Before the Flock

by David Inglish

  Gilligan is the everyman. He is trapped between two unattainable women—the girl next door and the seductress. He cannot understand the Professor or attain the wealth of Mr. and Mrs. Howell. He spends his time bumbling about, and he breaks the rules because they mean nothing to him. Swift punishment is what he knows best—the boot in the ass.

  EJ is the Skipper and Spewing is Gilligan.

  If the other castaways ever came to their senses, they would kill Gilligan. He’s always the reason they can’t get off the island. He’s the one that foils every plot, ruins every plan. They could club him with a giant coconut mallet. But they never do. It never even occurs to them. There’s something more to this. Maybe they need Gilligan. Maybe they love him. Perhaps something magical happens between the punisher and the punished.

  At some point, everyone takes a shot at Gilligan, even Eric the Professor. Spewing back talks him once, so he shoves him to the ground. It feels good to both of them. But then Eric thinks, Come here, little buddy. Those words mean I beat you because I love you. It’s the chemistry between guard and inmate, master and slave. It brings nations to their knees and in Thunderstick it brings the people to their feet.

  An essential bond must exist between the drummer and the bass player. The bond can be constructed of respect and mutual admiration or, in this case, the bond is built with the kind of love that stings.

  These are the last days at Gates. The band will start recording the album in a week at A&M studios. The band has about fifty well-rehearsed songs. Songs from the Badd Bobby! era, songs from the Full Nelson Mandela era, early Thunderstick songs, the kicking Mellaril songs, even a happy-we’re-finally-signed song. When tape is rolling, perfection eludes. But this time, instead of Spewing, it is Eric who plays the wrong chords. Kurt stops the song, walks over, and pretends to kick him like he would’ve kicked Spewing. Everyone laughs. Including Alexandra and her friend—she has brought around a young starlet—Mary Kathryn Elizabeth O’Donnel. She belongs to the group of eighties actresses who all have three names. She does them one better—she has four. She is adorable and innocent, cute little freckles and red hair and a little turned-up nose. Kurt’s whole bad-ass thing seems to turn her on. She guffaws, slaps her jeans, and claps her hands while Kurt acts out an ultra slow-motion attack on Eric. Kurt hugs him afterward and walks off the stage. With Priscilla back in La Jolla, Kurt walks straight up to Mary Kathryn Elizabeth O’Donnel and introduces himself. “Hey, I’ve seen you on that show with the space aliens that are inside everyone.”

  “Yeah?” She smiles.

  “It’s a good show.” Kurt nods seriously and lights a smoke. “Good acting. I respect it.”

  “Thanks, I’m Mary,” she says, and extends her whole body with her hand like a little girl who has just learned how to shake. He puts out his gnarled claw. She takes it and turns it to look at his wedding ring. She even touches the ring with her other hand. Kurt winces.

  A smart girl, she moves on, reaches out and touches Eric’s long hair. “This is so awesome.”

  “Thanks.”

  “You want to come watch me play guitar?” Kurt asks her.

  She points to the stage, giggles, and asks him, “Again?”

  Kurt nods.

  “Yeah, sure.”

  It’s a club on Santa Monica Boulevard. The Jovi and Kurt show up at the velvet rope with guitar cases in hand. The bouncer lifts the rope, and they all walk in together. Another bouncer stops the girls and asks for ID. Alexandra points at Mary Kathryn Elizabeth O’Donnel and says, “She’s on TV.”

  The bouncer apologizes and lets them through.

  In the blacklit disco, the walls are thumping. Retail chicks wave their hands above their heads. Muscle-bound dudes show off their fluorescent teeth. The band keeps walking—into a hall, past another velvet rope, and into another world, the back patio, a lattice of wood is strung with a thousand tiny lights, there are small shrubs and little café tables and a three-piece jazz band making real music. The guitar player adjusts his knit cap, smiles with bent teeth, and welcomes the Jovi and Kurt. They plug in and start trading licks. Mary Kathryn Elizabeth O’Donnel sits with Alexandra and Eric, and watches Kurt’s thick, flat-ended fingers vibrate on his fret board.

