Bill DeMarco Reviews Some More Bands (cont’d.)

So amazingly I find myself heading to the bar and ordering a Corona. Between zero and zero I had to round up and arrived at “Ending B.” I personally think my make-up looks lousy but that’s the internet for you. Not lousy, just non-committal. Nah, lousy. Not the internet, my make-up. Wait.

I’ve distracted myself dangerously from my own androgynous boredom. Gotta get back on track. Lawyers Who Use to Be In Rock Bands take the stage. They do ‘80’s covers. The Kajagoogoo sounds relevant, Dire Straits sexy. I’m waiting for my mark. I order another Corona and doodle script ideas on a napkin: eight sexy twenty-somethings plan to have the “ultimate weekend” on a party boat when they’re attacked by a genetically engineered shark that can read minds. The shark turns them against each other, they hallucinate, don’t believe the shark exists, jump into the water, shark eats them. But there’s a twist: The military wants the shark back.

Plot complications start crowding my napkin when I realize The Cups of Coffee are already playing. I sweep my hair out of my eyes and try to listen objectively. It takes about two seconds. Casagrande, Casagrande. This is your great product tie-in? They’re not even bad. They’re just. . . everybody. Everybody is them. Same clothes, same hair, same white loafers. Chapter and worse. On the periodic table of rock clichés they are hydrogen. And they look like they’re off balance. Like they’re going to trip or fall over or slip. When did that become fashionable? I don’t get it. They’re singing this song, it goes like “drop a dime drop a dime drop a dime. . .” Two-fifths of the crowd is singing along and jumping around. They start falling over, the band, exactly as if they were off balance, or say standing on bowling pins. They play like three songs and finish. I roll up my tote bags and think of what bullshit I’m going to say.

I almost intercept them on the way backstage. It’s three guys and a girl. “Hey you guys rocked” I say loudly. No one looks at me. Plus Minus Equals roadies are setting up mikes. “Hey you guys rocked” I say loudly again. In my peripheral vision I see the whites of rolling eyes. One of the guys in the band makes a “rock and roll” hand symbol over his head without turning around. I’m pretty sure he’s being an asshole. It pains me but I need their attention, in the way you need a dog to stop biting your crotch. If I don’t get Casagrande those autographed tote bags my credibility’s shot. Think DeMarco. I get an idea. “Hey, Cups of Coffee, you guys rocked”. There are half a dozen bodies between me and them. Someone either in the band or out of it says “Awesome dude buy some CDs.” A guy and a girl laugh. This doesn’t sit well with me. I’m sitting on a pair of deuces but decide now’s the time to go all in.

“You guys are fuckin’faggots,” I say, my trapezius muscles tightening into thick knots. . . .

If you think Bill gets in a fight, text or e-mail “Continuation A”

If you think The Cups of Coffee defuse the situation with a light-hearted joke and invite Bill into their dressing room to exchange pleasantries and sign tote bags, text or e-mail “Continuation B”

If you think nothing happens and Bill orders another Corona, text or e-mail “Continuation C”