Chapter 3
Johnny had gotten away with it again and his life of luxury
continued on track. When he arrived at his lavishly dressed hotel in Berlin he
felt right at home. But this home didn’t have a pestering father in it ever. He
was far far away and off Johnny’s back and Johnny still had limitless spending
at his disposal. His first plan of
action was to spend days sleeping mostly and only interrupted by room service
that he always ordered too much food from. But Johnny always bought more room service than he knew he could actually eat
because he loved to fulfill every desire he had and waste was not something Johnny
ever thought about.
Days passed into weeks as Johnny languished his days between
his room, the hotel bar and fine restaurants around Berlin. The concierge arranged
a few very sexy companions for him and his life felt glorious until a moment one early morning that began with the phone ringing. It was his father and he was checking
in. No one else Johnny knew got up as early as that call was being made so he
knew who it was when he regained consciousness on the third ring.
Johnny’s cocky confidence resonated through the phone line as he fired off his self -defined brilliant plan to his father about making himself into a rock god. He dominated
the conversation from the outset intentionally. He always felt so good about
getting away with bullshitting his father it always seemed so easy and he attributed this ease to his superior intellect. This further always inflated Johnny’s already intense egotistical view of himself.
Johnny’s father was not so convinced; knowing the realities
that large money returns rarely come from little effort and/or pure luck. But his hope that even if this effort
failed his son would be broken from his foolhardy ways, kept his feeling of
anger in check. Johnny’s plans didn’t
make much sense and sounded more like a shopping spree alone. But Johnny’s father had not failed at
much of anything and the idea that his son would one of the few failures he had
was something he was not ready to accept or could probably ever believe.
Motherly DNA aside he knew he had been the only parent in Johnny’s life. If Johnny failed he too would have
failed.
He put the phone down gently after trying once more to give
his sound advice to the deaf ears of Johnny but knew that he just had to
wait.
Johnny put down the phone and quickly picked it up again
ordering his usual banquet of room service for breakfast; his thoughts
languishing on the food and little else. There was no hurry to do anything and
Johnny felt he had all the time in the world.
After a few more days Johnny eventually headed to the Berlin
rock clubs and quickly became the center of some attention from his willingness
to pay for the company he kept. In
these places money doesn’t venture often and Johnny liked being the moneybags
in the room and making it known. It didn’t matter to anyone where his money
came from as long as he was spending it; no one cared. Johnny’s knew the power
that money had and he used it effectively to buy whoever he wanted. He didn’t
care whether anyone cared about him or that it was only about the money. To Johnny
caring was for suckers like working was. In his opinion it was the force that
you lost your edge over everyone else with.
After a few weeks he found musicians who were hungry enough
that they were willing to play in his band and agreed that he would be the
singer before even hearing him sing. His band his voice his songs his money.
Johnny thought his plan was working perfectly as he reported his progress to
his father who called only once more since he arrived in Berlin. Johnny began
dreaming of his fame to come. He
was destined to be a rock god and his daddy’s money was going to buy it for
him.
Though the other musicians he bought including a bass guitar
player, a lead guitar player and a drummer all had enough equipment to create
the right image for Johnny, they wanted to spend a lot of time practicing
before recording. Johnny had no patience and didn’t want to wait to go to the
recording studio. He wanted to be
in the spotlight of the studio rocking with his
band. They could just follow his
lead in there and make it up as they went along. He didn’t have a budget so
they could stay at the recording studio for days or weeks if that is what it
took.
Johnny just dismissed all of them. He thought they were just
a bunch of peasants from the hungry crowd trying to pinch through to a
successful release, which he thought was pathetic really. He was also sure they
could see his rock god status and knew that he was definitely above them all.
He even had each of them sign off to make sure they had no part of any success
in his creation and he wouldn’t be obligated to them for anything except for
the money he paid them for the recording time.
