"But... ?" Jake asked.
Doolittle shook his head. "No buts here," he said. "As of today, I've removed Max Acardio from his position as your Artist and Repertoire rep. He will be reassigned to work with some of our other bands. From this point on, Steve Crow will be your rep from the A&R department. Steve's a little younger than Max, but he is a little more up on current trends in hard rock. I think he'll be able to work a little more harmoniously with you on this second album."
"Replacing our rep is not going to change anything," Jake said. "If he's just going to try to get us to record other people's music then we're still at square one here."
"He's not going to try to get you to record anything you don't want to," Doolittle told them. "It's obvious that you have very strong feelings about that. Now personally, I think those songs our writers came up for you would have been phenomenal had they been recorded but I would never force any of my artists to do things against their will. I only wish Max would have come to me with this problem earlier and we could have resolved it before so much bad blood developed between you all."
"Wait a fuckin' minute here," Matt said, leaning forward. "Are you saying you're not going to try to get us to record those shitty songs?"
"That's exactly what I'm saying," Doolittle said. "Steve has your preliminary recording and has been going over it since yesterday. He'll help you decide which of those songs to record in place of the three by our in-house writers that you've rejected. The important thing here is that we get you boys into the studio as soon as we can. We want that next album ready for release when Descent starts to fall off the charts."
Jake and Matt looked at each other, sharing a bit of telepathic communication. They turned back to Doolittle.
"Okay," Jake said. "If that's the way you want it, then we'll get to work."
"That's the way we want it," Doolittle told them. "Steve's office is on the sixteenth floor. I'll have my secretary let him know you're on the way. Matt, why don't you head over there now, meet him, and get the wheels turning."
"What about Jake?" Matt asked.
"He'll be along in a minute or two. I'd just like to have a word with him about another matter first."
Another look was shared between the two musicians. Jake gave an almost imperceptible nod. Matt returned it and walked out the door.
"I suppose you know what this is about," Doolittle said as soon as the door clicked shut.
"I suppose I do," Jake said. "And I'm standing firm on this as well. I will come and go from my condo as I please. I am not an inmate, I am not a slave, and I refuse to be treated like property."
"We're just trying to look out for your safety, Jake. Max may have been a bit over the top in his response to you, but that was all he was doing. You're a famous person and you're also controversial. There is a real danger of you getting hurt when you go off on your own like that."
"Well, that's a chance I'll just have to take," Jake said. "Cut my allowance off if you need to, but it doesn't matter. When I want to go out, I will go out and I will go out where I want to go and it's none of your business, or anyone else's business, where I'm going or what I'm doing."
Doolittle sighed. "Jake, I appreciate where you coming from with this, really I do. But the fact of the matter is that you've got a history of unauthorized performances of music in violation of your contract. That is one concern."
"Unauthorized performances, huh?" Jake said. "That would be the time I played my guitar and sang for some of the employees of the restaurant I was working at. I still think calling that an unauthorized performance was a bit much, but I was told not to do it again and I didn't do it again. And I'm not going out and performing concerts behind your back now. I think you probably know that. Don't you suppose you might've heard about it if I were?"
"Nevertheless," Doolittle said. "We have a vested interest in keeping you safe and in knowing your whereabouts."
"I'm a big boy," Jake told him. "I can take care of myself."
"I'm sure you can, Jake," he said. "But what harm does it do to let us know where you're going and what you're doing? If you're not doing anything contrary to your contract, why should you mind letting us keep tabs on you?"
Jake looked up at the ceiling for a moment, taking some deep breaths. He then looked around the room and locked his eyes on an expensive leather briefcase sitting on a table behind Doolittle's desk. "Is that your briefcase?" he asked.
Doolittle looked back at it. "Uh... yes it is."
"Can you bring it over here for a minute?"
"Why?"
"I want you to open it up for me so I can look through it."
"What?" Doolittle said.
"You don't have anything illegal in there, do you?" Jake asked him.
"No, of course not, but..."
"If you don't have anything contrary to the law in there, then why should you mind me looking through it?"
Doolittle sighed. "That's not the same as what we're asking you to do, Jake."
"I know," he said. "What you're asking me to do is even worse. I just want to look through your papers. You want to stick your nose into my private life. That is offensive me to me, Doolittle. Very offensive. And I will not allow it. Now you can accept that or you can not accept that, but that's the way it's going to be."
Doolittle seemed about to say something else but didn't. He raised his hands in surrender. "Okay, Jake," he said. "Have it your way."
It seemed he'd given in too easily. But Jake didn't press the issue. He simply said his goodbyes and left the room.
Chapter 9B: Rebellious Souls
They met with Steve Crow. He was a young, hip-talking man in a loud but fashionable suit. He had long platinum blonde hair styled in punk rock fashion. He wore sunglasses even though he was indoors. He was intelligent and articulate and he sat and went over each of the previously rejected tracks with them, rating each on its relative merits.
"The only one you're absolutely forbidden to record is Its In The Book," he told them.
"Which is one of our best songs ever," Matt said sourly.
"Hey, guys," Steve said. "I'm trying to work with you here. I agree it's a bitchin tune, but the bosses say no go on that one. That's the only thing they're standing firm on."
In the end, they picked two of Matt's songs and one of Jake's — all of them the more recent numbers — songs they'd written after maturing a bit by performing at D Street West. That gave them a complete list of ten tunes for the next album, every one of them an Intemperance original.
"Looks like we're set," Steve told them. "I'll get Bailey and his merry men working on a song order and an album title right away. In the meantime, I want you guys to be prepared to start hitting the studio in two weeks. That means lots of rehearsals, okay? Janice's publicity trips aside, I'd like you to do at least four hours a day in your warehouse. Tune that sound in tighter than a schoolgirl's ass."
"You got it," Matt said.
Steve smiled, shook their hands again, and then dismissed them.
As they rode the elevator down to the lobby level, Matt asked, "What do you think? Did they cave to us, or are they raising up a hammer to drop on our fuckin heads."
"They caved," Jake said. "Doolittle was trying to make it seem that all of the resistance was just Acardio's little quirks."
"Which is a bunch of bullshit," Matt said.
"Agreed. But that was just their face-saving measure to make it seem like we didn't really win."
"But we did."
"Yeah," Jake said. "I think we did."
Matt grinned. "Let's get the rest of the guys together tonight and go hit the Flamingo. This is a cause for celebration."
Jake and Mindy were not able to get together much. Mindy was still heavily promoting Thinner Than Water, which had been released across the country and was currently the most popular movie in theaters, and Jake was spending at least a portion of every day rehearsing the ten tunes they were to record. They were able to talk on the phone almost every night and usually spent at least an hour doing so. Manny no longer bothered enquiring who was calling when she called (she never told him) and had stopped trying to backhandedly pry the information out of Jake.