or
One Night With the Pogues
I forced my heavy legs to move and rounded a corner. And then I spotted her, a slender figure slipping from the side door of the venue. She wore a coat and held a bulging bag in her hand. And she was coming right in my direction, striding determinedly, her head bent, not looking left or right – nor straight forward. If I hadn’t sidestepped, she would have bumped into me. She stopped, distracted by the movement, and looked up. Her eyes, the greenest green I’ve ever seen, sparkled in the lamplight. Snowflakes caught in her jet black hair.
"Sorry," she muttered.
"That’s okay. You... you were at the gig? The Pogues gig?"
She didn’t answer, just laughed a small, almost hysterical laugh.
"What is it like? And why are you leaving so early? The performance must be at its height now. And..." It wasn’t polite, but I couldn’t stop myself. Curiosity was winning a resounding victory.
She looked me straight in the eye. "I spent the whole tour with them last Christmas," she said. "And all this year’s concerts. But I cannot take it any longer. I’m leaving the loony bin before I end up in the real one." The same laugh as before. "Though in the real one, there would at least be caring nurses."
I was perplexed. "What are you taking about? I would give anything to be able to see the Pogues..."
"Really?" She bent her head again and fished in her coat pocket. Her pale hand emerged with a piece of paper. "Take it."
"What is it?"
"Backstage pass."
"Are... are you kidding?"
"Not at all. A special pass for the privileged ones, the inner circle, so to say. Like a universal card opening all doors." She looked back. "But don’t go there now. Wait till tomorrow. And get there before the gig, what happens afterwards is just a well-rehearsed show. If you want to see the real thing...," her green eyes were gazing earnestly into mine, "... the real loony bin, come before the beginning."
She shuddered in a gust of wind. Then she grasped the handle of the bag more firmly, mumbled: "I’ve had enough," and walked on without even bidding me good-bye. I watched her retreating in the falling snow, walking briskly at first, then almost breaking into a run. I lowered my eyes to the card in my hand.
***
Next day, I walked down an empty, brightly lit corridor, my expectations whipped up to the utmost. At the bend, two guys stood, chatting, smoking. Roadies? I approached them, a friendly smile glued to my face.
"Excuse me, I’m looking for the Pogues."
The taller of the two looked me up and down. "You’re a new one?"
Old one. Old fan who is finally about to see his heroes in person. But I gave a noncomittal nod.
The man feebly waved to the end of the corridor. He had deep shadows under his eyes. Deep lines framed his mouth and were etched to his brow. "Good luck," he said and took a mighty pull from his cigarette.
I headed in the indicated direction and came to a halt in front of a scratched wooden door without any sign. Two muscular men stood there, emanating the unmistakable air of bouncers.
"This is the Pogues dressing room?" I ventured.
"Your pass," growled one of them. He studied the card meticulously, turned it over several times, and only then he gave it back to me and stepped away from the door.
I put my hand on the handle. Felt the coldness of the hard metal. Hesitated for just a second as if to prolong the excited expectations. Then I pressed the handle.
***
"You’re a new one?"
Upon my entering, James started on his chair, an expression of pure horror on his face. For a moment it looked as if he would bolt from the room, but then he seemed to relax. He ran a hand over his brow as if recovering from a shock and asked me the question I’d already heard before. If I admit I’m just a fan, will they kick me out immediately? Better not try the chances. So I supplied one more polite nod, accompanied with a wide, hearty smile. James returned my smile and resumed his chat with another guy – a roadie perhaps as it wasn’t anybody I could recognize. Nobody else paid any attention to me. I took a deep breath and tried to take in all the impressions from finally entering the place of my dreams.
They were all there. All my music heroes scattered around the spacious dressing room. Spacious and a bit messy. The mysterious hints almost led me to expect instruments of torture hanging on the walls and glasses with human blood on the tables, but there was just clothing, dishes, bottles, magazines, the usual mess. But I was interested in the human beings, not the lifeless things.
