FAME and GLORY (6 page)

***

Jake, caramel macchiato in hand, took his sunglasses out of their holder on the visor.  The rain of California's North Coast now but a memory, he steered the Sprinter back on the long road east.

The musicians had arrived in Chico at about 11:45 AM.  They were just finishing the Chinese takeout they had ordered for lunch when Jake and Brandee arrived at the venue.  Suzi had been craving dimsum the whole way and Bruce waited at Hunan's until they opened their doors so she could satisfy the craving.  Full and happy, the 3 musicians were ready to take on what Chico would offer.

The Big Room seated about 250 people.  Nearly 200 were seated on the main floor and there was a small balcony that seated about 60. 
Brandee
was used to that kind of layout.  It was similar to The Trinity Alps setup in Weaverville. There was something different about The Big Room though. It was going to be different for Brandee herself.  It had to do with her spatial relationship to her audience.

There was almost no stage to speak of.  It had a riser that lifted the performer about 6 inches above the main floor.  This meant that Brandee was going to be free to mingle amongst the crowd as she sang.  She was looking forward to the new experience.

The other members of the group weren't quite so sure.  They knew that Brandee was prone to make changes on the fly during her performances.  Sometimes it was something as small as a key change.  She would look back at the musicians and raise her eyebrows a little, and the musicians would know what she wanted them to do next.  The communication that they had developed on stage was almost uncanny for the short time that the group had been together.  Now, if Brandee was going to be wandering around among the paying customers, the others wondered from whence their cues would come.  The easy euphoria they had felt when they had been enjoying lunch was replaced by a small worry.

Truth be told, the musicians all considered Brandee a bit of a loose cannon.  It wasn't only the fits of temper that she displayed during rehearsals.  Occasionally, after meticulously laying out the contents of the set that they were going to perform, Brandee would change big parts of the set on stage on the spur of the moment, leaving the musicians to try and catch up.  It had happened during their second performance in Crescent City.  The first time there, they had played mostly slow ballads.  For their second performance, they had rehearsed some different material, but it had contained the same general rhythmic style.  Brandee changed up on them midstream.  She switched into fast moving, foot-stomping mode.  Only the skill of her group prevented a performance hiccup.

“I was feeling the vibe of the room, so I went for it,” was all that she could say when questioned about it later.

The rest of the group hoped that, if she wandered around the room feeling the vibe, she would communicate it to the people that were paid to help her sound good.

The group set up their equipment, checked the sound, and rehearsed for about 45 minutes.  They had to damp down the sound to keep the acoustics of the room from making the sound too bright. That would enhance the richness of the product.  Brandee was in good shape and wanted to keep it that way, so she went to their hotel, The Californian, ahead of the others.  There she would engage in her usual pre-show ritual.

She liked to take a power nap before she sang.  She had learned from her naps in the car - if she slept for over an hour, she was a little sluggish on stage. That's why she kept her naps to a strict 30 minutes, and always with a cool compress over her eyes.  That combination seemed particularly refreshing for her.

Then she would drink two 20-ounce bottles of iced sparkling water, one after the other.  She found this refreshing also, but she did this partially to give her skin the glow that she wanted it to have.  She was blessed to be able to perform without much makeup, even under the harsh stage lights.  She mentally thanked Debra for the genetics that made that happen, as well as the good folks at Purestream, who made her favorite brand of sparkling water.

She would get back to The Big Room at about 6:00, 90 minutes before her performance was to start.  She would change into her performance attire (tonight, a flame red Chatelaine dress with sequins) and pick at her favorite dressing room snack, plain M&M's and mandarin oranges, both chilled in the dressing room refrigerator.  At 7:15 on the dot, she would gargle with a salt water and lemon mixture that she never would have normally touched except that it opened up her throat and cleared her sinuses for the performance.

She never had much to say to the other members of the group during the last hour before the performance.  The dressing room was mostly quiet during that time anyway.  Bruce would hum tunelessly to himself at times, while Diane would spin her sticks as a nervous habit.  She did that out of sight of Brandee, though, since it made the singer nervous to watch.  Jake stayed out of the way of all of them during this time.  He knew that he was more nervous than all of them combined, even though he wouldn't be on stage.  He didn't know if he would ever get used to life as a peripheral member of a traveling performance group.  His stomach was in knots every time.  He wished that he had Bruce's cool.

He had once asked Bruce how he remained so calm in the run up to a performance.  He knew that Bruce cared deeply about how the group sounded, so it couldn't be lethargy.  Bruce explained it to him this way,

“You know that I've done more than my share of bad things to my body.”

Jake nodded.  Bruce had been legendary for his drug and alcohol use during his younger days.

Bruce went on. “I almost died more than once.  I woke up in a hospital one time thinking that they had taken me in after a drunk the night before.  Turns out that I had been unconscious for six days.  That wasn't the only time that I lost some days either.  To tell you the truth, I've probably polluted this old body enough that I should be dead.

Anyway, I gave that up.  I was in in-patient rehab for six months two different times.  I spent some time in the county joint once when I fell off the wagon and threw up.”

“There's nothing illegal about throwing up”, Jake said, incredulous.

“They find a way to make it illegal when it's on the shoe of the sheriff,” Bruce answered.

Jake nodded.  “Go on.”

“Anyway, I like my world a lot better now.  I've got a job I like, playing music for a living. The love of a good woman playing music with me.  If I don't know where I am when I wake up tomorrow, it's only going to be because I forgot we're in a different town than we were in yesterday, and not because I'm wasted. Long, ugly story short, my friend: I want to give these people a good show, but it's not the end of the world if we have an off night.  It's just show business, man!” he said with a warm smile for Jake.