  At the break, Kurt stuffs a hundred-dollar bill in the trio’s brandy glass and sits next to Mary Kathryn Elizabeth O’Donnel. “What’d you think?”

  “You’re really good at playing this.”

  “Nah. You can’t really play jazz until you’re forty. When I’m forty, I’m gonna play jazz. These kids who think they can play jazz, they can’t. Nobody understands it until they’re forty. At least forty.”

  “There’s nothing worse than fusion,” the Jovi adds. “There’s nothing worse than jazzy rock. Jazz and rock are like church and state. They must always stay separate.”

  “Why don’t you play with them?” Mary asks Eric.

  “That dude is wicked-sick on the Hammond B3. Those chunky, syncopated, church-soul riffs—I can’t play like that.”

  “I’m sure you could if you tried. I once had to make out with this really gross guy for a scene. I didn’t think I could do it.”

  “What’d you do?”

  “I ate this super gross pastrami sandwich, like covered in onions, then I stuck my tongue in his mouth. It was so totally my revenge.”

  Eric laughs.

  Kurt asks her, “You want a drink?”

  “No way. I just got out of rehab.”

  “One of us!” the Jovi yells, and offers her his hand.

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m clean, too,” Eric says.

  “Right on. You guys are like all straight edge.”

  “Kinda. Yeah. But not Kurt, he likes the barley pop.” Eric says. “Spewing smokes weed pretty much non-stop, and EJ can pickle himself pretty good. But me and the Jovi we’re clean.”

  “This has totally been fun, but will you drive me home?”

  Eric nods.

  Outside the club, he opens the door of his blue BMW for Mary Kathryn Elizabeth O’Donnel. He walks around and gets in the car. “Oh, my God, you totally saved me,” she says when he starts the car.

  “How?”

  “I was just like going to drink or something if I stayed in there.”

  “Good thing we got you out.”

  “Yeah. When I drink, it’s not pretty.”

  Eric smiles. “Me neither.”

  “This one time I was doing a play in Chicago, that’s where I’m from, and I was like so drunk I was barfing between scenes. And I was the lead.”

  “What play was it?”

  “Annie.”

  Eric laughs. “No way! Little orphan Annie is into the hooch.”

  She laughs.

  “The sun will come out tomorrow…” He makes a barfing sound. “That is hilarious. How old were you?”

  “Thirteen.”

  “Oh shit. I guess I was doing the same thing, just not on stage. Good thing you’re sober.”

  “Yeah. My life depends on it. This is our place over here.”

  “Who do you live with?”

  “My mom slash manager. She’s probably gonna want to smell my breath when I walk in.”

  “We should go get you a pastrami sandwich with lots of onions.”

  “Yeah, I guess we should.” She looks at Eric. “I guess this is goodnight.” She leans over and presses her adorable Irish lips onto his mouth. He resists for a second and then slips her the tongue. She arches her back, leans into his lap, and starts lapping at his face and grabbing at the buttons on his black jeans. He reaches his arm around her waist and pries his hand into her tight Levi’s. She pulls through his underwear and starts jerking up and down. His fingers are backward and squashed in her jeans. He wrenches them around, pushing into her abdomen, finding her spot. Their tongues are intertwined. She turns her head. “Holy shit, she’s looking at us!”

  “What?”

  “My mom. She’s looking at us. I have no fucking privacy!”

&
nbsp; “Let’s go back to my place.”

  “Oh, my God. I want to. That was so…I just lost control. Let’s do that again.”

  “Let’s do it now.”

  “I gotta go. Call me.”

  “I don’t have your number.”

  “It’s unlisted.”

  Eric laughs.

  “Get it from Alexandra, stupid.” She laughs, blows a kiss, and slams the door shut.

  Eric arrives at the Cokewoods with the angry itch.

  EJ is sitting in the hot tub with a Coors Light in his hand and several crumpled cans by the side of the pool. His head is bobbing a little from side to side.

  “What are you doing?” Eric asks.

  “Lunky and Talkssssley found sssome ssslut and they’re doing a ssssex show for Spewing.”

  “So what are you doing out here?”

  “I don’t know…It’s weird. I’m drunk.”

  “Dude. Drunk and hot tub—not good together.”

