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Reed
Afternoon rehearsals are the worst. I can’t concentrate in the afternoons. I’m a morning person. I get shit done in the mornings. Important shit. Creative shit. Shit that makes us a ton of money.
And yet, here I am, at Empress Records in downtown SoHo at five o’clock in the afternoon while our band manager, Nick, runs through the upcoming tour schedule with us.
We hit the road in three months.
Sighing softly, I run my fingers back through my hair as I look around the studio, bored out of my ever-loving mind. Empress Records is a typical studio space with a soundproof booth, mixing equipment, a boardroom table, and a large lounging area. The walls are covered in framed photographs and awards–our band, Cold Neptune, featured in more than half of them.
Quinn, our electric guitarist, is slouched on the red velvet couch beside me. He’s a solid wall of muscle, covered in tattoos, much like myself. He’s also my oldest friend. We’ve known each other since we were kids, and we’ve been through more than most guys go through in an entire lifetime.
I glance across the room at our bass player, Kael, stretched out on the other side of the table, hands linked behind his head, fast asleep. He’s wearing a slouchy gray beanie over his shaved hair. It’s pulled down low as if he’s trying to disguise the fact that he’s asleep. But the idiot just snored and totally gave himself away.
Jaxon, our drummer, sits behind his kit on the opposite side of the studio. He’s mindlessly twirling a set of sticks between his fingers while he stares out the window beside him, dressed in his usual head to toe black jeans and sweater. He looks just as bored as the rest of us.
“Hey!” Nick leans forward, snapping his fingers an inch from my face. “This concerns all of us. Lead singer included, funnily enough. Pay attention. I’m not going over this stuff again.”
My eyes snap in his direction.Asshole.“I’m listening,” I grunt. “But Jesus, man, get on with it, will ya?”
“Anyone ever told you, you’re a miserable sack of shit?”
“Only on a daily basis.”
Nick grumbles something under his breath that I don’t quite catch. I can only imagine the long list of names he’s calling me right now.
We have a love-hate relationship.
He loves it when I write him a hit song. And I hate that he gets such a huge cut of our royalties. But the thing is, Nick Dundas knows his stuff, and he hasn’t let us down since we signed with him almost ten years ago. He’s got an ego that could fill the room, and he’s a masochistic bastard when he’s cutting a deal.
But I guess that’s what we’re paying him for.
“Kael!” he suddenly shouts, shoving the table so hard that Kael’s entire body jerks. Kael opens his bloodshot eyes, pushing his beanie back with broad hands. He sits up a little straighter, giving Nick the finger.
“Like I was saying,” Nick continues with a deep breath, tapping his pen on the edge of the glass table. “The new stuff Reed’s been dabbling with lately has done well. Very well, in fact. The fans are going crazy for the more edgy stuff. The last three singles went to number one within a week, downloads have skyrocketed, which, as it turns out, record labels love. And as a result, Cold Neptune is being played on every radio station across the country.”
“And?” asks Quinn, leaning forward, his thick forearms resting on his wide-spread knees. He’s waiting for the kicker. He’s waiting for thebutor thehoweverthat often accompanies one of Nick’s long, drawn-out speeches.
“And… they’ve just tripled the tour budget to include a dozen more shows across four more states.”
“Triple!” Quinn almost chokes on the word.
“The budget for the tour was already decent,” says Jaxon, his sticks poised mid-air. He pushes his stool back and stands quickly, moving out from behind his kit. Pacing around the room, he starts tapping his sticks against the sides of his jeans as he walks. “What exactly does this mean for us?”
“It means an extra six weeks on the road,” says Nick. “They’ll be putting us up in five-star hotels. We’ll travel in private planes, have chauffeur driven cars, and Cold Neptune will get to perform in sold out stadiums from one side of the continental US to the other. You’ll be playing to packed audiences over the holidays, and you guys are pinned to be the number one act at the Hollywood Bowl on New Year’s Eve.”
“No shit.”
“The label’s also arranged a one-off industry performance about two weeks before the tour’s scheduled to start, as a kind of full dress-rehearsal, I suppose. They’re calling it‘Goodbye NY’,cheesy, yeah I know. It’s a way to knock out some of the kinks with lighting and sound, and it’ll give you guys a feel for the size of the stages you’ll be performing on. Tickets go on sale in a couple of weeks. The website’s going to explode. If things go well, there’s even talk of taking the show on that European leg they’ve been hinting at lately.”
Quinn meets my gaze. He collapses back against the couch, a slow smile spreading across his face.
As lead guitarist, you would think he’d be the cockiest, most self-indulgent member of the band. But that isn’t the case at all. Quinn Tanner is humble, and pretty damn shy, to be honest. He’s way more subdued than the rest of us. He likes to lie low and keep his private life just that. He’s as private as hell, even among the rest of the band, let alone with the fans.
Until he stands on stage, of course.
Put a screaming crowd in front of him and he becomes someone else entirely. He’s the consummate showman, and he puts the rest of us to shame with the way he whips the fans into such a frenzy. Especially those of the female variety. It’s fucking insane how wet they get for him. Quinn Tanner steps on stage and I don’t know what it is, but seriously, panties come off and tits come out quicker than green grass through a goose.
“So, if the tour does well,” says Quinn, obliviously. “The record label might send us to London, and then onto France like they talked about last year?”
