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anada "Styx" #
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There is the before and there is the after.
The before is watching "Styx: The Story Behind The Music" on Vh-1
one afternoon in late August back when it was jsut a fun story to me.
The after is watching "Styx: The Story behind The Music" after the Merry
Men broke up, and understanding it to a whole new level.
I find in my life that all the great adventures and changes start as
a joke. The Merry Men started when me and Marc and Nirgel decided to
play Christmas music out in the streets to annoy people. We got this
grand idea when we saw Christmas decorations and nick-knacks go on sale
at Kroger in early September, just a little after school started.
Kroeger is supermarket.
Marc and I were in Kroger and looking for cards for this girl's
birthday... I would tell you who and why, but that is getting too off
track... we were in the store and saw the Christmas stuff and one of the
items was an ornament that played Jingle Bells and Marc cannot keep his
hands off stuff so he kept pressing the button on it and making it go
and he'd sing along and then I joined him -- what the heck -- and we were
a band of roving minstrels for the moment, at least in the Kroeger.
I had a recorder which I'd bought a long time ago when I wanted to
sound like the song Stairway To Heaven, maybe the only rock song with a
lead recorder in it. The recorder was mostly unused for a few years,
but I still knew a few songs, and I at least knew how to make the notes.
Before I tell you about what Nirgel said when he heard this, let me
state clear out -- and this gets him pissed if you get it wrong, it is
Nirgel and not Nigel. Nigel Tuffnel, from Spinal Tap (it is a movie, go
see it), he is not. Nirgel.
Neeeeeerrrr-joel.
Somehow the ornement got into Marc's pocket and came along to
Nirgel's house and Nirgel said we should make it official. He had a
harmonica that he could not play and he knew I had the recorder, which
I'd bought a long time ago when I wanted to sound like the song Stairway
To Heaven, maybe the only rock song with a lead recorder in it. The
recorder was mostly unused for a few years, but I still knew a few
songs, and I at least knew how to make the notes. We just needed an
instrument for Marc and we would be a roving band of Christmas minstrels
bringing Christmas cheer to people in September. Only 2 1/2 months
before Christmas.
Marc got a slide whistle, but all he could do was make the sound of
going up, whoooooooooop, and down neeeeeeep. But he said the point is
to make our own music and not just stick with Mozart and Beethoven, but
I don't think Mozart or Beethovan made any Christmas music I have ever
heard.
I mentioned "Styx: The Story behind The Music" and it is a sordid
tale. Styx became successful as a band, mildly successful and were
making money. Then the lead singer writes a song that was not part of
their harder rock image. "Babe." A Puss song. The song goes to number
one. Styx is big, more puss hits, more radio play, bigger crowds. The
lead singer is writing these bad songs and he slowly takes control of
the band. Things go bad eventually, the stench of bad music overpowers
the fans and things get ugly. The rest of the band don't want to deal
with this tyrant who happens to be making them tons of money, so he is
jetisoned and he goes on to have no career on his own and the rest of
the band carries on and have no career and Styx is dead. Good for them,
from what little music of theirs I've heard on the classic rock stations
nowdays.
I saw all that on Vh-1 before the Merry Men came together, I should
have taken heed.
Now picture. Nirgel on the harmonica, he does not know how to hit a
single note, each time he breathes he hits two or three notes. There is
me on the recorder, honking all the low notes. Recorder takes a bit of
breath control, I just blew hard and took whatever came out. Marc on
the slide whistle, going up and down and random. We are outside Borders
bookstore, on a corner and making Christmas music. Here I kind of know
"Angels We Have Heard On High", it is a pretty easy song to play, and
Nirgel can follow along, enough to know that he is trying to play the
same song as I am, and Marc sort of jacking off with the slide whistle --
pardon my language -- at least musically.
And guess what? It turned out to be pretty cool. People listened to
our pathetic attempts. Even gave us requests, which were the best since
we would just make up crap and tell them it was their song. We never got
a crowd, but we did get attention. Even a few cars drove by calling us
retards.
