"What've you got for us this morning, Donny my man?" She could make her voice so sweet it sometimes stunned them.
Donny was clearly overwhelmed by the mere concept of hearing his own voice coming out of his own radio, and he needed goosing. Robbin's rebound was automatic. She knew callers frequently had nothing to say.
"You got something to get off your chest, or a chunk 'o' news for us, or a question for all the other rockers tuned in? Any rap at all-it's all yours. All of southern Cali is waiting on you, so go for it."
That was the correct track. Encourage the idea of the radio family.
"Uh. Right." Donny marshaled his thoughts-such as they were. "Oh! Yeah, I gotta question. Y'know, like, how come there's these great groups, right? And they do like one album. Like Quiet Riot, y'know, like they did one album and it was like, rock out. N'then… shut up, Sasha, I'm like talking, okay? And then, they break up after makin' one album… like one album that's really great. So like, how come they gotta break up just when everything's, y'know, going real great?"
Robbin had answered this one before. "No way to predict how personality conflicts are gonna affect a band, Donny. Sometimes the sparks fly and the group can't hold together. Look at it this way: at least we got the one album, right? And the members move on to new groups. And other groups come along. And whatever music they're able to give us in the time they're with us is fine. Hey, thanks for calling KRZE."
She ignored the fact that Quiet Riot had cut more than one album, and cut the line before more time could be wasted. Rex had cruised out of the outer office. That helped her kick into gear. "Line five, you're rappin' with Robbin on the KRZE talkback."
Several girls, laughing.
"Hello-hello?" Robbin said musically, amused.
More giggling, more hysterical.
"Hm, well, somebody's having themselves a fine old party out in the Basin somewhere," she said, chuckling. She cut direct to line eight and did her prefab spiel.
"Hi, Robbin, this is Ginger from Sherman Oaks."
Right away, this one sounded as though she was sitting with a cup of coffee instead of half a beer. "Hiya, Ginger. What've you got for us?"
"Well… this is sort of related to what that previous guy mentioned, about only getting so much music from a group?"
It wasn't a question, and I mentioned it, not that moron Donny. But let's be charitable.
"Groups breaking up is one thing," said Ginger. "But this thing where Jackson Knox got blown-er, killed, in San Francisco. And now, just a few days ago, this other guy gets killed in Denver…"
"Brion Hardin. He played keyboards for Electro-shock."
"Yeah, and both guys used to be in the same band, right?"
"Whip Hand, way back when. Right."
"Well, is this a pattern of some kind? I mean, do the other guys who used to be in that band need protection or something now? I mean, why would anybody want to kill them? They're just musicians. They just make music."
While Ginger talked, Robbin sucked the last of the life from her smoke and stubbed it out in the gargoyle's mouth, then cleared her tubes with another jolt of KRZE's killer coffee. "What you're asking me, Ginger, seems to me, is this: Is someone trying to kill everybody who used to be in Whip Hand? I put that question to the KRZE group mind. But I'll tell you what I think. I think it's terrorism."
Dramatic pause.
"It's violence against heavy metal artists by certain people who, shall we say, have a different viewpoint on music and don't think people should be allowed to choose what they like." It was the sort of speechmaking that was permissible on Sunday morning, when the KRZE station manager thought no one was listening.
"You mean like those right-to-lifers that were bombing the abortion clinics?"
"You got it. They weren't even what you'd rightly call abortion clinics. They were health centers that made a lot of people healthier and better. Nobody ever forced anybody to walk through the doors of a health center at gunpoint. And the sort of person who would use violence, blow up a building because they don't like the ideology of the people who work there, that's twisted and sick. It's like blowing up somebody's house because you don't like what they watch on television. It's an animalistic response. Well, there are a lot of people out there who-"
"Mentally deranged," Ginger interjected.
"Well, that's your description, Ginger." In the back of Robbin's mind was the imperative that she could appear to take a stand as long as it wasn't one that threatened any of KRZE's sponsors. There was art and there was commerce, and commerce was what paid the rent on Robbin's duplex. The one where she and Rex had done the bump all night long. And might again someday. There was hope in the world.
