Excerpts From The Grand Tour

Today I am going to feature a few snippets from my book, The Grand Tour, the story about a fictional rock band called The Extrations that existed from the mid 1970's until 1982, broke up and then reunited in 1987. Patrick Bolo is the bass player of the group who starts the novel finding his girlfriend dead from an excess of drugs.

Though he didn’t know it yet, the girl lying in bed next to Patrick Bolo was dead. In fact, he didn’t know much in his semi-comatose state. The night before was filled with heavy drinking. He hadn’t had as much cocaine as he usually did. The effects of that on one’s system were powerful. Patrick Bolo had a long sleep. It was three in the afternoon and he and the girl next to him, Jenna McAllister, had settled in ten hours ago. The sunlight blaring into the messy, trashed hotel room had not even awakened him.
He stirred with an intense urge to piss. Ugh, he thought, my head is killing me. I should just piss myself and spare the effort to get up. He turned over to see Jenna’s short dyed pink hair stop her pillow. Her face was turned the other way. The blankets had all fallen off the bed and he could see her naked body. His memory started coming back to him. He could see the screaming crowd at the concert last night and the fun he had with Jenna when they got to the room. He couldn’t enjoy the fun at the time, being too clouded in the head at the time. Thinking back though, he started remembering the fun. What fun that was. Ow, he held his head grunting. Getting out of the bed was difficult. He noticed the sunlight as he rose and it hit his already screaming head like an explosion. He staggered out of bed and crashed into the fretless bass that he kept in his hotel room. Ahh, shit, he said to himself as the bass fell. Damned thing cost three thousand dollars, oh well. His clumsiness had caused him to crash into the bass countless times before. The thing still played amazingly. He staggered his way over to the bathroom.
Coming out of the bathroom he felt as if something was amiss. He was not quiet moving around the room yet why was Jenna not even reacting to his noise. He looked at her face, turned as it was to the opposite side of him. He stood over her and turned her face toward him. Her eyes were closed but her mouth was open in a strange way. Open as if she was gasping. He noticed how still she was. He touched her arm. Cold to the touch. He felt her wrist for a pulse, there was none. His foggy head cleared real fast at this point. His heart started racing. Fuck, fuck, what do I do? He paced back and forth. Now he felt his asthma kicking in. He couldn’t breathe and he couldn’t think. He grabbed his bag and pulled out his inhaler. Puffing on it frantically, he hoped that maybe she was playing a joke on him. Maybe he had too much to drink last night and was still in la la land. He checked her again. No change.
The question was now what? Should he talk to the other band members or call for emergency help right now. He was too fucked up to handle all this. “Ahhhhh”, he yelled out in his room. He threw some jeans on, his boots and a t-shirt. He grabbed his hotel keys and ran out of the room to find the other band members and see if they could help him figure out what he couldn’t figure out himself. This was not a good way to start off a day.
He raced down the hall to the suite where the rest of the band used as their communal lounge. He knocked hard. Walter Engle, the burly tour security chief, answered the door. Walter said, “Hey, finally awake-“. Patrick’s face stopped him from saying more and he moved aside allowing Patrick entrance to the large room with the view of Jacksonville, Florida. Only Brian Hertwell and Eric Mitchell were in the room with Walter. Brian looked up from his game of solitaire, Eric fooled around on his brand new shiny blue Gibson guitar. Brian stated with a look of some bemusement, “it seems something has your attention. Is it that you need more coke?”
“Shut up, man, this is serious!”
“Okay, I’m sorry, Pat, you don’t look too good anyway. I wouldn’t look too good anyway if I had as much to drink as you had last night.”
“Look, I think the girl I came up with last night is dead. Dead or extremely fucked up, I don’t know what the hell to do. I can barely walk.”
Eric said, “You definitely look like you’re fucked up.”
Brian rose from his chair, “Let’s check up on this girl and see what’s up here.”
They rose from their seats and walked with Patrick to his suite.
From the room they heard a scream. Just as they reached the door, a fifty-ish maid ran from the room, her face filled with terror. Brian catches her, “What’s wrong?” He knew the answer already; he just wanted to hear her say it. The maid looked at all three of them frantically, “She’s dead! The girl in that room is dead! Oh my God, what happened?” She ran down the hall before anyone could try to stop her and calm her down.
Brian checked on the girl. There was no pulse. She was going cold. He turned her face over. The eyes were closed. She most likely died in her sleep. Around her mouth were traces of vomit. That’s the cause of death he guessed. Vomit in the sleep. Although he had nothing directly to do with the situation, Brian felt an overwhelming sense of guilt. At the moment, he wanted to forget about his own involvement with her.
“Fuck, she’s definitely done for”, he said in a flat tone. Patrick simply collapsed into the corner with his head in his hands. He then lifted his head only to put a cigarette in his hand and light it. Then he buried his head in his hands again, the cigarette sticking out from between two fingers.
The maid was quietly watching the whole scene in a silent horror, the shock finally hit her and she screamed again loudly and ran out of the room. Brian said, “Well, Patrick, I hope you can get yourself in condition to talk to the police.”

