Satisfaction came in the chain reaction
Feb. 25th, 2011 09:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eilonwyhasemuPreviously, Lee DeWyze was on the verge of telling Ke$ha exactly what he thought of her performance, over the protests of Katharine McPhee.
DeWyze: Then that bogeyman's just gonna have to come get me. Ke$ha, what I really think is that your interpretation of that song wasn't true to its meaning--
Ryan Seacrest: And that's tonight's show, America. Don't forget to vote your little fingers off for your favorite! Good night!
DeWyze: --or to your personality as an artist.
Adam Lambert: [claps slowly]
Katharine McPhee: Dear god, no. It's about to happen.
Ke$ha: Who are you to put me in a box?
DeWyze: Well--
Cook: Not to put you on the spot, Lee, but was that album of middle-of-the-road HAC songs really who you are as an artist?
DeWyze: Dude, I did what I had with what I'd got.
Ke$ha: Come to think of it, who are you, period?
DeWyze: Huh?
Ke$ha: Seriously. Who are you? The glittery dude, I've met. The dude in Simon's old chair, I've heard of. The chick with the dead goats shows up all over the place. But you--
DeWyze: I effing won American Idol! [to Cook] RCA gave a shit about you. They knew you'd move albums.
Cook: You think that didn't amount to pressure?
DeWyze: I think it meant you had some negotiating leverage. How was I supposed to sell the label on what I wanted when they felt they couldn't sell who I am?
Ke$ha: Dudes. Enough about you. We were talking about my performance and your stupid boxes--
DeWyze: Look. [He gets up, clearly headed for the stage, where Ke$ha is standing on the seal next to Seacrest.] If you just think about it--
McPhee: Don't go there.
Lambert: [following DeWyze] You know, Ke$ha--
Cook: [following Lambert] I had a question about when you worked with Taio Cruz--
McPhee: Don't go there. Just don't go there.
DeWyze reaches the seal a step ahead of Lambert and Cook.
DeWyze: --the best that can come of all this--
McPhee: Don't--
DeWyze vanishes. Lambert vanishes. Cook vanishes.
McPhee: --go--
Ke$ha: What the f*ck? [vanishes]
McPhee: --there. [to Seacrest] I told them not to do it.
***
Cook, DeWyze, Lambert, and Ke$ha are standing in a vast subterranean cavern thronged with people who shuffle back and forth, their weeping eyes blank and their mouths agape.
Ke$ha: What the f*ck?
Cook: I think I know where we are.
Lambert: Spill, bro.
Cook: This is the mysterious dungeon under the American Idol seal, where Nigel Lythgoe chains bizarre monsters.
DeWyze: How did you know that?
Cook: I read about it on TWOP.
DeWyze: You read TWOP? They told us to stay away from online sh*t.
Cook: How else was I supposed to know how people responded to my performances? It wasn't like the judges were going to give us straight answers.
Lambert: I skimmed it, too. Some of the women's reactions... I wanted to log in and say "babe, it's great I rock your world on stage, but for off-stage, you need to draft some picks who play on your team."
Cook: You like football?
Lambert: Tight little pants for the win. [pause] Actually, no.
DeWyze: When you know a lady's been fantasizing about seeing you naked, doesn't that make it a little weird to meet her in person?
Lambert: Well--
Fox-like Creature in Leather Jacket: You're partly right... and you're way, way wrong.
DeWyze: About it being awkward to know some stranger wants to get into your Gap boxer-briefs?
Fox-like Creature: About where you are. You're under the seal, all right. The part you're wrong about is this being a dungeon.
Cook: What is it, then?
Fox-like Creature [takes drag on cigarette]: Hell.
Cook: And what kind of demon would you be?
Fox-like Creature: I'm the Followills' rock cred.
DeWyze: See? The Kings of Leon gave up their rock cred--
Followills' Rock Cred: Hardly. No, they ignored me and kicked me around and whined about losing me until I finally said "f*ck it" and figured I'd hang out where it's warmer. Plus, there aren't any clean air laws in hell, so nobody bitches about the cigs.
Ke$ha: So all these people are in hell for the sin of having really stupid expressions?
FRC: Okay, fine, you're not in hell yet. This is the antechamber to hell. The people here aren't really suffering.
Ke$ha: They look kinda numb to me. I want to shake 'em up with some glitter.
FRC: No glitter! These are the people who never had the nerve to pursue their dreams. They aren't really in hell, but they'll never get to heaven, either. They're just... here.
Ke$ha: And how do we get ourselves un-here?
FRC: I'm going to take you on a tour--
Lambert: Do we get dancers?
DeWyze: Do we get groupies?
Cook: Do we get a good cut of the ticket price?
FRC: Not that kind of tour. You're going to get a taste of the hell that awaits musicians who make the wrong decisions.
Ke$ha: Why?
FRC: What do you mean "why?"
Ke$ha: Why do we have to go on a tour of hell? Why can't we just go back to the American Idol stage, go out for a couple beers, do some clubbing, maybe take in a burlesque show, and then go home?
FRC: [mockingly] Why? Why? You have to go on the tour because this one [he points a paw at DeWyze] defied The Powers That Be on national television, and these two [the paw indicates Cook and Lambert] egged him on. You're included because you were on the seal with them.
Ke$ha: Ryan Seacrest was on the seal, too. Why isn't he along?
FRC: He lives here.
