I <3 Musicians
5:54 p.m. || 2005-01-18
I visited Greg at one of his gigs last night. It's hard to imagine Greg as a frontman for a rock band, he's all gangly and awkward and when you look at him you can barely imagine him with a guitar in his hands. But supposedly his band are pretty good so I agreed to support him. His band made £1 from every ticket sold so there's no harm in being there, and a gig is always a good night out. Also, my friend Jay was making his drumming debut at the same gig.
The gig was at an old rock club that has been around for quite some time. Mum used to go there for punk concerts back in the 70s. It's a cool little dive in the middle of nowhere, teeny place but with everything you need...a little stage, seating areas, a bar who don't check ID...great for a local band starting out. There's a huge sign on the door that reads OVER 18s ONLY, but the door is handled by two punky biker men with big hair and scary tattoos and they don't give a damn, as long as they get your money you could be eight or eighty-four.
Vicky and I got bored waiting for the gig to start so we wandered down to the toilets and indulged in reading the mess of black marker scribbles all over the walls. Along the mess of names and song lyrics there were the traditional "JANE AND BECKY WERE 'ERE!" tags and of course the ever tasteful "STOP FUCKING READING THIS". I quite liked the "To find out the rules of space tennis, see opposite wall" - written on both sides, and someone had written out an entire recipe for chocolate cake along the mirror.
Typically, Jay and Greg's bands were the last to play, so we had to watch three bands before them. Strangely, they were all very good. Usually there is at least one cruddy band who makes everyone cringe and use their time on stage as an opportunity to go to the loo or go across the street to buy chips. But they were all very good, we have some real talent around my area.
The first band were especially good. They did covers of "I Will Survive" and "Jailhouse Rock" and everyone enjoyed it. The frontman was bloody gorgeous, tall, jet black hair and a cheeky smirk....a lot of girls had suddenly made their way to the front when he started to play.
After they had finished I tried to get his attention with the ol' smile and hair fiddle routine, but it failed miserably as he was too busy packing up his equipment.
I told Vicky I was determined to at least talk to him by the end of the night, but then I remembered....I'm chicken shit.
About fifteen minutes before Jay was due to start playing and I noticed Sexy Frontman was saying goodbye to his friends with his guitar on his back and was due to leave. OK...now or never.
I told Vicky I was going for it and she shot me a sarcastic "yeah...uh huh" look. I didn't blame her, I never do stuff like that. It's just that I've stood by and let boys slip through my fingers so many times because I'm too embarassed to tell them how I feel. But not anymore. You only live once, right?
Before I knew what was happening I had tapped him on the back and he'd turned to face me.
"Excuse me...this is kinda embarrassing....but do you think I could have your number?".
And you know what? He gave it to me.
My fingers were shaking with nerves and adrenaline as I typed his number into my phone. I don't think he really noticed though, he just seemed very impressed I'd made my move.
We agreed to meet up at the weekend.
I turned to Vicky and Jay who stood there with priceless looks of absolute shock on their faces.
"My god!" whispered Vicky "You're like a bloke!".
Jay and Greg both did amazingly on stage. Jay has a priceless "drumming" face of pure concentration whilst Greg is a complete show-off and Hendrix enthusiast who plays the guitar with his tongue and above his head.
I was buzzing for the rest of the night on my little achievement. I felt really powerful and sexy, horrified and amazed at exactly the same time.
We're meeting for a drink on Saturday.