Jake knew then that he didn't need to worry about Suzi.  For all of his rough appearance, Bruce was a solid, stand-up guy who wouldn't hurt his friend.

It also got him to thinking about his own life.  He counted his blessings.  He didn't know if he could survive without the love of his life, but the great thing was, he knew that he would never have to try.  Brandee still excited him in every way imaginable and he couldn't wait to see her every morning.  Some mornings, he got up earlier than usual just because he wanted to start another day with her as soon as possible.

***

Brandee
absolutely smoked Chico that night!  The interactive aspect of the seating arrangement worked perfectly with Brandee's already considerable stage presence.  She walked among the crowd, belonging to them and them to her, all night.  She put her head on an elderly man's shoulder and sang, “Dream Catcher” to him.  That sealed her with the crowd (not to mention sealing her with him.).  The adlibbing that had concerned the rest of the group during the afternoon was kept to a minimum and, when it did happen, Brandee was close to, or on, the riser with the others.  They were called back onstage for not one but two encores, the second of which brought down the rafters when Bruce and Suzi punctuated it with a long bass and keyboard riff.  The group was riding a high when they went out for dinner after the show.

Brandee never ate much before she performed.  The bite or two of mandarin oranges and M&M's didn't amount to much. She was always famished post performance.  Jake used up a couple thousand calories of nervous energy during the show, just pacing backstage.  Diane worked herself into a lather on the drums, and Suzi hadn't eaten since the Chinese food at lunch.  Bruce was just always ready for a good meal. Since there was an Applebees between The Big Room and The Californian, they decided to go there.

The noise inside Applebees fit the euphoric mood of
Brandee. 
They ate, talked, and laughed for over 2 hours at the restaurant.  Brandee believed that this tour was the beginning of something bigger than she had been involved in before.  Jake was hopeful that her dreams would come true and was happy to see her in such a relaxed mood.  The others basked in the good feeling, too.  Brandee could light up a room with her smile.  She could also bring a room down faster than anyone, but tonight was all about triumph and hope at the beginning of a tour.

The group knew that they had to eventually get some sleep since the next day would be one of the longest days of the trip.  Those in the Nissan van would be leaving at 6:00 so they could arrive in Elko at about 1:30 or 2:00.  Jake and Brandee would be following 2 hours later.  Luckily, they weren't due on stage at the Western Folklife Center until 8:30, or they would have to leave even earlier.  All of them preferred the later starting time because it allowed them to sleep in a bit the morning before.  Of the five of them, only Diane was a little bit of a morning person, and she had learned to stay by herself until the others had shaken off the AM cobwebs.

So, shortly before midnight, the five members of
Brandee
knew that they needed to go their separate ways.  They walked five across, arm in arm, along the wide and deserted Chico sidewalk on their way back to The Californian.  When they arrived, they said their good nights and parted ways.  Brandee removed the last vestiges of her stage makeup and, by the time she got into bed beside Jake, he was snoring softly.  She smiled to herself and patted his shoulder before turning her back on him and settling into the bed.  The sound of the cheers of the crowd at The Big Room was her final thought before sleep overtook her.

***

“She should be well rested,” Jake thought to himself about noon the next day.  Brandee had been asleep for much of the drive.  Jake had planned to wake her when they stopped at The Truck Inn, a breakfast place that he had heard about near Fernley, Nevada.  When they got there and found out The Truck Inn was closed, Jake just drove on, letting Brandee sleep.  She wasn't missing much.

The drive to Elko included 340 miles of the most God-forsaken terrain that Jake had ever seen. Sparsely traveled, the road invited Jake to push the underpowered Sprinter as hard as its little diesel engine could go.  He didn't want Brandee to stress about not having enough time for her pre-show ritual.  He felt that the least he could do for his little blonde headliner was to get her to the shows on time.  Jake smiled to himself as he wondered whether that was a song that he had heard once.  He would ask Brandee when she woke up.

Having been disappointed by the shuttered doors of The Truck Inn, Jake thought that they would find another place to stop within the next half hour.  He hadn't counted on the desolation of western Nevada. That stretch of Interstate 80 is called the loneliest road in America.  Well named, Jake thought.  It was dry, brown and windblown even now that it was early spring.  On and on, Jake drove.  On and on, Brandee slept.

Finally, Jake pulled off to the side of the road and Brandee woke with a yawn and a stretch.  She started to unbuckle her seat belt before she realized what was happening.  Jake had stopped in the middle of nowhere and was relieving himself behind some scrub brush on the left side of the road.

“Hey!” she shouted, “What about me?  A girl has to take a piss herself once in a while!”

Jake zipped up and came back to the Sprinter.  “I know you do," he said, starting the engine.  “I just couldn't wait.  That mocha I had before I left Chico was working on my old guy bladder.”

Brandee laughed.   “That's right.  I sometimes forget what an old coot you are.  How do you expect to stay up with a hot young thing like me?”

“Just watch me stay up with you.  Hell, just watch me leave you behind, child bride," he said, putting his hand on her well-tanned, muscular thigh.  He wished that they could stop for a romance break, but the schedule wouldn't allow it. 
The life of a roadie
, he thought.

***

Early afternoon brought them to Elko.  The Western Folklife Center was most known for its dance presentations.  Western and Native American dance predominated, but they had zydeco and Cajun dance performances as well.  The members of
Brandee
had been invited as a part of the National Cowboy Poetry gathering. They would be performing that evening as the fifth of six acts.