Lambert: What's with the music?
Cook [singing with the background music]: And in the naked light I saw ten thousand people, maybe more--
Cook and Ke$ha [singing]: People talking without speaking, people hearing without listening--
Cook, Ke$ha and Lambert [singing]: People writing songs that voices never shared. No one dared--
Cook, Ke$ha, Lambert and DeWyze [singing]: Disturb the sound--
Lambert: [to DeWyze] Man. They weren't kidding about voices not blending in your season.
DeWyze: Didn't I read somewhere that group numbers in your season were lip-synched, too?
Lambert: Not once the blind guy went home. I went to The Powers That Be--
FRC: Quit the bickering! I feel like I'm back with the Followills. Move it along. We have a boat to catch.
Our four heroes, following the Followills' misplaced Rock Cred, push through the milling crowd toward a pier in the misty distance. As they walk, the lost souls who never pursued their dreams reach out to them.
Ke$ha: Ouch! I think that one pinched me!
DeWyze: Let go! That's my best jacket you're yanking.
Lambert: My hat! Give me back my hat!
Cook: Who are they? [he points toward a chain gang of dudes in plaid being pulled toward the pier]
FRC: They're the latest consignment to hell.
Ke$ha: Why are all the people... clutching at them?
FRC: In hell, at least something happens. Some people would rather feel pain than feel nothing at all.
Lambert: I want my friggin' hat back!
DeWyze: Dude. And we've got to go on that boat?
Cook: You are so kidding.
FRC: Actually, I'm not. Of course you're getting on the boat. [He waves a paw at the steps onto the pier. The chain gang is already on the pier. People clutch at our heroes, whimpering and pleading.]
Cook: I know we're getting on the boat. But it's not just any boat.
Ke$ha: Is this a pop quiz? It's a ferry. That's what you take to get to hell.
Cook: It's a ferry 'cross the Mersey. Look at the sign up there. The entrance to hell is is in Liverpool.
Lambert: Personally, I would have put it somewhere in Ohio.
Cook: South Carolina. That interminable stretch of road with the South of the Border billboards.
Lambert: Maybe South of the Border should be the entrance to hell.
DeWyze: What are you dudes talking about?
Cook: Touring. As a result of following my tour route with push pins and string, I may have discovered an alternate theory of non-Euclidean geometry.
Ke$ha: Wouldn't all coordinates mapped on the earth's surface be geometric topology?
DeWyze: Wait a sec. Aren't you supposed to be a bimbo party girl?
Ke$ha: Whatcha gonna do next--ask if I really brush my teeth with Jack?
FRC: Move along. Move along. This boat has a schedule.
Cook: I can hardly wait to see who the boatman... Whoa.
DeWyze: Whoa?
Boatman: All aboard! Afternoon ferry for hell departing in five minutes. Please find your seats. All personal belongings must fit under the seats or they will be tossed overboard. We know you have no choice about going to hell, so if you don't like our service... go to hell!
Cook: That's Brian Epstein. The Fifth Beatle.
Epstein: That's right, son. [to Lambert] Hey, hot stuff.
Lambert: Hot stuff, yourself.
Cook, Lambert, Ke$ha, DeWyze, and the Followills' Rock Cred find seats across from the chain gang, who are slumped with their heads bowed over their bound hands. The Followills' Rock Cred lights another cigarette and inhales slowly.
DeWyze: Weren't there just four Beatles?
FRC: Epstein was their manager.
Epstein: I'm the one who got John Lennon into a suit and made the guys brush up their stage presence.
DeWyze: And you're in hell for that?
Epstein: Hell, no. Pragmatic compromise ain't a sin. I'm in hell because I wasn't totally straight with their finances and my lifestyle was borderline suicidal.
Lambert: [after a pause] Awkward question, but some of my fans are sure to ask. You're not here for anything to do with being... gay, are you?
Epstein: Are you kidding? You're not kidding.
Lambert: I'm not kidding. Not that I'm worried--
Epstein: Boyo, you have nothing to worry about. Sure, being gay in the 1960s was no walk in the park... well, come to think of it, some parks...
Lambert: That kind of stereotype--
Epstein: I'll admit I did some things that wouldn't go down well in a family publication. But no one gets sent to rock-and-roll hell for shagging another man. Under-age groupies, now...
Ke$ha: I thought hell was supposed to be about suffering head down in muck or something. How'd you end up with a job?
Epstein: Pragmatic compromise. Back in life, I popularized the idea that someone should get between the artists being artsy and the label being libelous... no, that didn't come out right... someone has to keep it clear to the artists that music is a business and to the suits that music is an art.
Cook: So your role in hell is to provide a transition from the real world, the way you provided musicians with a transition from indie to major-label?
Epstein: No, I'm just good at talking my way into a job. Speaking of which--
The ferry bumps a pier. This side of the river seems much like the other, filled with people milling about, except that these people carry musical instruments. Many have guitars. One is pushing a drum set on a wheeled cart. Another drags a grand piano. Spiky haircuts are common; so are t-shirts with obscure sayings.
Epstein: Welcome to hell! Last stop, everybody off! Please check under your seats for personal belongings. Have a nice day and go to hell!
Cook, DeWyze, Lambert, Ke$ha, and the Followills' Rock Cred file down the landing ramp behind the chain gang. As they reach land, Cook stumbles. The front man of the chain gang reaches out to steady him. Their eyes meet.