  “It’s good for my blood pressure. Doctor said so. See you in the morning.”

  The Jovi is waiting for Eric in their apartment. “Did baby get some?”

  “She almost did me.”

  “Tell me all the filthy details.”

  “I drove her home. She grabbed my dick. That’s about it.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “I don’t know. I feel pretty guilty—about Dane.”

  “You don’t look like you feel guilty.”

  “Well, I do.”

  “Look, man, you just got to assume the position. You’re in a band. If you don’t do this now, you’re going to regret it when you’re an old man. You’ll never be young again.”

  “You think I should bale on Dane?”

  “Nah, man. Dane’s way hotter.”

  “Yeah, dude. You’re right. I’m a fucking idiot.”

  “No, you’re just a filthy, filthy, filthy, dirty little horny guy. That’s why I love you.”

  “Thanks, man. I love you, too.”

  “You going home to La Jolla tomorrow?”

  “Yeah. You?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Let’s hang out.”

  “For sure.”

  A concrete plus sign drawn in gray, this is La Brea at Sunset. It’s busy and loud. Two major thoroughfares in the L.A. grid take turns pumping cars in different directions, north toward the San Fernando Valley, east toward the mud wrestlers at the Tropicana, west toward the Pacific Ocean, and south toward the giant round Baptist Superdome for Jesus.

  The storefronts have changed over the years. Fruit stands became beauty parlors, became car-stereo stores, became chicken stands, became tanning salons. The pace is jarring and inhuman. It’s been that way for years. But if you stood right here in 1916 on the southeast corner, the scent of orange blossoms would’ve surrounded you in the first L.A. grid—the perfect green rows of an orchard with fat peaches hanging low and oranges turning from green to yellow to orange. This was the orchard that Charlie Chaplin purchased in 1917. He was sick of taking orders, so he bought the acres and paid grunting laborers to tear out the grove and build a Tudor township with a warehouse-sized soundstage.

  When the camera wasn’t rolling, Chaplin swam naked with hopeful girls in his pool. Every one of them surprised when he showed them the door. The little man with the Hitler mustache got old, but a soundstage in Hollywood has many lives. The TV shows Superman and Perry Mason were filmed here. In 1966 Jerry Moss and Herb Alpert purchased the lot and made it the world headquarters for A&M records. They brought in a NorCal hippie vibe with shiny stained-wood walls and hanging ferns cradled in macramé. In the years that followed, they built a state-of-the art studio where Chaplin’s pool used to be.

  Lunky the Loyal has been to other places like A&M, other places surrounded by high iron gates, other places with guard stations and men in uniform who ask questions, but this is different. The security is meant to keep people out, and today Lunky is free. His thick white arm hangs out of the window of the yellow box truck. His mirror shades reflect the Somali security guard’s cheerful expression. “I’m with Thunderstick,” he says. “Where do I unload?”

  The guard looks down at the clipboard in his hand. “You are in Studio A. We call it the ‘We Are the World Room.’ Go thataway.”

  When Lunky walks into Studio A carrying Eric’s keyboard cases, something about the barn-sized main room, its A-shaped ceiling, the three isolation rooms, and the wood floor is vaguely familiar. He scratches his chin and thinks to himself, Yes, Band Aid. This is where Boy George held hands with Tom Petty, held hands with Bruce Springsteen, held hands with Michael Jackson, and they all swayed back and forth like gospel singers for the starving in Africa. Afterward they did lines of whitey, got back on their private planes, and headed to the South of France, but some bags of rice did arrive in Kismayo a few years later. The Lunk smiles, grits his teeth, passes wind, and starts setting up the keyboards.

  They are all on their way, Kurt in his Fastback, the Jovi on his chopper, EJ and Spewing in a 1975 Cadillac Eldorado convertible, and Eric in his BMW. All of them are coming from different directions, expecting different things. Kurt and the Jovi arrive at almost the same time. Felder greets them at the door. They both smile at the long hot receptionist. She smiles back. Felder looks at her, looks at the boys, and says, “Don’t shit where you eat. There’s plenty more where that came from.”

  The receptionist flicks her brown hair over her shoulder and sways from side to side. “Can I give you the tour?”

  “Yeah.”