"I certainly agree that people should not force their views on other people. All views on all issues should be aired in a forum. Information should be accessible, and people should make their own choices." That was a nice, high-sounding, thoroughly bland party line. Normally, Robbin hated cluttering up her brain with other points of view. She knew what worked for her.
"But what about the guys in Whip Hand?"
"I think the… the tragic happenstance that befell both those men was terribly unfortunate. As far as anybody knows, Jackson Knox's death was some kind of accident. And there's no evidence that it was connected to Brion Hardin's murder. For all we know, he might have been killed by a robber or something, right?" Her tone indicated that she had her thumb on the pulse of the facts, was an all-knowing rock'n'roll DJ. She was waxing authoritarian on something she knew little about because she knew no one would challenge her.
"People shouldn't kill the people who give us music," said Ginger.
"I think everybody listening to the sound of your voice right now would be in total agreement on that one. I hope that nobody out there is crazy enough to believe that killing musicians is ever going to stop the power of rock."
Whoa, back off, Robbin! That had sounded a bit too much like a challenge itself. The freaks out in bozo-land didn't need any new ideas. She was suddenly glad her radio handle was not her real name. Robbin Banks couldn't be looked up in any phone book.
"Well, I just think it's really sad. I cried when I heard. And I hope nobody else gets hurt, you know?"
That's right. And keep on believing the world won't try to harm you.
"I say if the solution is violent, it isn't a solution. We should all try to be more civilized toward each other, hm? I gotta move on, Ginger, but hey-thanks for sharing your thoughts with us."
She took a break to spin some vintage Ted Nugent -"Free for All"-then cut to the line three blinker.
"Fuck you, nigger dick-," bellowed a voice, followed by the hard clunk! of disconnect.
Robbin winced. "Whoops, wrong number. Let's check out line seven… and no more abuse, huh, gang?" She became instantly jumpy about what pleasures or terrors the next call held. "Yo, there, you're rappin' with Robbin on the KRZE talkback."
"Umyeah… hi, Robbin, this is Kyle from Garden Grove."
"Way south! Good to know KRZE penetrates all the way down to Disneyland land. What's doin', Kyle?"
He cleared his throat. "We work the night shift, okay, and me and some of the other guys at the Datsun plant were just wondering… like, if the death orientation of a lot of metal music, okay? And speed metal, and thrash, might have something to do with the fact that a coupla guys who actually play the stuff got wiped out, y'know what I mean?"
"I think the idea of metal music being 'death-oriented' is a misnomer, Kyle. Do you know what I mean?"
"You mean it's… like a mistake?"
"You got it. A lot of metal music deals with occult imagery, sure, and there's an aggression in metal music that implies violence, but the guys in the bands are not ravening monsters. I mean, Vince Neill loves his mom, okay? Blackie Lawless probably has a great pet dog. That's not what he chops up and tosses to the audience at his live shows. It's just slaughterhouse leavings, props. Like actors-just because Clint Eastwood blows away people in the mov
ies doesn't mean he packs a Magnum in real life. Why, in real life he wants to make sure the citizens of Carmel can eat ice cream on the streets, man! The rats the Grimsoles toss into the crowd during their live shows aren't rabid, or anything. It's all show business. And like movie actors, the guys in heavy metal aren't very violent, or hung up on death. Some of them maintain a public persona that's pretty rowdy, but that's part of the image-making process. Unfortunately, some listeners can't tell the difference between fantasy and reality, man. And that's how people like poor Jackson Knox get killed. Heavy metal employs death imagery, but that doesn't automatically mean it promotes death or violence. A kid who listens to an Ozzy Osbourne track and jumps out a window had capital-P problems long before that record made it to his turntable. Some of the greatest poetry in history deals with death imagery. You gonna ban or label all poetry because of that?''
''No way," said Kyle.
Robbin was trotting out her responses and theories by rote today. She needed to focus a little more, but she was doing better than the callers so far, who were singularly uninspired.
Another puff. Another sip. The coffee had gone cold. Line one.
"Like, is it true that the lyrics to 'Sleaze Weasel' are about, um, oral sex?"