Cook and Front Man [simultaneously]: David Cook?
Cook: What are you doing here? I thought--
Other David Cook: I thought you were off having your perfect, famous, sell-out life under my name. But you're in hell after all.
Cook: It's a common name. There are seven in the Los Angeles white pages.
DeWyze: Dude. You're in the phonebook?
Cook: Of course not.
Other David Cook: Before you went on American Idol, I was the only David Cook making a mark in the music industry. And I didn't need a TV show to do it.
Cook: What would you call The Hills?
Other David Cook: Song licensing. At least I write my own songs--
Cook: So do I. Can't we just agree there's room for both of us--
Other David Cook: I'll see you in hell first.
FRC: That you will, that you will. Come on. Places to go, people to see. Since we're tourists, we don't have to go through the interminable check-in line. Come along.
Cook, DeWyze, Ke$ha, and Lambert follow the Followills' Rock Cred through a vast and menacing archway. Across the top of the arch, there is an inscription.
DeWyze: [reading] Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.
Cook: Actually, the Latin translates to "That was pitchy, dawg."
Ke$ha: [seeing DeWyze's crestfallen expression] He's picking on you.
Cook: I'm joshing him.
They pass through the arch and keep walking. The mob carrying instruments mills around them, murmuring.
Mob: Man, I need a gig. Who's got a drummer? It's 360 miles to Madison. I learned a new chord today. Man, I need a gig. I sent six demos to labels yesterday. Do you want to hang flyers for me?
Cook: Are these all indie musicians?
FRC: This first level is for musicians who gave up on their careers too early. They made no horrible mistakes and committed no sins, so they don't suffer.
Cook: But why consign them to hell?
Mob: Man, I need a gig. Want to hang some flyers? There's a secret show at the Gray Snail. My girlfriend lent me gas money. I want a new guitar.
FRC: They also never took the positive steps that would allow them to see heaven.
Lambert: How come most of them have haircuts that date from before 2000?
Mob: [singing] I walk a lonely road, the only one I've ever known.
FRC: The internet, baby. The internet.
Mob: [singing] Don't know where it goes, but it's home to me and I walk alone.
Lambert: There's internet in hell?
FRC: No. The internet means bands that would have given up after a couple years of doing dead-end local gigs now are on MySpace and Youtube. They don't sell enough albums to make a living, but they sell enough to keep up hope. [drags on cigarette] Women's lib didn't hurt, either.
Mob: I walk this empty street on the boulevard of broken dreams...
Ke$ha: What do you mean, women's lib? I don't see a whole lot of chicks down here.
FRC: Not down here. Up on earth, paying the rent for their boyfriends who work a McJob by day and play in a band at night.
Ke$ha: That's ridiculous.
FRC: The indie movement couldn't exist without wives who have jobs, health insurance, and a sense of humor about being the subject of songs saying what bitches they are.
DeWyze: [to Cook] If you settled down with a chick, would you write sappy love songs about her eyes and her smile?
Cook: Probably not. But I might praise her for being an interesting bitch.
Mob: [singing] I walk alone, I walk alone.
Ke$ha: Did I ever tell you why there's a dollar sign in my name?
Mob: [singing] I walk alone, I walk alone.
Lambert: Look out! There's no floor!
Our heroes have come to the edge of a precipice. Every now and again, a failed musician wanders too close and tumbles over, only to be blown upward to safety by a mighty wind.
Cook: What the hell?
FRC: There should be a stairway here somewhere.
There is. It is carved from the rock of the cliff and meanders steeply downward. By the first landing, the wind is too strong for conversation. At the third landing, the howling of the wind resolves into eerie voices.
Voices: [singing] Same old song, just a drop of water in the endless sea. All we do crumbles to the ground, though we refuse to see.
Cook and Lambert, with Voices: [singing] Dust in the wind. All we are is dust in the wind.
At the fourth landing, the stair becomes too steep and narrow for Ke$ha's high heels. She kicks them over the edge.
DeWyze: You could kill someone that way.
Ke$ha: They're already in hell. How much worse could I make things?
Cook and Lambert, with Voices: [singing] All my dreams pass before my eyes with curiosity.
At the bottom, the wind is so strong that our heroes have to fight to stay standing. The Followill's Rock Cred's cigarette is torn from its hand and skitters away in a whirlwind of faces, leather jackets, and guitar cases.
DeWyze: Is it my turn to ask what's going on?
FRC: This is the second level of hell. It's for the musicians who were blown so many ways by their labels, their fans, and the press that they lost their musical direction.
Lambert: Is it my imagination, or do the haircuts here look newer?
FRC: Two words. Twitter.
Cook: Twitter is one word.
FRC: Fine. Two syllables. Twitter.
Cook: [looking around] Archie?
David Archuleta: [whirling by] Dave?
Cook: Archie? What's Archie doing here? He's not dead.
FRC: Who said you have to be dead to be in musicians' hell?
Lambert: Twitter is its own hell. Did you catch my adoring fans' session of trashing my boyfriend?
DeWyze: You're kidding. Who'd do that?
Lambert: You want a list of Twitter handles? I'm after my management to just block the bitches, 'cause you know what? If you don't want me to be happy, you are not my fan.
DeWyze: Damn straight. My fans would never act like that.
Lambert: If you don't think I'm smart enough to make my own choices about who to f*ck, you're not my fan, either.
