Rebound

 

Joe was exhausted.

After the three-hour concert, and an hour of beer, he decided to leave. His partners were still celebrating at the bar for ending the seven-day gigs. Joe was really tired, they thought.

Yes, he was. But his mind was not resting but kept thinking … about the concerts, songs, the band’s future … and dreams.

 

‘Joe, are you okay?’

‘Yeah, I’m fine, just felt a bit uneasy last night. Ar, are you all fed up with the gigs?’

‘A bit, but saw them screaming, yelling, … yeah, it’s great.’ Gee was excited.

‘Nothing special.’ Ring hit the drum twice, ‘Bom, Bom,’ and they all laughed.

Paul smelled something wrong. ‘Joe, what is on your mind?’

‘I thought a lot last night, no sleep, and I’m getting tired, I mean, … I’m tired of the concerts, and those songs.’

‘What’s the matter with the songs? We wrote them together, they’re fantastic.’

Gee and Ring left the guitar and drums and came closer to Joe. ‘Joe, what is it?’

‘I don’t know, I feel … you know, we write pop songs, we talk about love, we slip away their chasing, we try to sound funny and stupid in front of them, … I’m pretty bored.’

‘Don’t be silly. We’re hot, we’re going to be great, we’re on the right track, we – ‘

‘What is it, Paul? What’s the track? What are we going to do?’ Joe asked.

‘Well, … we’re bloody hot, we’ll make good songs, and hung amount of money.’

‘I don’t want to sound different, but I simply think it’s time to do something else, some different. We can write stuff about ourselves, about people, life … whatever. I mean we can’t always get stuck with the stupid love. I know we’ve been doing great in the melodies, easy to follow, easy to remember, easy to get excited, I feel proud. But can we do something more? Try something a bit different?’

They all sat quietly for a moment. They knew if Joe had something to say, you better let him say it all. After he’s been through, they tried to digest the words, but had difficulty. 

Finally, Gee broke the ice.

‘What’s going on? I’m not going to waste time on this. We just finished the gigs, we’ve done a good job, right? Joe, don’t push us for that, okay? How about some beer now?’

‘Yeah, let’s go.’ Ring showed support.

‘Sorry about that mate, but it’s just something I feel strongly about, not only yesterday but for a long while. But, let’s go.’

 

It had been a week but Paul was struggling with the words. He didn’t want to argue with Joe, he could not figure out what’s wrong at the moment. “We are going to succeed,” he thought. But deep down, he started to feel uneasy too. 

 

‘Hey men. I wrote these in the last couple of days, take a look.’ Joe gave them his writings.

Typical Joe, Paul thought, the first song was about how a boy felt after losing his girl.

‘What’s this?’ Ring yelled, ‘What’s that, would you please define, Joe?’

‘Uh … I don’t know, just got the melody ... the notes … I think it’s a joke, but that sounds prefect to me. We’ll try.’

Paul was staring at the second song, no lyrics, but the sound was strange.

‘I wonder if we can put this in the album.’

‘We’ll try, alright? Now, I’ll show you the rhythm I want, um … just listen,’ Joe started playing with his guitar.

‘What do you think?’ Joe studied all of them. ‘Wait, can you just play again?’ ‘Sure.’ Joe did it again.

‘Hmm … Hmm I think the middle-8 is a bit weak … A song with three chords, strange indeed … It will be more interesting if we can bring in the keyboard. And the end is a bit far away, do you intend to do this? Or do we need to get it back.’

‘Good, Paul, I hope you can help me work on this. Anything else?’

‘Well, still I think it’s odd, but it’s okay, a good piece I would say, a bit different, we should try.’

‘Gee?’

‘Ah,… … the lyrics. What kind of words it’s going to take? It does not make any sense if it’s about he and she.’

 ‘What do you think, Paul, any lyrics idea?’

‘Um, it’s hard to say. I have no idea.’

‘Well, I’ve got an idea actually. I wanna express a kind of boredom in the song, I mean that sort of feeling.’

‘You kidding?’

‘Not really, it’s gonna be a big challenge for us, Paul.’

‘Huh, How nice. Beos feel bored! This will be the headline of tomorrow’s papers.’

‘Come on, Paul, I’m not saying we are bored. We just have to write something we feel bored. That can still be positive at the end, can’t it? We are going to do it now.’

They all struggled in the studio that night. But they enjoyed it. “What did you say? Fuck you” … “Come on, the world is going to call you Jesus, write this down” … “Can’t believe I can’t play the line”

The song is finally called I’m Bored.

 

In the coffee shop, they sat together.

‘What the fuck he is doing?’ Paul went straight to the point.

‘I don’t know. It’s all of a sudden. He’s not Joe London anymore. The song comes out alright, but it’s Greek.’ Ring lit a cigarette.

‘Probably, he was not feeling well these days, … I just …don’t know.’

‘I’d say he is now asking for a change, though not necessary a big one, but he just wants something different, something more. Look at the song he wrote, it’s simply unheard of, it’s creative, it’s terrific, it’s fucking good! And to be frank, in front of him, I sounded negative, but I’m glad to have worked on that song.’

‘Paul, the important thing’s you, you know, both of you write the songs, if you are getting well with each other, I believe it’ll be fine whatever the style we choose,’ Gee sounded quite serious.

‘I don’t know, it’s just all of a sudden, you know. He just came in, telling us he was tired, then gave us the song and wanted the hell of change! Jesus Christ! You see, we suddenly have a new member in our group. It’s no use to ask him to go back. We have to come to know him now, I mean really know him or otherwise, I can’t imagine, and I just don’t know what on earth should we do.’

 

A couple of weeks later, Paul sat near the piano, trying to get the picture. He thought of Joe’s words and the song. He flipped through their previous writings … oh that one, “I want to hold your hand” we wrote it in the cab immediately after the Liverpool gig …  Joe’s crazy … So far, we’re doing love songs for all these years, and maybe it’s time to go outside the loop. Our dream - to bring good music to people and to play our music, he still remembered. In fact, he really appreciated the new song, deep down he thought Joe was a genius, that he himself could never come up with such a song. It’s a long time, Paul thought, that he had not sat alone with the piano like this. In the past few years, he just wrote those lovely stuff to please others, performing them repeatedly, yeah, Joe was right, it’s not their destination. He put his hand on the keyboard, pressed the keys, wrote down the notes, press the keys again and again, then got the bass. 

 

‘Let me see, Paul. The first and second lines are good, you’re pretty excited, then, … you find something goin’ wrong, then … in the middle, you find a light there and with it, you feel safe and relieved, and … finally, you’re on your way to the Promise Land. Wow. Cool.’ With the thumbs up, Joe continued, ‘Paul, can I take the vocal?’

‘Yep.’

 

Six months later, Joe was reading the magazine, the Hammer. It went, ‘The Beos new album, Spinning, shoots top to the chart this week, it carries the usual Beos style. Worth mentioning are the two songs, ‘I’m tired’ and ‘Light’, they are not at all Beos, yet they fit the album a lot surprisingly, and both songs show a strong desire to search for something, perhaps, they mark the new direction for the Beos.’

That’s true, Joe thought.