Jem was seated in a rocking chair, rocking softly and persistently, smiling the heartiest smile I’ve ever seen. Staring straight ahead and his hands moving as if he were playing an invisible banjo.
Terry sat to the right, his broad back turned to me, so I couldn’t see what activity he was engaged in. Spider floated into my field of vision. He looked at least twenty years younger than his age, bronze skin, a chic cap sitting jauntily on his head, his fingers toying with a whistle.
"Hi, Spider!" I greeted him as was passing by.
"Spencer," he replied, grinning broadly. "Hi. What a brilliant evening today! Cannot wait to get onstage!" An embodiment of enthusiasm, he was nearly jumping for joy as he was crossing the room. If energy could fly like sparkles, he would be a walking firecracker.
I scanned the room further. Andrew was lounging on a sofa, tiny discman headphones in his ears. He was nodding his head rhytmically to the silent music, his eyes half-closed. Darryl was sitting on a chair nearby, sipping from an enormous glass of red liquid – tomato juice? – through a straw and reading a book, not paying attention to the outer world. Philip was standing in a corner with his guitar strapped across his shoulder, his fingers gently strumming the strings, his lips moving silently as if forming song lyrics, fully absorbed in concentration. Only Shane was nowhere in sight. In a cozy armchair, a ragged guy hunched over a crossword. Another roadie most likely. There were more of them, roadies and technicians, running here are there, finishing the preparations.
I suddenly didn’t know what to do. Shall I bother them now? They are due to go onstage in a short while. Maybe I should have come after the gig like a decent fan. But I couldn’t make myself leave. After all, it might be a welcome distraction for them to have a short chat with a guy who fully appreciates the beauty of their music, who even thought about sending them some of his poems to be made into songs. I braced myself and headed towards Terry.
I circled the small table he was sitting at, and an amost surreal sight greeted me. There was a chessboard spread on the table. Terry held a black horse poised in the air as if intending to make a move but re-considering his decision. At the opposite side of the table there was no chair. But there was a companion. A stuffed purple elephant sat on the table next to the chessboard, his trunk down, his beady eyes staring earnestly at the chess pieces. Terry finally played his piece and smiled with satisfaction. "So what will you do now?" he whispered. "I got you, didn’t I?"
I winced, thinking the words were addressed to me. But then I noticed Terry was staring at the elephant, tiny fires of triumph sparkling in his eyes. Suddenly his expression went bland. His fingers picked up a white piece and made a quick move. In the next second the sparkles were back – but sparkles of anger this time. "Hey! That was wicked. Where did you learn such clever tricks? But you won’t beat me this time, you won’t... Just you wait..." And he stared at the board so intensively that it seemed his eyes might burn holes into it. I swallowed hard. There was an army of small beasts lining the chessboard from both sides – barely half an inch tall, tiny pigs, bears, dogs, maybe even dinosaurs. I retreated, slowly and noiselessly, to a corner of the room, feeling even more awkward than before.
Oh, well. I noticed Andrew pulling the headphones out of his ears and I snatched the chance. "Hi!" We shook hands. "Good music?" I nodded to the discman and winked. "Maybe demos for your new solo album?"
"Bloody good music," he replied. "The very best. We...," he gestured around to iclude all his bandmates, "... can only envy." He drummed his palm on his thigh. "Bloody great stuff."
"Who?" I inquired.
"A true master," Andrew whispered reverently, turned the volume up and handed the headphones to me. I didn’t even need to bring them all the way to my ears to recognize the familiar croak.
"Crazy Frog?" I breathed out.
Andrew didn’t answer, just gently took the headphones from my limp fingers, put them back into his ears and closed his eyes dreamily.
A roadie passing by with a coil of cable in his hand chuckled when he noticed my amazement. "Come on, boy, at least it’s a change. I was beginning to get sick from listening to the fucking Pet Shop Boys over and over."