DeWyze: Whom.
Lambert: Huh?
DeWyze: Whom to f*ck. Seriously. Ask him. [He indicates Cook, who is intently watching the whirling figures go by.]
Cook: Archie! [grabs at a figure in the whirlwind, is almost pulled off his feet, holds firm, struggles, and pulls David Archuleta out of the whirlwind to stand with them] What the hell are you doing here?
Archuleta: I don't know. I don't know. I just wanted to make music.
Cook: You did make music. You've put out three albums.
DeWyze: They were kinda disjointed, though.
Cook: Don't pick on him--
Archuleta: No, I know. My first album, Jive wanted teen pop. And we did Christmas songs. And then I wanted a more grown-up sound for the third album--
DeWyze: And fewer people bought it than bought my album!
Ke$ha: Geez, guys.
Archuleta: I have 570,000 followers on Twitter and can't sell 100,000 albums. Are they all following me for "hush cats!"?
Cook: Maybe the restaurant reviews--
Ke$ha: Hey, I have that t-shirt! That was you?
Archuleta: That was me. Jive wants to go with another album but says if I'm not willing to sing about... about... about...
Cook: F*cking?
Archuleta: [blushing] I have to go the Tiger Beat route. They have the songs all written for me, and all I have to do is go into the studio and record them, and my management says it's a great idea--
Ke$ha: Who controls your image? Them or you?
Archuleta: Well, they're paid--
Ke$ha: I don't care who's paid. Who decides what you're all about?
Archuleta: It's not that simple. They're telling me this is what I need to do to survive in the music industry, and... I don't know how to say this... it's so embarrassing...
Cook: We've appeared on national television in satin bathrobes. It's not more embarrassing than that.
Archuleta: I'm not even sure I want to keep going as a musician.
Ke$ha: So what's stopping you from stopping?
Archuleta: My fans would be heartbroken. They have hopes and dreams resting on me--
Lambert: What I tell my fans is "It's my life, thanks for tuning in."
Archuleta: [looking from Lambert to Ke$ha and back again] It's my life?
Lambert: It's your life.
Archuleta: I can decide what I'm willing to do?
Ke$ha: Do you think I'm letting some manager tell me who to be? I listen to the people I work with, sure, but the person who controls my life is me.
Archuleta: The person who controls my life is me. I could just stop. [to Cook] I could tell the label "no."
Cook: You could. You have to be prepared to live with the consequences. You may never get another major-label deal.
Archuleta: But it'd be my decision to take that risk. I could fire them all and go to medical school if I wanted. I could live my own life.
Ke$ha: [singing] I need a doctor. Call me a doctor, doctor, to bring me back to life.
FRC: Do you notice anything different now?
DeWyze: The wind. It's not pushing against us any more.
FRC: Now that he's decided not to be tossed this way and that by other people's whims, hell doesn't want to hold young Mr. Archuleta here.
Archuleta: So if I take control of my life, I'm free to go?
FRC: Yes. [It lights a fresh cigarette.]
Archuleta: I can come on whatever adventure Dave's going on?
FRC: No. Your choices are to stay here or to go home. And you don't belong here any more.
Archuleta: So what do I do, click my heels together three times and say "There's no place like home"?
FRC: You sing. Sing something that's true, and it'll take you where you need to be.
Archuleta: [sings] I had a dream last night, I didn't know what floor to get off on--
Cook: Aren't you past going with the flow until your feet are back on the ground?
Archuleta: Well, yes, but... I don't know...
Lambert: [sings] It's my life--
Lambert and Ke$ha: [singing] It's now or never--
Lambert, Ke$ha, and Archuleta: [singing] I ain't gonna live forever. I just want to live while I'm alive.
Archuleta: [singing alone]: My heart is like an open highway. Like Frankie said, "I did it my way." I just wanna live while I'm alive. 'Cause it's my--
He vanishes.
DeWyze: Wow.
Cook: So musicians can escape from hell?
FRC: It would seem so. But hardly any do. [drops his cigarette and stomps it out] Anyone see a manhole cover? That's the stair to the next level.
DeWyze: [wandering a little to the left] This one?
FRC: That one. [he tugs at it] Hell, that's heavy.
Cook: Here, let me. [He heaves it aside as if it weighs nothing.]
DeWyze: Dude.
Cook: It's all a matter of working out with the right trainer.
Lambert: So what was with the crawling like a dog routine?
Cook: It works muscles you don't even know you have. You should try it.
Lambert: Oh, don't worry. I've already figured out how to work it into my next music video.
Ke$ha: Are we going down, or what?
They stare at the hole that's been revealed. A ladder leads down into blackness.
DeWyze: I'm all for going down.
Lambert: That was supposed to be my line.
DeWyze: Huh?
Lambert: Never mind. Okay, one of us has to go first. [He starts down the ladder.]
Ke$ha: I'm going next. The gay dude won't care if he's looking up my skirt.
She follows Lambert. DeWyze, Cook, and the Followills' Rock Cred follow her. The blackness descends into more blackness, with a feel in the air that's indefinably slimy. Eventually, the darkness is broken by neon lights flashing blue to a faint throbbing beat. Blue, red, green, yellow--the lights increase in number and brightness, while the music gets louder.
Suddenly, the shaft becomes a cavern, the neon lights turn into spotlights, and the music resolves itself into a beat. Our heroes drop the last few feet, into--
Ke$ha: Oh, hell! That's me singing that song.