From line four to line eight, back to line two.
"Dude, you want the Grateful Dead, I think you're tuned to the wrong station, and I don't mean on your radio, can you dig it?"
She cut to line six. A virgin Benson & Hedges kissed fire. Nigger Dick had been good for only one call. Wimp radio terrorists; no stamina. Kneejerks, one-shots. They'd make great line soldiers.
"I dunno what the hell they're talking about," claimed a blood named Kent calling from East Hollywood. "I played 'Kill Again' backwards on my stereo. And all I got was a headache and a fucked-up record."
Line seven: "Those bands, you know, they ask for it. By making so much money, and then braggin' about it, and gettin' their picture in People and stuff. Bound to get someone's dander up. So naturally someone's gonna pay the price."
Line three: "I think that last caller is deranged. But then, I think most of your callers are deranged."
Robbin Banks kept a straight radio face… but Tracie Nichols smiled.
"Public figures cannot accept responsibility for the lunatic behavior of aberrants or mental defectives," the caller went on. "There are a lot of kooks out there just ready to explode. Primed. No one can predict what will touch them off. Peter Kurten, the Dusseldorf Vampire, got sexually excited by listening to the Catholic High Mass. Then he went out and strangled women, stabbed them to death with scissors, killed them with a hammer. And maybe some other nut case apes what he sees in a movie, or acts out the lyrics to an extreme song. But the artists cannot be made culpable."
Inspiration struck Robbin. Now was the perfect time to cue up a Whip Hand tune for the next break. She selected "Drive It in Deep," from their second album Menace to Society.
"Maybe if this guy, whoever, in Denver hadn't knifed Brion Hardin, he'd've raped some little girl instead, and the know-nothings and the brain-dead religious right would blame it on the Movie of the Week. My point is, that person would have exploded into violence eventually not because of movies or music, but because he-or she-was a disturbed personality. There are people out there with very limited horizons. They wear social blinders. They feel it is better to play it safe, to run scared, and blame the most convenient scapegoat. And that means censorship… and censorship is the attempted murder of our whole culture. Censure replicates itself until it engulfs everything. Slapping irons on a few artists who dare to be dangerous is in no way an acceptable solution…"
Dare to be dangerous, I like that, Robbin thought. And thank you, God, for this caller. She set turntable #1 to spinning.
***
"Horus, turn that shit off, huh?"
Gabriel Stannard had once done a promo dub for KRZE-FM. They meant so much to the fans, those simple little station IDs, and they had a lot of recognition value. They cost zero-audio tape, no more-and took less than sixty seconds if done right, in one take. Stations were eager to have the voices of the top guns plugging them.
This is the man your mommy warned, you about, Gabriel Stannard of Whip Hand. So what station could this be but KRZE-FM in Los Angeles, right? The supercharged 101.7 is gonna help you drive it in deep!
History now.
Now "Drive It in Deep" was coming back to taunt him, and he did not care to be razzed by some asshole DJ's idea of a ratings grabber.
Horus was doing fixed isometrics against parallel bars that were bolted to the poolside deck. He disengaged to flip off the radio remote. Sunday morning programming was usually all jabber, and he preferred something rhythmic to counterpoint his workout. His oiled ebony torso gleamed like dark, polished wood, intricately carved with sinew. He exercised wearing only a Grecian wrap. Stannard thought it looked like a potholder on a string, insufficient for covering his dong.
Stannard sat cross-legged on a tanning lounger near the deep end, with a tall Long Island iced tea and a couple of monster magazines to occupy his hands. He looked pale and ill and had snapped his order for the radio talkshow to be cut off. The tone of the calls had sunk a prong of fear into his gut. The song was the last straw.
Sertha Valich, who had accompanied Stannard to Jackson Knox's hurried funeral in San Francisco, emerged from the sauna hutch. She too gleamed, with perspiration from the steam. She wore a beach robe and had her magnificent hair wound up in a towel. Stannard watched her cross the terrace on slender, elegant feet.