"Pet Shop Boys?" I exclaimed. "The bastards who..."
"Shhhh. If he had his stupid frogman all those years back, Fairytale Of New York, could have made it to no. 1. But no, there were those fuckers. And he fell in love with their opus so much that he decided he had to own every copy in the city. We all suspect it must have been him who swayed the chart. He still has the records – hundreds of them."
The roadie shrugged and went on to pursue his task. I just stood there and nearly flinched when a voice cut through the silence: "On stage in ten minutes!"
Nobody stirred. Only Spider hissed an ardent "yessss" and his fingers moved frantically over the whistle holes.
"Time to go," I heard from my left. I turned.
One of the smokers I encountered in the corridor was standing over Jem. When Jem didn’t respond and just went on smiling broadly and fingering his imaginary banjo, the man continued: "Come on, Jem, time to get up. The gig is about to begin."
Jem looked up and if I had thought that his a smile couldn’t get more hearty, I was totally wrong. It got even warmer. "I am not going today. Tomorrow, okay?"
"Please, Jem..."
"Tomorrow?"
"Come on, Jem, it will be fine. You will enjoy it."
Jem shook his head. "No no, not today. I will go tomorrow, I promise. Really!"
"Jem, you must. Look, the audience is waiting, your banjo is waiting..."
"No, I cannot go. They will do fine without me, I know they will. No, no."
"Jem..." More shooking of the head. The man sighed exasperately. Then he clenched his teeth and muttered: "Shit, I’m going for her." And turned on his heel and left.
The roadie with whom I spoke a minute ago, going in the opposite direction and still carrying the same coil of cable, gave a chuckle. "It’s easy now with miss Ella around. She can persuade him in ten minutes, dunno how she does it. We always needed hours, trying everything from promises and sweet words to threats. We used to draw straws to decide who’d do it. Ahhh, no nay never again."
From the adjacent room a female emerged, young and gorgeous in her flowered dress, and bent to her father. But something else diverted my attention. The door from the corridor burst open and Shane walked in, staggering just a little, accompanied by his manager Joey. He nodded to several "hellos" coming from all directions, shuffled to a small empty sofa and plopped himself down. Joey took a seat next to him, pulled out a pen and a sheet of paper from his pocket, smoothed the paper on a table next to him and began to draw something.
Reluctant to approach any of them, I spun to see James giving excited orders to one of the bouncers.
"You won’t let it happen again, understand? You will be quicker. You will fight them. You will..."
"Don’t worry, James. We won’t let them in."
James shot a nervous glance to the door. "Okay, you promised. If..." His voice broke. He wiped his sweaty brow and turned away.
"Onstage!" a voice boomed through the dressing room. Spider whooped with joy and ran for the door. Darryl abandoned the straw and took hungry gulps of his tomato stuff as if he couldn’t tear himself away from the glass. A young technician approached Philip. "So both, yeah? Or only guitar?"
"Both, please. Both today."
"Okay, Philip."
Philip put on a hat and left too, intense concentration still shrouding him like a cloud. James followed in his wake.
Andrew went out of the door, the headphones still in his ears.
"He will listen to Crazy Frog even when playing Fairytale?" I joked.
The nearest roadie looked at me earnestly. "We tried to persuade him it wasn’t the best idea. We at least demanded he discarded the bloody thing when singing Star Of the County Down. As it’s visible from the audience and everything. But he won’t relent. Not even for those three minutes. Well, he manages it somehow," the guy shrugged.
Terry got up from the chess game and picked up his mandolin from the floor. He stared at the table for a while. Then he reached for one of the tiny animals, blue something, maybe a hippo, picked it up and carefully threw it inside his mandolin in between the strings. Then he cast one last glance at the table and departed with his instrument.
Even Jem finally got up and slowly, reluctantly walked to the door. He turned once, twice... but then he left the room.