TO BE CONTINUED
DeWyze: Then that bogeyman's just gonna have to come get me. Ke$ha, what I really think is that your interpretation of that song wasn't true to its meaning--
Ryan Seacrest: And that's tonight's show, America. Don't forget to vote your little fingers off for your favorite! Good night!
DeWyze: --or to your personality as an artist.
Adam Lambert: [claps slowly]
Katharine McPhee: Dear god, no. It's about to happen.
Ke$ha: Who are you to put me in a box?
DeWyze: Well--
Cook: Not to put you on the spot, Lee, but was that album of middle-of-the-road HAC songs really who you are as an artist?
DeWyze: Dude, I did what I had with what I'd got.
Ke$ha: Come to think of it, who are you, period?
DeWyze: Huh?
Ke$ha: Seriously. Who are you? The glittery dude, I've met. The dude in Simon's old chair, I've heard of. The chick with the dead goats shows up all over the place. But you--
DeWyze: I effing won American Idol! [to Cook] RCA gave a shit about you. They knew you'd move albums.
Cook: You think that didn't amount to pressure?
DeWyze: I think it meant you had some negotiating leverage. How was I supposed to sell the label on what I wanted when they felt they couldn't sell who I am?
Ke$ha: Dudes. Enough about you. We were talking about my performance and your stupid boxes--
DeWyze: Look. [He gets up, clearly headed for the stage, where Ke$ha is standing on the seal next to Seacrest.] If you just think about it--
McPhee: Don't go there.
Lambert: [following DeWyze] You know, Ke$ha--
Cook: [following Lambert] I had a question about when you worked with Taio Cruz--
McPhee: Don't go there. Just don't go there.
DeWyze reaches the seal a step ahead of Lambert and Cook.
DeWyze: --the best that can come of all this--
McPhee: Don't--
DeWyze vanishes. Lambert vanishes. Cook vanishes.
McPhee: --go--
Ke$ha: What the f*ck? [vanishes]
McPhee: --there. [to Seacrest] I told them not to do it.
***
Cook, DeWyze, Lambert, and Ke$ha are standing in a vast subterranean cavern thronged with people who shuffle back and forth, their weeping eyes blank and their mouths agape.
Ke$ha: What the f*ck?
Cook: I think I know where we are.
Lambert: Spill, bro.
Cook: This is the mysterious dungeon under the American Idol seal, where Nigel Lythgoe chains bizarre monsters.
DeWyze: How did you know that?
Cook: I read about it on TWOP.
DeWyze: You read TWOP? They told us to stay away from online sh*t.
Cook: How else was I supposed to know how people responded to my performances? It wasn't like the judges were going to give us straight answers.
Lambert: I skimmed it, too. Some of the women's reactions... I wanted to log in and say "babe, it's great I rock your world on stage, but for off-stage, you need to draft some picks who play on your team."
Cook: You like football?
Lambert: Tight little pants for the win. [pause] Actually, no.
DeWyze: When you know a lady's been fantasizing about seeing you naked, doesn't that make it a little weird to meet her in person?
Lambert: Well--
Fox-like Creature in Leather Jacket: You're partly right... and you're way, way wrong.
DeWyze: About it being awkward to know some stranger wants to get into your Gap boxer-briefs?
Fox-like Creature: About where you are. You're under the seal, all right. The part you're wrong about is this being a dungeon.
Cook: What is it, then?
Fox-like Creature [takes drag on cigarette]: Hell.
Cook: And what kind of demon would you be?
Fox-like Creature: I'm the Followills' rock cred.
DeWyze: See? The Kings of Leon gave up their rock cred--
Followills' Rock Cred: Hardly. No, they ignored me and kicked me around and whined about losing me until I finally said "f*ck it" and figured I'd hang out where it's warmer. Plus, there aren't any clean air laws in hell, so nobody bitches about the cigs.
Ke$ha: So all these people are in hell for the sin of having really stupid expressions?
FRC: Okay, fine, you're not in hell yet. This is the antechamber to hell. The people here aren't really suffering.
Ke$ha: They look kinda numb to me. I want to shake 'em up with some glitter.
FRC: No glitter! These are the people who never had the nerve to pursue their dreams. They aren't really in hell, but they'll never get to heaven, either. They're just... here.
Ke$ha: And how do we get ourselves un-here?
FRC: I'm going to take you on a tour--
Lambert: Do we get dancers?
DeWyze: Do we get groupies?
Cook: Do we get a good cut of the ticket price?
FRC: Not that kind of tour. You're going to get a taste of the hell that awaits musicians who make the wrong decisions.
Ke$ha: Why?
FRC: What do you mean "why?"
Ke$ha: Why do we have to go on a tour of hell? Why can't we just go back to the American Idol stage, go out for a couple beers, do some clubbing, maybe take in a burlesque show, and then go home?
FRC: [mockingly] Why? Why? You have to go on the tour because this one [he points a paw at DeWyze] defied The Powers That Be on national television, and these two [the paw indicates Cook and Lambert] egged him on. You're included because you were on the seal with them.
Ke$ha: Ryan Seacrest was on the seal, too. Why isn't he along?
FRC: He lives here.
Lambert: What's with the music?