I did not tell Nirgel and I did not tell Marc, but I bought a
Christmas song book for solo recorder and I learned Frosty The Snowman.
I learned it for real and it is not an easy song (except in the hands of
a master like me... har har). And I played it for Nirgel after I pretty
much had it memorized and he was impressed and wanted the sheet music
and he learned it too and we even, get this, practiced together.
We played it for Marc and he was impressed, and tryed to come up with
a slide whistle part that did not sound like crap. He was not
successful, but it still was funny so we went out the next weekend and
played again. This time for almost 20 minutes. I think it was kind of
a bad scene to play one song rather well and the other stuff we made up
as we went. But we got people to stop and ask us questions and us
telling them it was the holiday season and about really it was since
there were decorations at Kroger and the magazine that comes in the
Sunday paper had ads for Christmas plates and Christmas CDs of bad old
Christmas songs. And people seemed to take us seriously, even though we
were horrible. This was still September, not even homecoming and we are
playing Christmas music.
But it got us out there for another week and another. And eventually
we learned the songs. And then Amy came around from school. She is in
band and told us we could play music and make it a fuller sound if we
played differnet notes and made harmony.
I joked to her that Christmas is all about peace and harmony and then
she explained what the heck she was talking about.
I am going to leave stuff out, I want to tell what happened towards
the end. Since we got good and other people would sometimes join us.
Amy plays flute. And it became a big thing and Nirgel and I came up
with "arrangements." Okay, I think that is maybe making the term mean
more than it really means.
Take the song "Let it snow" there is a part which goes "Let it snow,
let it snow, let it snow" so an arrangement is that we play the song
together and when we get to that part first Nirgel plays "let it snow"
on his harmonica, and then I play tehe second "let it snow" on my
recorder and then we play the final "Let It Snow" together. And it is a
really neat effect. Like stereo left and then stereo right and then
full THX sound.
So Amy taught us a few sinple tricks since we did not really
understand all the music stuff she threw at us. But I would come up
with a cool version of a song and then Nirgel would come up with a
totally different but still really cool version of the same song and we
would learn the songs and the different parts and it sounded boffo. And
we would play like every Friday night.
Marc never really got into it and he would show up and like be the
showman and yell for people to come listen and if he was in the mood he
would sing along, which annoyed us since it took away from the music.
But all was not perfect in the Merry Men. We had two versions of the
songs. Mine and Nirgel's and it seemed like more and more we'd be
playing his version. He was a sort of lead instrument so he could steer
the songs into his arrangements.
He would start off on a path and I could look like a chump trying to
force my way into my version of the songs, or I could follow.
Soon we were only playing Nirgel's arrangements.
We got a reputation as the Christmas guys and it was a lot of fun but
Nirgel kept saying the whole thing was his idea and even though we were
popular, I was not as happy that he was taking all the credit and
finally we had a fight.
We were playing "Oh Holy Night" and near the end there is a high
note, sort of a show stopper and Nirgel decided he would be the one to
hit the note, which is not even a trick on a harmonica; on a recorder it
sounds really cool and takes a lot of breath and everyone can see that
it is hard to do. But he decided to take the high note and I got pissed
and I called him a hog and he said I was jealous and why did he even
bother to play with me and I was not taking it seriously and that I was
ruining the Merry Men which he came up with in the first place. So I
left and did not talk to him at school.
After I left the concept pretty much died. Nirgel went out the next
week but no one would play with him. A joke is only funny if you have
someone to laugh with. Standing in the cold with a harmonica might be
fine for a homeless guy but it did not work for Nirgel and it would not
work for me, so I set my recorder back in a place where I could forget
it for a long time.
A few weeks later I was watching VH-1 and "Styx: The Story Behind The
Music" came on and I totally identified with the band. I understood how
you can build something great with someone else but when it came time to
accept your share of the applause you find yourself cut out of the
picture.
That was the after.
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anada235 by Oregano (c) 2000
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