After the show, as they were sitting in their dressing room, sipping their first beers of the night, smoking their first post-show cigarettes, snorting their first post-show lines of cocaine, all of them were noticeably more gleeful than usual.
"Louisville, Kentucky tomorrow night and then two weeks off!" Jake said happily, taking the bong from Coop and inhaling a tremendous hit.
"I can't wait to go back to LA," Matt said. "By now we're famous there. The bitches will be throwing pussy at us. I'm gonna hit up every nightclub I can and fuck a bitch in every one. And the nightclubs that have B's as the first letter in any word of their name, I'm gonna either fuck two or fuck one up the ass."
Everyone cracked up at this, not only because it was funny but because they knew Matt took such vows seriously. If he said he was going to do that, then he meant to do just that.
Jake coughed out his hit. "Jesus, Matt," he said, still chortling. "Where do you come up with this shit?"
"It's the way my mind works."
Greg walked into the room. "Hey, guys," he said in his best glad-handed manner, the way he talked when he was pretending to be just one of the boys. "Great show tonight. You rocked hard and steadily."
"Thanks," Matt said blandly. "And you set up your usual impressive spread of hooch, blow, and smoke. So what about the groupies?"
"Yeah," Bill said. "Is Jack gathering us a suitable cross-section of Nashville promiscuousness?"
This caused another outburst of laughter. They were in a good mood indeed.
"I know nothing about that," Greg said in his best conspiratorial voice. "You boys are aware of my views on fornication."
"Hey, Greg," Coop asked. "Tell us the truth. You been doing this gig for a few years. Ain't you ever slammed a groupie? Not even once?"
"Never," Greg said with righteous conviction. "My wife and I were sealed in the Temple. To violate our vows would be the utmost betrayal of my faith before Heavenly Father."
"But snorting a couple grams of coke a week is cool with The Man?" Jake asked.
Greg grinned. "That's just to keep me alert and responsive enough to do this trying job I've been assigned," he said. "It's a minor infraction and I'm sure I'll be forgiven come judgment, especially in light of all the other temptations I avoid."
"Of course," Jake said.
"Anyway," Greg said, "I was on the phone with Mr. Acardio while you guys were playing. The results are in for the week and Descent Into Nothing has slipped back to number eight on the charts. Since it's reached its peak and is heading back down, we're going to release Who Needs Love? on Monday. The radio stations across the country will start receiving their copies of the song by next Friday and hopefully it'll start getting airplay over the weekend."
All five band members uttered some version of approval at this. Cool, bitchin, awesome, groovy (that contribution from Bill).
"A new release," Greg continued, "means we're going to need to get a new video out. Fortunately there's a two-week break in the tour coming up after tomorrow's show. We're going to utilize that break to film videos for Who Needs Love? and for The Point of Futility, which will be the next release."
This time there were five different phrases of disapproval from the band members, most of them profanity-based.
"I'm sorry, guys," Greg said. "I'm just passing on orders."
"Two videos?" Matt asked. "Christ, it took us a week to shoot the Descent video. Our whole vacation is shot to shit."
"This is supposed to be a break," Jake said. "Is Acardio unaware of what the definition of that word is?"
Greg simply shrugged. "I'm just a small cog in the National Records machine," he said. "They don't consult me when they make these decisions."
"Why the fuck not?" Matt grumbled.
Greg wasn't sure whether he was supposed to answer that or not. You never could tell with Matt. He chose not to.
"Are they flying us out of Louisville then?" Bill asked.
"Does Louisville even have an airport?" Jake put in.
"We're not flying anywhere," Greg said. "We'll be taking the tour bus."
"The tour bus?" Matt asked. "We're driving all the way back Los Angeles? That'll take three days."
"We're not going to Los Angeles," Greg said. "We're going to Orlando, Florida."
"What?" Jake said, sitting up so fast his beer dumped onto the floor. "Orlando? Why the hell are we going to Orlando?"
"Well, because we're close by it and NTV maintains a studio there. Norman Rutger and his production staff are on their way there now to start setting up the pre-production details."
"Great," Jake said, kicking his beer bottle across the dressing room. It spun from one corner to the next, spraying beer the entire trip.
Greg's grin faded the tiniest bit. "Orlando's a great place, Jake," he said. "And I hear Mr. Rutger has some awesome themes for the videos. They're flying a complete wardrobe out for all of you!"
Jake grabbed another beer out of the ice chest. "I can't wait," he said. "I just can't fucking wait."
They managed to film both videos in twelve days, although this meant the days in question were spent with them on the set at least twelve hours and sometimes as much as sixteen. If not for the cocaine - Matt and Jake had both decided that filming a video was not exactly performing so the no drugs rule was ruled not-applicable - they might very well have collapsed from sheer exhaustion.
None of the band was happy with the end results of their efforts. Once again they were forced into bizarre clothing and forced to act out a bizarre production that had little or nothing to do with what the songs were actually about. Who Needs Love? was about a man who simply enjoyed casual relationships because he didn't want to experience the lack of freedom that went with commitment. But the video for the song, utilizing Matt as the main character, was about a disturbed serial murderer who killed every woman who got into a relationship with him. It was full of images of beautiful women sliding notes to him or trying to move things into his house or displaying other signs of affection for him and then ending up as the starring feature of various crime scenes. And The Point of Futility came out as being an anti-nuclear weapons piece, complete with images of old nuclear tests, protests at various weapons productions facilities, and still photos of victims of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings.
"My God, you freakin' moron!" Jake had screamed at Rutger, infuriated, when he first read the script. "This is a song about breaking up with a woman! It's about the point when you realize its over and there's nothing more to be done to save the relationship! It's not about nuclear weapons! Not even remotely!"
This, of course led to a dramatic tantrum by Rutger and threats to end his relationship with National Records and NTV. "These are visionless buffoons you've sent to me!" he complained. "Buffoons!"
And this, of course, led to phone calls from Max Acardio and a few people even higher up the ladder, all of them issuing threats and reading provisions of the contract to him.
The videos were shot as scripted and the band members dressed as they were told and did what they were told.
The upshot was that they never saw anything of Orlando but the inside of cheap hotel rooms and the inside of the NTV Florida studios. Jake never got a chance to call Angie, and, in truth, his desire to do so was rapidly fading.
The second leg of the Earthstone/Intemperance US tour started on February 20 in Hartford, Connecticut. The following night they played in Newark, New Jersey. The night after that brought them to New York City and a break in the routine. Though they would still be doing consecutive shows they would not have to travel in order to do them. They were playing Madison Square Garden - one of the most prestigious venues in the country - not just once but three times, every one of the shows a sell-out of the 17,000 seat facility.