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Kingston
The gig at the Whiskey was booked for a Thursday night at the beginning of November, so even though the original plan had been for us to start rehearsing for the tour that week, we had to start two weeks early. Devyn had adjusted her schedule to work at the studio early in the morning. That way, she’d be done by four and could meet up with us at the rehearsal studio by five. So far, it was working out perfectly, though I kind of hated to see her working two jobs. We needed her to be on top of her game when it came to the music, and no one could burn the candle at both ends for any extended period of time.
We needed rest and hydration when we toured, and even though they wouldn’t do the amount of singing I did, the rest of the band still needed their voices to stay in peak condition. Devyn hadn’t shown any signs of fatigue so far, but I was watching. I really wanted to offer her money so she could take some kind of leave of absence from her day job. I didn’t think she’d be receptive to that idea yet, so I was keeping it on the back burner.
For now.
“I’m really loving the way this is coming together,” Z said as we finished rehearsal on Friday night. “We need to tweak the timing on some of the solos, but otherwise, this set will work out well.”
“How long are your sets normally?” Devyn asked. “The last time I saw you live, I want to say there were seventeen songs plus three encores?”
I nodded. “Yeah, and that’s a long-ass set. For this upcoming European tour, we decided to do thirteen, plus two encores. If we book another full-scale world tour, we might go back to doing twenty, but for this, I think fifteen is good.”
“The show at the Whiskey will give us better perspective on the fans’ reactions,” Z said. “Fans who come to see us here in L.A. are usually diehards, and if they’re unhappy about the set, we’ll know.”
“And if they are?” Devyn asked. “Will you change it up?”
“It depends,” I replied. “We’ll hear from fans but also some local journalists we know, and if all of them have similar comments, like they think it’s too short or something, then we might consider it. Generally, we can do whatever the fuck we want, but at the end of the day, if we’re not making our fans happy, what are we doing?”
“Makes sense.” Devyn nodded.
“Anyway, it’s not a big deal to add a couple of songs if they’re bent out of shape because we didn’t play something deep in our backlist,” Tommy added. “I don’t think they’re going to care, but you never know.”
“I need a little time to learn them,” Devyn pointed out. “Remember, I still have to work during the day.”
“At some point,” I said lightly, as if it was no big deal. “You might need to take some time off. Rehearsals will get intense as we get closer to leaving.”
“I can’t afford to do that just yet, but we’ll reassess as it gets closer.”
“Okay.” I wasn’t going to push her because I understood her need to keep one foot in the door of her old life. Especially since I couldn’t yet promise her this was going to work out. That was the plan, but we wouldn’t know for sure until we played together in front of a crowd. That was the only way to gauge not just our chemistry, but how fans reacted to us with her in the mix.
“Well, I’ll see you guys tomorrow. Noon?” She picked up her backpack.
“See you then.”
I was only a couple of steps behind her, since I felt like someone should be walking her out to her car, when a flash of light momentarily blinded me.
“Are you Onyx Knight’s new bass player?” someone yelled.
Another figure popped out from behind him, the flash of his camera going off multiple times as he asked a similar question.
There were two more reporters heading in our direction and Devyn was just standing there, completely frozen.
“Are you rehearsing for a tour or an album?” someone else yelled.
“Is it true Carter hand-picked you as his replacement before he killed himself?”
Before I could react, the throng of reporters had started to make a semi-circle around us. But it only took a second for my brain to kick in.
“Guys, this isn’t cool,” I said in a loud voice. “Come on, you know how we feel about stalking us at the studio.”
“First Amendment!” someone yelled.
I managed not to roll my eyes and gently tugged Devyn’s elbow.
“Come on. Let’s go back inside.” I pulled her in and firmly closed the door behind us, even as the reporters continued firing questions.
“What’s going on?” Z’s eyes narrowed when he caught sight of us.