What Johnny didn’t know is that each of the musicians he
paid didn’t have any faith in Johnny at all and they just needed the money until
they could get a better gig going on that had real potential at success. These
were real musicians that had been working at their craft for years. They knew
Johnny had no musical background and didn’t have any experience writing songs
or singing for that matter. He was just a rich boy with money that could easily
afford to pay for recording studio time to play his self-absorbed junk. Of
course it was always a possibility that Johnny could have monetary success with
this plan but it definitely wasn’t probable in any of their opinions; an
opinion they didn’t share with Johnny and thus wrote off royalties easily.
Johnny missed the first five recording studio appointments
deciding instead to spend his time shopping for outfits that are more beholden
to his rock god status and to otherwise play around doing whatever he wanted as
he was accustomed to doing his whole life. Eventually the studio manager called him and told him that
if he cancelled one more time they would not allow him to re-schedule. Johnny
then had the concierge find him another recording studio and his father’s next
call sent him to the appointment on time.
Once the recording began Johnny thought he could easily milk
the time out for at least a year like other rock gods did and maybe even longer.
There were some bands that didn’t
put music out for years so why not him?
This time when Johnny’s father hung up the phone he found
his already little hope draining away. Johnny was clearly not taking this plan
seriously and everything he saw from what Johnny was doing was stinging in its
reality. He felt foolish for believing Johnny and began considering that he had
been lied to again. It had been nice not thinking about Johnny and his problems
for a while. If something didn’t
change soon he would have to change things. Cutting Johnny off was all he had
left to fix Johnny’s problem if Johnny didn’t make something happen soon. He
was began considering that being cut off completely would make Johnny a much more
agreeable person and correct his egotistical arrogance. He had pleasant
thoughts imagining the new man Johnny would become.
For now Johnny’s father would give it a little more time as
he didn’t find it reasonable , though it had already been months, to not wait
for the recording to be accomplished. He acknowledged that Johnny did get
musicians and a recording studio at least. His father also knew that recordings
can take some time and thus he continued to wait for a result while thoughts of
cutting Johnny off completely was a never far from his thoughts.
Johnny didn’t realize that his hired musicians wouldn’t be
willing to be as flexible to accommodate Johnny’s extended recording plan. Their insistence of completing the recording
sooner than later was the reaction to Johnny’s first studio session where they
suffered in auditory pain listening to Johnny’s voice trying to sing along to
his ridiculous lyrics that no one would ever be able to relate to; most
especially rock fans. It was even hard not to laugh continuously as they
listened to him crow on but they could see Johnny didn’t know how bad he
actually sucked and they wanted to get paid.
But they weren’t willing to spend any extended time being
tortured by Johnny lyrics or voice; a now definitely go nowhere proposition
after hearing Johnny sing his songs. In fact many of the songs he was singing they
were sure he was making up as he went along and had not worked on anything
prior to coming to the studio.
It was also a struggle, because Johnny didn’t write any
music so they were left to fill in his musical blanks around his foolish lyrics
to speed things up crafting quick and uncomplicated riffs and beats to add to
Johnny’s crap voice and songs.
Johnny was sure that what he was doing in that recording
studio would give him fame; the one thing Johnny didn’t yet have. The musicians suffered on for a few
weeks before announcing to Johnny that he needed to wrap it up and conclude
things as they were all bowing out for other gigs and bands. Their push brought the recording to a
conclusion and everyone but Johnny was relieved the horror was finally
over.
Johnny began mentally preparing himself for his great fame
to come. It was his destiny, what he deserved in life. He could feel his blood
pulsing as he stepped out of the studio and reveled in how effortlessly he
created his music. Now he was not only a god but also a rock god and everyone
that heard it would knew this was true. He was the new Mozart!
Johnny decided he now needed to alert the worldwide media
right away. He couldn’t wait for the music industry big wigs to be on their
knees begging him and competing for a contract to distribute his music
worldwide. His destiny of fame was only moments away!
