrath chatted between themselves. They tried their best to pretend that everything was cool between them.
Like a gunslinger, Rhain sported a leather belt with two daggers inside two sheaths. One was a real dagger with a very sharp edge. The other, a stage prop with a retractable blade.
Dressed in an antique white wedding dress, Ann Marie made her way over to Wrath and Rhain but she didn’t look like herself. In fact, the usually bubbly teenager seemed uncomfortable.
“We need to go over a few things,” Rhain declared, oblivious that anything might be wrong with her. Then he stopped speaking, expecting Wrath to pick up the conversation.
“Okay so at the start of the second number, Rhain’s gonna introduce the song while the roadies bring you out on the cross. Try to make it look good. Resist a little and look scared but don’t pull too much or else it’ll fall over.”
Ann Marie nodded that she understood.
Rhain pulled out his two daggers and pressed the gimmick dagger against Wrath’s arm. It appeared the blade went in, but the guitarist was not cut.
“I’m gonna be holding the real one, talking to the crowd, and then I‘ll blade.”
“Blade?”
“He cuts himself a little so the crowd gets into it even more,” Wrath awkwardly explained.
Ann Marie seemed even more nervous.
“Don’t worr
y,” Wrath said, wanting to hug Ann but afraid to dirty her white dress. “You’ve seen him do it before.”
“Then the song starts,” Rhain added. “Between the lights and the smoke, I’ll swap the real dagger for the gimmick. You know the rest.”
“You stab me,” she said quietly, “and make the blood bag in my dress rip open while I bite the blood capsule in my mouth.”
“Exactly. And when the song ends the roadies carry you off.”
Rhain eyeballed Ann Marie before gently stroking her hair.
“You look perfect.”
Oblivious to the fact his guitarist was starting to fume, Rhain walked over to a mirror to tinker with his makeup and spray even more Aqua Net hair spray on his perfectly straight hair. The image in the mirror reflected the sin of Pride and why not? Tonight was the night he’d been waiting for all of his adult life—his band was going to get signed to a record deal.
Wrath stayed with his sister.
“It looks like so much fun from the audience,” she softly stated.
“Hey, if you don’t want to do this, we can always get Andrea to do it. She’s around here somewhere.”
“No, no. I’m just a little nervous and don’t want to mess up, “ she confessed and carefully touched one of the long nails protruding from his forearm band.
“Ahh, you’ll be fine.”
Ann Marie smiled.
“I’d give you a hug, but with all of these spikes—”
Ann Marie’s smile became even wider.
At that moment, Danny the roadie made an announcement.
“Alrighty people, if anyone has to piss do it now!”
Eyes darted around the room but no one moved.
“Everybody ready?”
Psyched up and itching to get started, everyone was indeed ready to hit the stage. Hands balled into fists, Revile and Ruin tapped each other five. Bouncing around and raring to go, Revile could hardly contain himself. Of the four members, he was the one who craved the rock star lifestyle more than anyone.
Rock On Page 44
