At 6:15 Greg told them it was time to head backstage for the public relations portion of the show. He reminded them once again to keep in character.
"Right," Jake said, vowing that he was going to be nothing but his normal self. After all, if Matt did the same thing, that would be in character enough for all of them.
As they exited the dressing room the four members of Earthstone were exiting from theirs as well, their tour manager leading them. This was only the second time the two groups had come into contact with each other. The first had been when they'd boarded the busses back in Los Angeles and that had not really been an official meeting. Jake looked at them, more than a little starstruck. He - like the rest of Intemperance - had been an Earthstone fan since their first album. He had seen them in concert twice. He knew their names, their faces by sight, what instrument each of them played, and their basic biographies. And here they were, standing in the flesh before him, all of them dressed in their concert garb. He walked over to Richie Valentine, the lead singer.
"How you doing, Richie?" he asked him, holding out his hand. "I'm Jake Kingsley."
Richie's head swiveled slowly toward him, revealing eyes that were bloodshot and swollen. "Wassup, Jake?" he replied, giving a brief handshake and then withdrawing his hand. "You got a pen?"
"A pen?" Jake asked.
"You want an autograph, right?"
"Uh... Jake's the singer for Intemperance," Greg spoke up. "Your opening band."
This struck Richie as deliciously funny. He broke up into peals of laughter. "Oh God, I'm fucked up," he said. "My fucking opening band. Jesus." With that, he continued down the hall.
Jake looked after him, his eyes wide. He was wasted! A little more than two hours before a show and Richie Valentine was wasted!
He quickly found out that this was not an isolated case. Greg decided that introductions were probably in order and did the honors. They all shook hands and muttered greetings and every one of the Earthstone members were reeking of alcohol and marijuana and were sniffing the frequent sniffs of recent cocaine use. Matt tried to engage Brad Winston, the guitar player - a man who had been a considerable influence on Matt's style - in some conversation but Brad was too far gone to even understand what was being said. He could barely walk without grabbing onto the walls for support. Mike Hamm, the bass player, was aggressive and tried to pick a fight with Darren. He had to be pulled away by his tour manager. Only Gordon Strong, the drummer, was amicable.
"I like that tune you guys got," he said. "That Descent thing. Good guitar work, good vocal range, good lyrics."
"Thanks," Matt said. "Are you gonna catch the show?"
Strong shrugged. "If I get enough blow in me I might. You guys any good live?"
"Yeah," Jake told him. "We're damn good."
Strong chuckled and clapped Jake on the shoulder. "Conceit," he said. "You gotta love it. Enjoy it while it's there, my man. Enjoy it while it's there."
The rest of the Intemperance members gathered around the drummer, since he was the only one who seemed to be capable of conversation at the moment.
"We've seen you in concert before," Bill told him. "Back in Heritage, California. The Wandering Soul tour and the Lightening Strikes tour."
"Yeah," Strong said whimsically. "I kinda remember them dates. Did you like us?"
"Fuckin' A," Matt said. "You guys rock."
"That drum solo you did in Lightening Strikes was bad-ass," Coop told him. "You gotta catch our show, man. I try to play like you do."
"I'll check it out," Strong promised. "If not tonight, than tomorrow, or some fucking night. Hell, we're gonna be playing together for months, right?"
"Right," Jake said. "Hey, you got any advice for us? Since this is our first tour and all?"
"Advice?" Strong said, his bleary eyes creaking open a little wider.
"Yeah," Jake said. "You've been on these tours through three albums now. This is our first tour, our first show. Anything you can tell us?"
Strong scratched his head for a moment and then grinned. "Yeah," he said at last. "There's one piece of advice I'll give you, one thing I've decided is more important than anything else when you're out on tour."
"What's that?" Jake asked eagerly. Darren, Coop, Bill, and Matt all leaned in to hear this as well.
"Never," Strong said, "and I mean never, kiss a groupie."
The rest of the Earthstone members cracked up at this advice. Greg did too for that matter.
"He ain't fuckin' with you there," Richie Valentine said between chortles. "Heed the man's words."
Earthstone and their manager continued down the hall, still laughing, leaving Intemperance to look at each other in confusion. Never kiss a groupie? What the hell was that supposed to mean?
As soon as they emerged from the tunnel into the stage left area, they heard the crowd. There were no cheers at the moment, just the low-grade babble of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of conversations, loud enough to compete with the recorded rock music that was playing through the amplifiers.
"Listen to that," Jake said, feeling a little of his fatigue dropping away. "Our first big audience."
"How big is it?" Darren asked slowly, casting a nervous glance at the partition that separated them from the stage.
"This is one of the smaller venues," Greg replied. "We sold it out, so that means there are going to be about 5200 people."
"5200?" Darren said, his eyes widening. "Wow... I mean... you know... wow."
"You okay, Darren?" Jake asked him.
"Yeah," he said, fumbling with his cigarette pack. He lit up with shaking hands.
There were about thirty people - locals, Greg called them - gathered near the rear of the backstage area awaiting the two bands. There were several DJs, reporters from both the Bangor and the Portland newspapers, even a television reporter who had been given permission to film small portions of the concert. The rest were fans - mostly of Earthstone since Intemperance was still somewhat unknown. They greeted people, shook hands, chatted, signed a few autographs, and gave a few impromptu interviews. Jake saw one of the female fans - an auburn haired beauty of about nineteen - pull up her shirt so Richie Fairview could sign her bare breast. He did so with a shaky hand and then leaned down and slurped the girl's nipple into his mouth, making her squeal in delight. Their road manager pulled the two of them apart before things could go any further.
Finally the locals were hustled out of the backstage area by the tour security guards. The members of Earthstone left as well, descending back into the tunnel as they discussed how many more beers they could drink before the shot.
"Twenty-five minutes until showtime," Greg told them. "Is everyone cool?"
Everyone said they were cool. They sat down on packing crates to wait. The roadies continued moving about from place to place, setting things up and doing double-checks on things that had already been set up. Jake heard the sound of his guitar being strummed by Mohammad, who was doing a final sound check. This elicited a muted cheer from the crowd - the first they'd heard so far.
"Jesus," Darren muttered, lighting up another cigarette. "5200 people."
"I gotta check this out," Matt said, standing up. He headed for the stage access door, through which the roadies were coming and going.
"Me too," Jake said, standing up and following him. After a moment, Darren got up as well.
They crowded around the door and creaked it open a few inches, staring out over the stage and into the crowd. As was the norm for venues such as this, the seating was general admission, which meant nothing was assigned. The bleachers were all about half-full, with people still streaming in, but the auditorium floor was packed with well over a thousand people. They were crammed in like sardines, pushing and shoving and fighting for the coveted spots near the stage.