  The entryway is paved in hard stone. Geometric patterns backlight frosted glass walls. The receptionist is displayed inside a wall beneath a giant triangle that seems to be aimed at the chasm between her tan breasts.

  Once they enter the hallway, everything is entirely different. The sounds from the busy intersection are gone. It’s dark, windowless, and manly in an artless way. This is what happens when straight men are allowed to decorate. There are four studios within A&M. Studio A is the second door on the right.

  They enter the studio. The vocal iso room is to their left. They walk up to a six-inch-thick mahogany door with a triple-pane window in the middle. The door is heavy, soundproof, and electronic. Felder presses the button on the right and the door sucks up into the ceiling.

  They enter the control room. The console is a Neve 4792, inspired by George Martin, and it’s the last one made by Rupert Neve before he left the company named after him. The board was originally installed in AIR’s Montserrat studio. It is considered priceless. The black pane of glass on the right is actually another space-age door. Press the button and it disappears into the ceiling, revealing stairs. Walk up the stairs, first there is a bathroom, and then find the private lounge for Studio A. It has cable.

  Go back downstairs through the control room, through the vocal iso room, and enter the main room. Fill it with water and it’s like the tuna tank at Sea World. The observation glass in the center leads to the control room. On the left are the two big iso rooms, on the right the small vocal iso room. In 1988 all of this can be yours for a mere three thousand dollars a day—send DCA the bill.

  The biggest little band in the world, U2, is down the hall in Studio D putting the finishing touches on Rattle and Hum. But Felder, Felder wants Studio A for Thunderstick. Outside of Studio D is the communal lounge. It must’ve been remodeled at the same time as the lobby. Triangles of frosted glass overlap each other. A saltwater fish tank is filled with neon yellow fish.

  “We have caterers and runners,” the receptionist says. “Just tell them what you want. The menus are in books by my desk. The coffee and fruit are replaced every six hours. Is there anything else you guys would like?”

  “Your phone number?” The Jovi laughs. “Nah, I’m just kidding.”

  “Well you know where to find me.”

  Kurt, Felder, and the Jovi watch her walk away.

  They stroll into Studio A.

  Lunky the Loyal, Talksley of Lou
d, and Jesse the Giant are tangled in a mass of cords in the big room. Ernie the engineer says, “Grab me a cardioid condenser mic for the second tom and a dual for the rack.”

  “A what?”

  Inside the control room, Kostas doesn’t want to plug the Neve directly into A&M’s analog machines. Instead he is trying to hook the Neve to his own tube preamp and from there to a pair of brittle-sounding Sony digital decks. The preamp is huge and old, made of baby-blue metal with dials the size of grapefruit slices and needles that look like they were stolen from a Geiger counter.

  EJ, Spewing, and Eric walk in the control room. “This place is insane!” they say.

  Jesse strolls in carrying a Bacchanalian three-foot-long silver fruit plate he stole from the communal lounge. “Look at this fucking thing. It’s got pears and apples, and I fucking don’t know what these things are. Kurt, you want some cheese?”

  The receptionist glows. “If you’d like your own fruit plate, I can have it brought in once a day.”

  “Fuck. I like fruit.” Jesse the Giant bites off half an apple. “Whuh abow oo gahs?” he says, his mouth full of white pulp.

  Kostas tries to grab the reigns. “Listen, guys. I’ve got a ways to go with the setup here. Why don’t you go out and get a drink or something and come back in a few hours.”

  “You guys gotta come see my new ride,” Spewing yells. “My buddy jagged the hell out of this towelhead on a trade-in. It’s a Cadillac convertible.”

  “I thought you said the guy was Iranian?” EJ asks.

  “He was.”

  “That’s not a towelhead, you idiot. That’s a camel jockey.”

  Kurt sticks an unlit cigarette in his mouth. “Let’s go for a ride.”

  The band piles in the Eldorado. They roll down Sunset. Eric shakes his head at the traffic and says, “In a city with the worst traffic in the world, isn’t it strange that what people want to do on the weekends in their free time is sit in their cars in more traffic?”

  “Loosen up, Eric. It’s L.A. Look at the lights,” Kurt says from the front seat.