Shane struggled up from the sofa with difficulty. Joey kept moving his pen over the paper. Shane headed towards the door as if blind and deaf to the world around him. Darryl emptied his glass and eyed it with sadness. Then he jumped up and briskly walked out of the room. The door banged shut. The Pogues were on their way to deliver another unforgettable performance.
***
I glanced around. The remaining roadies seemed totally indifferent but I was struggling with the urge to trot in the wake of the band members to watch the show. Did I get there only to spend the gig in a stuffy dressing room? I was just about to turn on my heel and leave when the man sprawled in the armchair called out to me in a gruff voice: "You got light?"
He was holding an old, half-burnt cigarette in his tobacco stained fingers. His shaggy unkempt hair fell into his eyes and over his rough unshaven cheeks. But he looked familiar, oh yes, he did.
"No, sorry, I don’t smoke... Hey, are you Spider’s brother?"
The man narrowed his eyes and looked at me through the mess of hair. "Kidding? I am Spider." He bowed his head and began fishing in his pockets and feeling the seat around him. "Let the whelp Spencer do all the drudgery. While the fun is all ours." He emitted a satisfied growl as he drew a lighter from somewhere under himself and lit his cig. Blowing out a cloud of smoke, he tossed the crossword magazine on the floor and picked up Playboy from the table next to him. "Maybe he’ll even learn to play the whistle one day. Bloody botcher. Spoils my reputation with his lame beeping." He imitated a beeping sound, made a grimace and opened the magazine.
The door of the dressing room shuddered as if under a violent attack. All heads jerked up. More banging and scratching. And then the door burst open and a young girl went sprawling facedown on the floor. She struggled to all four, was back on her feet in a split second and frantically looked around the room. Two more lasses followed close behind while a fourth one was wrestling fiercely with the bouncers. All of them young, all in chic dresses or skirts. The first one, a wiry blonde, cast a murderous glance at the nearest roadie. "Where is he?" she hissed. "Where did you hide him?" Her voice rose into a screech: "James! James!"
Spider’s mouth spread in a wide grin, revealing brownish teeth. "Sweethearts, I’m here all for you. Forget about him! Come sit on daddy’s knee!"
The girl finished her scrutiny of the room. "He’s not here."
"Neither of them is here, hon," said one of her companions. "They must have already gone onstage. We are too late. Damn! James, that’s not fair!"
"Onstage? Onstage?! So there we go! He won’t slip away this time!"
Pounding of quick footsteps in the corridor, and in the next moment four guards from the Academy security appeared in the doorway.
"Ah, again?" one of them sighed. For a while, the guards, bouncers and girls turned into a mess of thrashing limbs, but eventually the men managed to take advantage of their numerical superiority. The door closed shut.
"Groupies," Spider sighed nostalgically. "James is a lucky guy."
"I’m afraid he wouldn’t agree since they nearly tore him into pieces the last time," remarked a roadie carrying a tray with drinks. In dark opaque glasses. Huge.
"Refreshments for the band?" I asked.
"For Darryl," he answered. "He’s an addict, you didn’t know? Five minutes without tomato juice and he begins to show withdrawal symptoms. And his playing goes down to gutter. Can you imagine how much the poor chap hates long numbers? They left out Rainy Night In Soho couple times for his sake... but fans blame them for it, you know. It’s always a dilemma – to accomodate a suffering friend or the hungry crowds. Crowds usually win. Friend is kinda less dangerous."
The roadie pushed the door handle with his elbow without spilling a drop of liquid from the overflowing glasses and disappeared in the corridor.
I sank down into an empty chair. Looked around. Shook my head to make sure I wasn’t dreaming. Then I grabbed the nearest bottle – it turned out to be tonic without a slightest trace of gin – and took a deep swig. A big screen on one of the walls blinked to life. The Pogues appeared on it in all their glory, and in the next moment sound filled the room as well; Shane was mumbling an impressive rendition of White City. After reaping a stormy applause from the huge crowd, Spencer took his place at the mic, pouring his heart and his vocal chords into Tuesday Morning and flashing beaming smiles at the audience. I let the reality of the dressing room slip away and lost myself in the music, the colourful lights, the magic of the show.