"How's your head? Eyes still hurt?" Sometimes her accent came on strong. She stooped to clear a spot on the table so she could sit right next to him. Under one of the monster magazines was Stannard's.44 Magnum.
The blunt gray noses of the bullets were visible in the cylinder. "I wish you would put this… thing away. It frightens me. I dislike firearms, Gabriel."
"It's mine. I'll do with it what I want. You don't like it, cover it back up."
Sertha had stayed with him since Knox's death. She'd been there when the news about Brion Hardin came down. She'd been sitting in Stannard's office when Horus had delivered the news that Josh, the private detective, had lost track of Lucas Ellington, who had bought a brand new Bronco and vanished up the Pacific Coast Highway, leaving no tracks.
A knee poked from her robe, so he reached to stroke it. His blue eyes sought the blue water of the pool. Words came, but he could not force himself to speak. He was glad she had chosen to remain. Guns scared her, but he was pretty frightened himself. He dared not show it. That would be contrary to his established persona. He had put armed guards on the gates of the estate and was packing his Magnum to and from the bathroom, but he could not say he was afraid, any more than he could admit just how much he needed her to be around. Gabriel Stannard was not, could not, be pussy. Fickle fans were eager to judge him; should they even get a hint that Gabriel Stannard was not the macho wild man he purported to be, they would be just as eager to forsake him.
His mind raced around like a lab rat in a puzzle box. Two accidents, sure. When Lucas Ellington braced me it was with a plastic gun, for christsake. Coincidence. Two unrelated tragedies. Right.
He had begun to have nightmares about his own death. Shadow figures appeared at the foot of his Playboy bed to shove him off this mortal coil. See this knife? Stannard exeunt. Next act, please. Twice he had awakened with a yelp. Sertha's concern for him was not only genuine, but justified.
She kissed his cheek and spread a towel on a vacant lounge, dropping the robe and unfurling her hair. She was trying to work up a full body tan and would want him to rub her down with cocoa butter.
He held the first dollop between his palms to warm it. "Top or bottom first?"
She smiled and lay down on her stomach. "Save the front for later. Back rubs lead to front rubs, and you know what front rubs lead to." She finger-combed her damp hair so that it hung off the end of the lounge.
He was performing ba
dly in bed, too, and he knew it. He wondered what she thought, and whether she was disappointed, and would endure. He worried, which was unlike him. Before, he had never worried about anything.
Right now, just putting his hands on her body to grease her up was giving him a nice, healthy hard-on. He thought of the way he fit into her, snug as a living glove, of the crisp abrasion of her pubic hair against his.
He massaged her methodically. Before he was done, he would touch every inch of her thoroughbred body.
But his eyes never left the loaded Magnum on the table. It sat there, likewise awaiting his pleasure.
13
EL GRANADA WAS A WIDE place in the coast highway, tacked onto a bedroom community. Lucas phoned Burt Kroeger, collect, from a phone carrel outside the local hardware store.
"… and so I just told her that you'd headed north to camp out for a while. Meditate. Violate furry forest animals, that sorta thing. And that you'd be back soon, and that you'd get in touch with everybody when you did. No specifics, no maps. Okay?"
Burt had done well. Lucas had been apprehensive about Sara checking up on him.
"You positive you didn't mention Point Pitt? I mean, I like Sara a lot, but she might get overzealous, and I'm doing fine up here all by myself."
"You want a signed guarantee? Don't worry about it." For some reason, it occurred to Lucas that Burt had taken up his cigarette habit again. He could not hear him puffing, for the noise of the ocean, but the image of Burt sucking on a cigarette between sentences locked in and held. "But let me ask you something, old buddy. What the hell difference would it make if Sara did know?"
It was obvious that Burt now felt yoked with the responsibility of being the middleman. "I sometimes think that Sara is a bit too eager to deepen our relationship, Burt. She's a valuable person. But she's in a hurry. I don't want to screw things up by rushing. You know." Burt replied that he did, in fact, copy and understand. The same sort of thing had happened during his courtship with his wife, Diana. Only in that mad race, it had been Burt doing the pushing. He was sensitized to the idea, and Lucas knew it.
The Kill Riff Page 13