Cook [singing with the background music]: And in the naked light I saw ten thousand people, maybe more--
Cook and Ke$ha [singing]: People talking without speaking, people hearing without listening--
Cook, Ke$ha and Lambert [singing]: People writing songs that voices never shared. No one dared--
Cook, Ke$ha, Lambert and DeWyze [singing]: Disturb the sound--
Lambert: [to DeWyze] Man. They weren't kidding about voices not blending in your season.
DeWyze: Didn't I read somewhere that group numbers in your season were lip-synched, too?
Lambert: Not once the blind guy went home. I went to The Powers That Be--
FRC: Quit the bickering! I feel like I'm back with the Followills. Move it along. We have a boat to catch.
Our four heroes, following the Followills' misplaced Rock Cred, push through the milling crowd toward a pier in the misty distance. As they walk, the lost souls who never pursued their dreams reach out to them.
Ke$ha: Ouch! I think that one pinched me!
DeWyze: Let go! That's my best jacket you're yanking.
Lambert: My hat! Give me back my hat!
Cook: Who are they? [he points toward a chain gang of dudes in plaid being pulled toward the pier]
FRC: They're the latest consignment to hell.
Ke$ha: Why are all the people... clutching at them?
FRC: In hell, at least something happens. Some people would rather feel pain than feel nothing at all.
Lambert: I want my friggin' hat back!
DeWyze: Dude. And we've got to go on that boat?
Cook: You are so kidding.
FRC: Actually, I'm not. Of course you're getting on the boat. [He waves a paw at the steps onto the pier. The chain gang is already on the pier. People clutch at our heroes, whimpering and pleading.]
Cook: I know we're getting on the boat. But it's not just any boat.
Ke$ha: Is this a pop quiz? It's a ferry. That's what you take to get to hell.
Cook: It's a ferry 'cross the Mersey. Look at the sign up there. The entrance to hell is is in Liverpool.
Lambert: Personally, I would have put it somewhere in Ohio.
Cook: South Carolina. That interminable stretch of road with the South of the Border billboards.
Lambert: Maybe South of the Border should be the entrance to hell.
DeWyze: What are you dudes talking about?
Cook: Touring. As a result of following my tour route with push pins and string, I may have discovered an alternate theory of non-Euclidean geometry.
Ke$ha: Wouldn't all coordinates mapped on the earth's surface be geometric topology?
DeWyze: Wait a sec. Aren't you supposed to be a bimbo party girl?
Ke$ha: Whatcha gonna do next--ask if I really brush my teeth with Jack?
FRC: Move along. Move along. This boat has a schedule.
Cook: I can hardly wait to see who the boatman... Whoa.
DeWyze: Whoa?
Boatman: All aboard! Afternoon ferry for hell departing in five minutes. Please find your seats. All personal belongings must fit under the seats or they will be tossed overboard. We know you have no choice about going to hell, so if you don't like our service... go to hell!
Cook: That's Brian Epstein. The Fifth Beatle.
Epstein: That's right, son. [to Lambert] Hey, hot stuff.
Lambert: Hot stuff, yourself.
Cook, Lambert, Ke$ha, DeWyze, and the Followills' Rock Cred find seats across from the chain gang, who are slumped with their heads bowed over their bound hands. The Followills' Rock Cred lights another cigarette and inhales slowly.
DeWyze: Weren't there just four Beatles?
FRC: Epstein was their manager.
Epstein: I'm the one who got John Lennon into a suit and made the guys brush up their stage presence.
DeWyze: And you're in hell for that?
Epstein: Hell, no. Pragmatic compromise ain't a sin. I'm in hell because I wasn't totally straight with their finances and my lifestyle was borderline suicidal.
Lambert: [after a pause] Awkward question, but some of my fans are sure to ask. You're not here for anything to do with being... gay, are you?
Epstein: Are you kidding? You're not kidding.
Lambert: I'm not kidding. Not that I'm worried--
Epstein: Boyo, you have nothing to worry about. Sure, being gay in the 1960s was no walk in the park... well, come to think of it, some parks...
Lambert: That kind of stereotype--
Epstein: I'll admit I did some things that wouldn't go down well in a family publication. But no one gets sent to rock-and-roll hell for shagging another man. Under-age groupies, now...
Ke$ha: I thought hell was supposed to be about suffering head down in muck or something. How'd you end up with a job?
Epstein: Pragmatic compromise. Back in life, I popularized the idea that someone should get between the artists being artsy and the label being libelous... no, that didn't come out right... someone has to keep it clear to the artists that music is a business and to the suits that music is an art.
Cook: So your role in hell is to provide a transition from the real world, the way you provided musicians with a transition from indie to major-label?
Epstein: No, I'm just good at talking my way into a job. Speaking of which--
The ferry bumps a pier. This side of the river seems much like the other, filled with people milling about, except that these people carry musical instruments. Many have guitars. One is pushing a drum set on a wheeled cart. Another drags a grand piano. Spiky haircuts are common; so are t-shirts with obscure sayings.
Epstein: Welcome to hell! Last stop, everybody off! Please check under your seats for personal belongings. Have a nice day and go to hell!
Cook, DeWyze, Lambert, Ke$ha, and the Followills' Rock Cred file down the landing ramp behind the chain gang. As they reach land, Cook stumbles. The front man of the chain gang reaches out to steady him. Their eyes meet.
Cook and Front Man [simultaneously]: David Cook?
Cook: What are you doing here? I thought--
Other David Cook: I thought you were off having your perfect, famous, sell-out life under my name. But you're in hell after all.