***
As the last sweet lines of Lullaby Of London spilled from the loudspeakers, three guys gathered around the sound board just below the screen, one of them sitting, the other two leaning over his shoulders, and began pushing buttons and toying with gadgets. When the tumultous applause of the audience slowly faded and the Pogues were ready to plunge into the next number, the sitting guy softly whispered: "Three, two, one... go!" A few more pushes. The first notes of Thousands Are Sailing filled the room, nearly drowned in the audience’s ecstatic roar. Philip’s concentrated face filled the screen.
"He’s good at it," one of the guys remarked.
His sitting colleague was about to nod, but then his face contorted with displeasure: "Just fucked it up, you seen? Was a split sec slower."
"Wasn’t. You’re seeing things."
"You’d be seeing things too if you were doing this as long as I have."
The singing was flawless as far as I could tell. I couldn’t stand still. "Hey, guys, what’s the problem? It’s a bloody great song and Philip’s delivery is perfect."
"Yeah, playbacks tend to be perfect."
I couldn’t believe my ears. "He’s... he’s singing on playback?"
"Playing the guitar too."
"Gee, he’s a hell of a guitar player, but he’ll never perform this one live," another technician added. "He sets the room ablaze when rehearsing, but then it’s always: ,No, the song deserves the best and I’d spoil it onstage. No, I won’t do it live.‘ So here we are, messing with damned machines. The guys from the band persuaded him to sing it live at that festival in the summer. It was okay. But what did he do? Made us record it, then came here after the gig, watched it and shook his head: ,No, that was terrible. Did you hear that part? Did you hear that false note? No, this cannot be.‘ Fuck, I didn’t hear a single false note. But here we are again, back to playback."
The sitting technician wasn’t listening any longer as the song was nearing its end. His fingers danced over the buttons again. Only when the band started Dirty Old Town, he turned back to us.
"You know what a goddamned difficult task this is? To insert playback in the middle of a live performance?" he complained. "It was almost easier in the old days when he mimed every song." Seeing my surprised expression, he grinned. "I’ll never forget the Top Of the Pops performance. The organizers shaking their heads: ,No, either all of you mime or all of you play live. Nothing in between.‘ And the guys trying to sway Philip: ,Come on, Fairytale isn’t difficult, you’ll manage perfectly.‘ But no, he wouldn’t budge. So they all mimed. Shane chewed a gum."
The mention of Shane made me raise my eyes back to the screen. I returned to the chair I had claimed for myself, to the empty tonic bottle, and tried to edge out the dressing room from my mind, to imagine that I am down in the first row of the audience, jumping, shouting, having fun.
By the time they got to Irish Rover, I’d almost succeeded. Clapping my hands silently, stamping my foot. I wouldn’t have even minded Shane’s lagging behind and the band messing up the song because of his mistake, if one of the roadies hadn’t called out: "Hey, Joey, that was nasty!"
"You’d prefer if I let him fuck up Fairytale?" came the immediate reply from Shane’s manager.
I turned abruptly. He was still sitting on the sofa, hunched over the small table, tapping the point of his pen on the sheet of paper.
"Damn," the roadie muttered and didn’t add anything else.
Despising myself for my unsurpressable curiosity, I got up and walked over to Joey. He had drawn a huge rectangle on the sheet. Inside the rectangle was a chaotic mess of lines, curlicues, dots and other undefinable scrawls. Just as I was about to open my mouth, his pen drew another short zigzag line in the middle of the paper.
"Uhm, hello."
No reply. Departing seemed somehow more embarassing than trying again. So I gave it one more attempt. "This is interesting. May I ask what it is?" Pointing at the rectangle on the paper.