Class (As In Common Decency)

When I went for the job interview a few weeks back, I was convinced that the corporation, a major producer of cameras and other electronic products, was the perfect example of a professional corporation. They had good benefits, good investment/401k elements and a no yelling policy in which all employees were meant to be treated in a respectful basis. Sounds good, right? Every silver lining must have a cloud somewhere.



They talked with me for two hours and I seemed to say all the right things. It was as smooth an interview as I ever had and I thought I was on the way to getting the job.......or at least getting a notification that I didn't. You see, it looks like my strong impression about this place being professional and respectful was dead wrong. They didn't even have the decency to call me and tell me anything and when I looked up the position on the web, it was listed as no longer available. So I am not even worthy of a notification phone call? I sent an email to the HR person I met with and, after almost a week, have not even had that email responded to. Just a lack of class! And of respect!



On a similar note, my coworker recommended I join a search engine called iRazoo.com. By searching you can earn points and eventually acquire rewards for accumulating enough points. Fair enough. I wracked up quite a few points in searching over a few days until I went to log in yesterday and was informed that my account was banned. When I inquired as to the ban, I was responded very quickly and told that there was a one account per household rule and that with my coworker being on her computer and me being on my computer, we somehow violated this rule. I explained the situation and was given a very unhelpful response offering me and my coworker a simple choice, my email to log in or hers. I responded that that was impossible, we are two different people and have two different emails but are not doing anything wrong on here. I never received the courtesy of a response. Needless to say I won't be using iRazoo ever again. Just like the HR Dept. of the place I interviewed with there was no decency in how this was handled. Again no class.

The Cult

Friday night I saw the great '80s hard rock, or acid rock (as lead singer Ian Astbury refers to it as) band The Cult play an excellent show. I saw them last year and they were very good too and I am not sure which show was exactly better, but this show was different in that they performed their entire 1985 album Love, which took up a bit more than half the set. I've been very familiar with their music in the past but, other than a couple of songs from Love, not familiar with the whole album.

This is a very good idea to play a good album from a band in their entirety. I've noticed Cheap Trick did it a number of years back, playing their first three albums separately in three separate shows. I've read about other examples of this but The Cult performing Love, was the first time that I've seen a band play a show like this and it made me really appreciate how good the album is. Last night I picked up the two-disc remaster, copied it to a minidisc, yes, Minidisc! Now I'll begin the process of familiarizing myself with all the songs on the album. "Phoenix" is really turning out to be a standout track!

I would recommend anyone to see The Cult on their current tour or any time that they are out, if you like hard rock, or course.

Summer is just about finished and it's the end of an excellent outdoor concert season

As one can feel in the air the beginning traces of the end of summer and the kicking in of autumn, I can say that this year had some excellent outdoor shows. I have never seen so many good outdoor concerts in one summer season. That's one great thing about living in New York City, there are so many parks to catch a good show in on a perfect summer evening. The season started with Ian Hunter down by Battery Park City. The former Mott The Hoople member put on a very good show in June with some vocal assistance from none other than Joe Elliot of Def Leppard. I wasn't familiar with much of his music before but was impressed with the set. Then there was a performance of Miles Davis' excellent On The Corner album in the same park. Some of the actual players on the sessions, including Michael Henderson were playing at the show.

There was Don Byron's tribute to Junior Walker at Madison Square Park featuring the annoying woman who bothered us to move from where were standing with just twenty minutes left in the set. I believe I have another blog post describing that event. There was the Robert Cray Band playing a real good set at the Bandshell in Prospect Park. Bad weather that evening but well worth dealing with for the show. Jackson Browne was there a few days later. I got to see him for a fourth time and that was a perfect evening.

One of the more unique concert experiences I have ever had was seeing the Czech Republic band, Plastic People of the Universe in the outdoor park in Lincoln Center. They were a very different yet very entertaining sort of rock band going back to the sixties. Between them and their opening act, whose name escapes me, they made for an excellent evening.

The outdoor season closed out with the legendary John Fogerty, performing at South Street Seaport from his excellent new album, Blue Ridge Rangers Rides Again.

Also I saw Night Ranger, the wonderfully talented Vanessa Bley (at my friend's benefit show with some other good acts) and will be seeing The Cult on Friday but those were or will be at indoor venues so they don't fit the summer vibe of this post. All I can say is that I hope next summer is this good!