Cook: It's a common name. There are seven in the Los Angeles white pages.
DeWyze: Dude. You're in the phonebook?
Cook: Of course not.
Other David Cook: Before you went on American Idol, I was the only David Cook making a mark in the music industry. And I didn't need a TV show to do it.
Cook: What would you call The Hills?
Other David Cook: Song licensing. At least I write my own songs--
Cook: So do I. Can't we just agree there's room for both of us--
Other David Cook: I'll see you in hell first.
FRC: That you will, that you will. Come on. Places to go, people to see. Since we're tourists, we don't have to go through the interminable check-in line. Come along.
Cook, DeWyze, Ke$ha, and Lambert follow the Followills' Rock Cred through a vast and menacing archway. Across the top of the arch, there is an inscription.
DeWyze: [reading] Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.
Cook: Actually, the Latin translates to "That was pitchy, dawg."
Ke$ha: [seeing DeWyze's crestfallen expression] He's picking on you.
Cook: I'm joshing him.
They pass through the arch and keep walking. The mob carrying instruments mills around them, murmuring.
Mob: Man, I need a gig. Who's got a drummer? It's 360 miles to Madison. I learned a new chord today. Man, I need a gig. I sent six demos to labels yesterday. Do you want to hang flyers for me?
Cook: Are these all indie musicians?
FRC: This first level is for musicians who gave up on their careers too early. They made no horrible mistakes and committed no sins, so they don't suffer.
Cook: But why consign them to hell?
Mob: Man, I need a gig. Want to hang some flyers? There's a secret show at the Gray Snail. My girlfriend lent me gas money. I want a new guitar.
FRC: They also never took the positive steps that would allow them to see heaven.
Lambert: How come most of them have haircuts that date from before 2000?
Mob: [singing] I walk a lonely road, the only one I've ever known.
FRC: The internet, baby. The internet.
Mob: [singing] Don't know where it goes, but it's home to me and I walk alone.
Lambert: There's internet in hell?
FRC: No. The internet means bands that would have given up after a couple years of doing dead-end local gigs now are on MySpace and Youtube. They don't sell enough albums to make a living, but they sell enough to keep up hope. [drags on cigarette] Women's lib didn't hurt, either.
Mob: I walk this empty street on the boulevard of broken dreams...
Ke$ha: What do you mean, women's lib? I don't see a whole lot of chicks down here.
FRC: Not down here. Up on earth, paying the rent for their boyfriends who work a McJob by day and play in a band at night.
Ke$ha: That's ridiculous.
FRC: The indie movement couldn't exist without wives who have jobs, health insurance, and a sense of humor about being the subject of songs saying what bitches they are.
DeWyze: [to Cook] If you settled down with a chick, would you write sappy love songs about her eyes and her smile?
Cook: Probably not. But I might praise her for being an interesting bitch.
Mob: [singing] I walk alone, I walk alone.
Ke$ha: Did I ever tell you why there's a dollar sign in my name?
Mob: [singing] I walk alone, I walk alone.
Lambert: Look out! There's no floor!
Our heroes have come to the edge of a precipice. Every now and again, a failed musician wanders too close and tumbles over, only to be blown upward to safety by a mighty wind.
Cook: What the hell?
FRC: There should be a stairway here somewhere.
There is. It is carved from the rock of the cliff and meanders steeply downward. By the first landing, the wind is too strong for conversation. At the third landing, the howling of the wind resolves into eerie voices.
Voices: [singing] Same old song, just a drop of water in the endless sea. All we do crumbles to the ground, though we refuse to see.
Cook and Lambert, with Voices: [singing] Dust in the wind. All we are is dust in the wind.
At the fourth landing, the stair becomes too steep and narrow for Ke$ha's high heels. She kicks them over the edge.
DeWyze: You could kill someone that way.
Ke$ha: They're already in hell. How much worse could I make things?
Cook and Lambert, with Voices: [singing] All my dreams pass before my eyes with curiosity.
At the bottom, the wind is so strong that our heroes have to fight to stay standing. The Followill's Rock Cred's cigarette is torn from its hand and skitters away in a whirlwind of faces, leather jackets, and guitar cases.
DeWyze: Is it my turn to ask what's going on?
FRC: This is the second level of hell. It's for the musicians who were blown so many ways by their labels, their fans, and the press that they lost their musical direction.
Lambert: Is it my imagination, or do the haircuts here look newer?
FRC: Two words. Twitter.
Cook: Twitter is one word.
FRC: Fine. Two syllables. Twitter.
Cook: [looking around] Archie?
David Archuleta: [whirling by] Dave?
Cook: Archie? What's Archie doing here? He's not dead.
FRC: Who said you have to be dead to be in musicians' hell?
Lambert: Twitter is its own hell. Did you catch my adoring fans' session of trashing my boyfriend?
DeWyze: You're kidding. Who'd do that?
Lambert: You want a list of Twitter handles? I'm after my management to just block the bitches, 'cause you know what? If you don't want me to be happy, you are not my fan.
DeWyze: Damn straight. My fans would never act like that.
Lambert: If you don't think I'm smart enough to make my own choices about who to f*ck, you're not my fan, either.
DeWyze: Whom.
Lambert: Huh?
DeWyze: Whom to f*ck. Seriously. Ask him. [He indicates Cook, who is intently watching the whirling figures go by.]
