A Cold Open

“You know how much I hate being seen at these types of things,” I whined. “Tony, people still like you because you’re a road dog.”

Tony, my six-foot plus friend, dressed in an indie Japanese neet core band t-shirt and jeans, laughed from his core as we walked through the backstage area of a four thousand seat theatre.

“Cy, it’s alright. It helps me out if people think they’re getting a major record deal when I talk to them.”

“So, you’re just using me to find your next opening act at a discounted rate?” I sighed.

“Yup. Ironic, isn’t it? We’re both wicked cogs in the same machine, but everyone hates the guy from corporate. As the saying goes: Men in denim built the land, men in suits destroyed it.”

I quickly put my hands over my face, trying to clear my mind.

There were four up and coming indie bands playing at this event. Tony invited me to just check it out to get away from the monotonous grind of managing the development bands on our record label: Twilight Reverie.

“I don’t know. This is just another piece of manufactured corporate music. The bands might be independent, but this whole thing is just an extension of how we got started,” I whined.

“I mean, not really.”

He paused, thinking about how he wanted to frame the conversation for any passersby.

“We were handpicked because of nepotism, and then assembled into the most commercially accessible rock band on the planet. This event still allows for young people to have their artistic integrity.”

“Young people,” I muttered under my breath. “Most of the people playing tonight are about our age, if not older.”

“Cy, you’re the oldest looking twenty-six year old I know,” he let out another laugh.

“Fifteen years in the business does that to you; you know that as well as anyone,” I side-eyed him.

He didn’t take the bait as we continued walking to the green room where the bands were waiting to perform.

As expected, four bands and four cliques in the corners of the room. Back when I was doing one-offs and touring I let my type-A personality shine and tried to vibe with the other acts, but I guess I was a dying breed.

“Good evening to you all, members of Hedgehogs, Arcadia, A Warm Place, and Ozean Horizon. I appreciate you accepting the invitation from Twilight Reverie to audition to open for me, Tony Black, on tour.”

Tony’s voice filled the room, his confident demeanor commanding everyone’s attention. Even though he was the bassist and back-up singer in our old band, it was obvious to me that he was destined for more than second fiddle.

“The order that you are performing is based on how many tickets you sold through your independent artist portals and the ticketing agency’s post purchase survey.”

Another pause to let his audience process the rules.

“If this were a simple matter of popularity, everyone else but Ozean Horizon would be wasting their time being here, but I will be judging you based on how I feel about your potential in the industry based only on your live performance.”

Eyes darted around the room as the bands finally knew how to size up the competition. Despite my outgoing nature, I hadn’t taken my eyes off either the floor nor Tony. I started to hate strangers. After years of hate mail and death threats, every room still felt hostile.

“This shy and arrogant jerk who won’t even look at you is my longtime friend, former bandmate, and the Director of Artist Development at Twilight Reverie, Cy Rondeau…if I can’t make up my mind tonight, he will make the decision for me.”

Chatter picked up in the room.

“Also, this should go without saying, but if he has to make the choice, that means that Twilight Reverie has an eye on you moving forward. So, don’t treat little Cy too poorly.”

He immediately walked toward the members of Hedgehogs for a more formal introduction. I decided to let him do it on his own. After his introduction, every interaction I had in the next half hour would be hollow.

I walked over to Arcadia to introduce myself briefly, and got the classic canned responses about how our old band Beyond the Realms was such an inspiration, and how my lyrics and guitar playing was so ahead of its time.

I crossed over with Tony to introduce myself to Hedgehogs where I got a similar rehearsed conversation. At least their drummer was authentic because he almost passed out from the nerves of meeting me. I was so used to people lying to appease my ego that meeting a real fan took me by surprise.

The interaction with A Warm Place was more muted. They didn’t have anything to say to me, and I respected them for it. I had as many detractors as I had fans, and it’s not like the stigma around me wasn’t earned. Any band with a woman in it saw me as scum. I never did anything illegal or heinous, but I never stayed with any woman–or man, for long when I was on tour. A serial cheater who cried about being alone. There’s a reason I was selling out stadiums.

Finally, I made my way over to Ozean Horizon, whose singing guitarist was glaring a hole through me.

“Cy Rondeau, just so you know, if your opinion is the reason we win this, we’re withdrawing,” she said in an even tone. “We don’t want the approval of someone like you.”

“Kiia, stop. I know how you feel, and we agreed on that, but you don’t have to be so…brash,” her bassist intervened.

I extended my hand to the bass player, “It’s alright, thank you for trying to keep the peace. What’s your name?”

“It’s Nate. Thanks,” he released the handshake quickly. “But we still aren’t like, down with the way you do things.”

“That’s fine,” I said calmly. “It’s not like I’m unaware of how people feel.”

The other bands were stirring and chattering loudly amongst themselves, shocked at the boldness of the band that was expected to benefit the most from this event.

“Kiia,” I said, meeting her eyes for the first time. She was striking in that sharp, grunge-pixie way that made looking at her feel like an accusation. “You have every right to think poorly of me, but if you win this competition, regardless of my involvement, at least let me do something for Ozean Horizon…”

Her bandmates were starting to sweat, afraid that she was going to lash out further at my attempt to be polite.

“We can sell out venues like this all the time without a label siphoning our profits and extorting our fans. There isn’t a thing you could offer us,” responded with a calm anger.

I smiled, the cocky smile that led to me being hit in the face more times than Tony and I could remember.

“Kiia, I know how successful you are. I know that Ozean Horizon has been around as long as Beyond the Realms. We’ve played opposite each other at festivals, had albums drop the same week, and have a lot of the same fans.”

I stopped myself, not wanting to tip my full hand right away.

“I promise you that with my experience in the industry and my deep knowledge of Ozean Horizon’s lore, I can personally do more for this band than any other industry executive on the planet.”

She hesitated—just a flicker, but enough. “Fine. Watch the show. If you still think all of that…we can talk. Over coffee, tomorrow.”

Tony’s laughter took over the room, but he chose not to add to the conversation.

“Okay,” I replied. “I’ll see you on the side of the stage before you go on with my answer. I don’t need to see Ozean Horizon for the sixtieth time to measure you against them.” I said scanning the room.

I gave Kiia a shallow smile before walking out with Tony to watch the show.