The 'Rocky' Effect

The elevator doors opened with a tin ding, the silence broken by a wave of muffled music like a house party two doors down on a Saturday night. The hallway was an outtake from a David Lynch film; long, narrow and high. The blood red paint soaked up most of the light from the low wattage bulbs shoved into the hands of metal cherubs, painted black. Either I was growing or the hallway was shrinking as I walked along the funhouse illusion set up by the black and white checkerboard tile, music getting a little louder with each step...a little crisper, like when you're just about to wake up from a dream.

The kick drum pulsed out low and hard with the far off rumble of a thunderstorm in June, and a whip-crack snare calling back in syncopation like a lightning strike splitting the sky. The guy in back was playing his guitar like a pump-action shotgun with an expression more along the line of reading yesterday's news. Out in front, a rooster in 11.5 cowboy boots strapped to an old brown acoustic that has seen better days. From the sound alone you'd think you were walking into a shack-shaking scene with couples slinging each other around the dance floor and waitresses in tight tops hoisting trays of beer over a brawl. But no.

Tonight the boys are playing to a room with nothing but a couple in the corner and the rest of the musicians waiting for their turn on stage, backed up by a 9 foot angel looking down with busted wings. I tipped the brow of my hat forward and slalomed through the black tables on black floor, faux flickering blue candles and red curtains lining the wall. The only other bearded cat in the place was Ray, already halfway through his first of two drink tickets.

“Now that's a damn shame...” I thought to myself. If you're on the marquee you shouldn't have to keep track of tickets. He was eating a warm pretzel the size of a hubcap. Obviously, I ordered one. We got to talking about how much the lead of this band reminded me of a guy I know back home. His mannerisms, the way he tapped that right foot north and south, the nonchalant way he played as the song unfolded. The only difference was this guy was wearing a gas station cap, where I wouldn't recognize the guy I know without his trademark bent-up cowboy hat. He's the only guy I know that can make that hat look good.

Ray said he recently got a gift from his father who wasn't well. A violin that's a hundred years old, a close copy of a Stradivarius, and its got an ancestor's name engraved in it. 'Thor' something. I don't care what your last name is, having a violin named 'Thor' is cool as shit. Repairing it is gonna cost.

“I know,” I said in a comfortable voice. “I've got a similar situation with an old Elgin watch my dad gave to me.” Of course it's all relative, I'm only pointing out that they were both a shocking number. I told him all about how dad found it on the flight line when he was stationed in the Azores. Dad said the smell of jet fuel was so bad he lost 20 pounds during his tour. It's right about this point I realized how great it was to have this band playing 30 feet away and still be able to have a good conversation. Imagine that, you can even understand the lyrics. You can tell that there are points in the song where the microphone just isn't big enough to hide behind.

They say the bar business is kinda recession proof; that if anything binge drinking goes up in line with stress levels. Tonight it was the opposite. The bartender said it was strange to have such a low turnout for this line up.

“It's late.” Ray said. He laughed, but it wasn't a funny laugh. It was a “I'm screwed” laugh. See, he's not only a bottleneck Bodhisattva, he's also a husband and a father. He's busy thinking about what it's going to be like waking up with a one-year old around 6 am, and when his first nap opportunity will show up. A more modern minstrel.

The guy onstage is a rubbertramp; he travels a lot. Evidently he's a producer too so he spends a lot of time on the road. He sat a couple stools down after their set, still in his coat and smelling from the cigarette he just had out in the alley. His fingernails were dirty enough that you'd think he just finished changing a tail pipe and not everything came off in the washroom.

“Yeah, now I gotta go get in the car and drive, smelling like this.” Turns out, he had in fact been working on his car before the gig. Tomorrow he'll be in the same bar in another town, grinding that leftover grit into his pick guard. Thinking up new songs.

Closing time. Rowdy bunch files in for last call. PBR tallboys and CC shots. That's my cue, Lash LaRue. I thanked everyone for the music, and headed out into the maze of one way streets.

It's nights like this that have the 'Rocky' effect on me; but instead of going home and working out I go home and practice till I can't feel my fingertips, leaving my own grit on the pick guard for someone else to wonder about down the road.