Cook: Archie! [grabs at a figure in the whirlwind, is almost pulled off his feet, holds firm, struggles, and pulls David Archuleta out of the whirlwind to stand with them] What the hell are you doing here?
Archuleta: I don't know. I don't know. I just wanted to make music.
Cook: You did make music. You've put out three albums.
DeWyze: They were kinda disjointed, though.
Cook: Don't pick on him--
Archuleta: No, I know. My first album, Jive wanted teen pop. And we did Christmas songs. And then I wanted a more grown-up sound for the third album--
DeWyze: And fewer people bought it than bought my album!
Ke$ha: Geez, guys.
Archuleta: I have 570,000 followers on Twitter and can't sell 100,000 albums. Are they all following me for "hush cats!"?
Cook: Maybe the restaurant reviews--
Ke$ha: Hey, I have that t-shirt! That was you?
Archuleta: That was me. Jive wants to go with another album but says if I'm not willing to sing about... about... about...
Cook: F*cking?
Archuleta: [blushing] I have to go the Tiger Beat route. They have the songs all written for me, and all I have to do is go into the studio and record them, and my management says it's a great idea--
Ke$ha: Who controls your image? Them or you?
Archuleta: Well, they're paid--
Ke$ha: I don't care who's paid. Who decides what you're all about?
Archuleta: It's not that simple. They're telling me this is what I need to do to survive in the music industry, and... I don't know how to say this... it's so embarrassing...
Cook: We've appeared on national television in satin bathrobes. It's not more embarrassing than that.
Archuleta: I'm not even sure I want to keep going as a musician.
Ke$ha: So what's stopping you from stopping?
Archuleta: My fans would be heartbroken. They have hopes and dreams resting on me--
Lambert: What I tell my fans is "It's my life, thanks for tuning in."
Archuleta: [looking from Lambert to Ke$ha and back again] It's my life?
Lambert: It's your life.
Archuleta: I can decide what I'm willing to do?
Ke$ha: Do you think I'm letting some manager tell me who to be? I listen to the people I work with, sure, but the person who controls my life is me.
Archuleta: The person who controls my life is me. I could just stop. [to Cook] I could tell the label "no."
Cook: You could. You have to be prepared to live with the consequences. You may never get another major-label deal.
Archuleta: But it'd be my decision to take that risk. I could fire them all and go to medical school if I wanted. I could live my own life.
Ke$ha: [singing] I need a doctor. Call me a doctor, doctor, to bring me back to life.
FRC: Do you notice anything different now?
DeWyze: The wind. It's not pushing against us any more.
FRC: Now that he's decided not to be tossed this way and that by other people's whims, hell doesn't want to hold young Mr. Archuleta here.
Archuleta: So if I take control of my life, I'm free to go?
FRC: Yes. [It lights a fresh cigarette.]
Archuleta: I can come on whatever adventure Dave's going on?
FRC: No. Your choices are to stay here or to go home. And you don't belong here any more.
Archuleta: So what do I do, click my heels together three times and say "There's no place like home"?
FRC: You sing. Sing something that's true, and it'll take you where you need to be.
Archuleta: [sings] I had a dream last night, I didn't know what floor to get off on--
Cook: Aren't you past going with the flow until your feet are back on the ground?
Archuleta: Well, yes, but... I don't know...
Lambert: [sings] It's my life--
Lambert and Ke$ha: [singing] It's now or never--
Lambert, Ke$ha, and Archuleta: [singing] I ain't gonna live forever. I just want to live while I'm alive.
Archuleta: [singing alone]: My heart is like an open highway. Like Frankie said, "I did it my way." I just wanna live while I'm alive. 'Cause it's my--
He vanishes.
DeWyze: Wow.
Cook: So musicians can escape from hell?
FRC: It would seem so. But hardly any do. [drops his cigarette and stomps it out] Anyone see a manhole cover? That's the stair to the next level.
DeWyze: [wandering a little to the left] This one?
FRC: That one. [he tugs at it] Hell, that's heavy.
Cook: Here, let me. [He heaves it aside as if it weighs nothing.]
DeWyze: Dude.
Cook: It's all a matter of working out with the right trainer.
Lambert: So what was with the crawling like a dog routine?
Cook: It works muscles you don't even know you have. You should try it.
Lambert: Oh, don't worry. I've already figured out how to work it into my next music video.
Ke$ha: Are we going down, or what?
They stare at the hole that's been revealed. A ladder leads down into blackness.
DeWyze: I'm all for going down.
Lambert: That was supposed to be my line.
DeWyze: Huh?
Lambert: Never mind. Okay, one of us has to go first. [He starts down the ladder.]
Ke$ha: I'm going next. The gay dude won't care if he's looking up my skirt.
She follows Lambert. DeWyze, Cook, and the Followills' Rock Cred follow her. The blackness descends into more blackness, with a feel in the air that's indefinably slimy. Eventually, the darkness is broken by neon lights flashing blue to a faint throbbing beat. Blue, red, green, yellow--the lights increase in number and brightness, while the music gets louder.
Suddenly, the shaft becomes a cavern, the neon lights turn into spotlights, and the music resolves itself into a beat. Our heroes drop the last few feet, into--
Ke$ha: Oh, hell! That's me singing that song.
TO BE CONTINUED
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Lovin' the new adventure
Date: 2011-02-26 08:49 pm (UTC)