Shane’s manager finally looked up. "The stage," he murmured. "Buzz off. Or are you so eager to be blamed for Shane’s next fuck up?" Instantly, he lowered his eyes again and added a few more resolute dots.
Somebody grasped my arm from behind. I spun around. A young roadie tugged at my sleeve and prompted me to follow him. At the opposite corner of the room, he whispered to me: "Leave him alone. Or he may really fuck up Fairytale."
"He?" My eyes darted to the screen where Shane was just singing that he ,got on a lucky one, came in eighteen to one‘.
The roadie shrugged. "It’s easier this way. With Shane one never knows what to expect. Joey never interfered in his Popes gigs. And you saw it – cancellations, fuck-ups. The Pogues don’t want to take the risk."
"But... but... I don’t get it."
The roadie looked at me as if I were dim-witted. "Imagine it as pulling the strings of a puppet, yeah? With the pen being the strings... although I’ve always suspected he doesn’t even need it and uses it just for show. He claims he always needs to make Shane mess up at least one song to make the performance more believable. And fair play to him, none of the Pogues gigs has been a fiasco yet."
I glanced back and caught Joey watching me, enigmatic smile on his thin lips. When I turned around again, the roadie smiled at me friendly and said: "Excuse me now, the guys will be back here any minute."
As if in reply to his words, huge roar of the crowd boomed from the screen and I watched the Pogues walk away from the stage. My eyes darted to Joey. The rhythm of Shane’s shuffled steps seemed to mirror the tapping of Joey’s pen. Then the screen darkened. And in the next minute the dressing room erupted in a swirl of movement and noise.
***
I walked out of the Academy door. The night had grown cold, snow was falling again. I headed away, sometimes walking, sometimes stopping and turning my face to the sky and the falling snowflakes. When the Pogues had come back, it was the usual merry-go-round of greeting fans, posing for pics, giving autographs, chatting. I joined the fun for a while. But then the roadies began their chores and kept casting meaningful glances at me, so I left before they could pile me up with some work. Work, that’s nothing for me.
I sneaked out into the night and headed home, still half lost in memories, still feeling the need to persuade myself that I’d really seen what I’d just seen. I rounded a corner and almost bumped into a girl.
"Shit, can’t you look where you are going?" she spat out. She was young. Obviously annoyed. And obviously at least a bit drunk.
"Sorry," I murmured.
"Shit, they didn’t let me in. And I had me tickets! Me fucking tickets! And the assholes didn’t let me in. Too drunk they said. Fuck them. I paid for me tickets! I had the right to go in! I wanted to see the Pogues! Fucking brainless idiots..."
"Bad luck," I offered sympathetically.
"But they won’t stop me. I bought new ones. For tomorrow." She waved two tickets under my nose. "I’ll get in even if I have to beat the crap out of the bastards..."
"Two tickets?" Excitement shot through me. "Wouldn’t you swap one?"
Her hand stopped in the middle of the movement and then fell down. She eyed me with suspicion. "Swap for what?"
"Backstage pass."
"Liar."
I reached into my pocket and showed the card to her. She eyed it with a mixture of disbelief and unabashed desire.
"But I need the other ticket. For my pal."
"This is a backstage pass, miss."
"Shit." With shaky figers she took one ticket and thrust it to me. I snatched it and slipped the pass into her hand in one swift motion.
"You won’t regret it," I assured her. "You’ll get everything, clowns, acrobats wild animals, the whole show. Just be sure to come before the gig."
I flashed her a warm smile, bid her my farewell and walked on in the falling snow. The ticket for the gig warmed me in my pocket like a glowing ember. Tomorrow I’ll be there. I’ll finally see their show. And I’ll see things nobody else will be able to see. I’ll be watching for the hints. I glanced back at the Academy building, its green neons lighting up the darkness. Tomorrow I’ll walk down this street again. A-rovin’ a-rovin’ a-rovin’ I’ll go...
THE END
photo © unknown