“Gentleman, this is R.U.N. Welcome to our headquarters. Welcome to your first steps towards freedom,” this guy in a Motley Crue t-shirt from their 1988 ‘Girls, Girls, Girls’ tour says. He pauses as he looks across the table taking each of us in, one by one. “Congratulations, gentlemen, we’re taking you home.”
The guy talkin’ is some dude named Roger, the leader of R.U.N. (Roadie Underground Network) We’re in the employee break room at the back of a Wal-Mart somewhere just outside a Albuquerque, R.U.N.’s official headquarters. Roger’s tellin’ us how his organization was set up to help free roadies like us and get us ta safety. He keeps talking, comparin’ himself ta somebody named Harry Toeman, or somethin’ I dunno, some black chick that lived a long, long time ago. Not sure what it really has ta do with us. But then again, I ain’t really listenin’ anyways. I’m just excited ‘bout finally being in Albuquerque.
We got inta Albuquerque a coupla days ago.We woulda got here sooner but we hadda stop off so cos I had ta take a shit. It wuz onna them really soft ones, the kind where it take forever to wipe yer ass. Plus Grumpy Bill got busted up kinda bad in a fight with one a them guys from that R.U.N. hingme that’s travellin’ with us – the big guy, Burt, I think his name is. Apparently, they wuz arguing over which band wuz better – Dokken or Winger – an’ things just got a bit outta hand.
“Dokken sucks!” Grumpy Bill screamed. “Don Dokken’s a PUSSY! He ain’t got NUTHIN’ on ma man Kip WINGER!”
“Shut the FUCK up, man!” Burt yelled. “You don’ know what the fuck yer TALKIN’ about!”
“Kip Winger will bring down a WORLD OF PAIN on Dokken and OWN his sorry faggot ass!”
“I told ya, NOBODY talks smack about Dokken, an’ gets away with it. You wanna piece a me? Ya got it. I’ll take ya down, ya ugly mother fucker ! I’LL TAKE YA DOOWWWN!!!”
…and then everything just kinda blew up from there. We ended up havin’ ta rush Grumps to the ‘mergency room in tha middle of the night. He had two black eyes, a busted nose an’ had ta get seventeen stitches on his cheek and the side a his forehead. Burt had a coupla busted knuckles an’ a sprained wrist. Ta be honest, I think it was Grumpy Bill’s fault, I mean he did start it an’ kept eggin’ the guy on; but in all fairness, Grumps was pretty drunk, an’ this guy shoulda know that Grumpy Bill’s a mean drunk.
Anyway we’re here in Albuquerque now an’ that’s all that counts in my book. I’m really jazzed, an’ I’m findin’ it hard ta concentrate on anythin’ because I’m just sooo excited ‘bout bein’ here. I mean, whew, Albuquerque…Christ, this is like a dream come true ta me. I mean this is somethin’ that I’ve been dreamin’ bout my whole life (well the past three years anyways)…you dream, an you plan, an you think ‘maybe one day’ but not in a million..no, a BILLION years did I think I would ever actually be here in Albuquerque…the actual home of High School Musical.
I ain’t done a awful lot since we been here on account a all this R.U.N. bullshit, but we’re supposed ta be in Albuquerque fer at least another week, so it will give me plenty o time to poke around, visit East High an the Lava Springs Country Club where HSM2 wuz made. Shit, maybe if I’m lucky enough I might get ta meet Troy an that Cordon Blue kid durin’ their basket ball practice, or Gabriella. Hell, even if it wuz just that kid that wears all them gay hats, Ryan, well that would be cool, too. But at the moment, I’m stuck in this goddamn meetin’ where these people are gonna try ta figger out how ta get me back ta Scotland.
Roger’s still talkin’, goin’ on ‘bout how before he made his escape he used ta roadie fer some hair metal band back in the 80’s –Hanoi Rocks. How they used ta make him carry all these speakers an’ heavy ‘quipment up to their rehearsal space on the top floor of this 12 story walk-up. How he had ta carry all this shit upstairs while the band took the service elevator. Then he’d have ta run back up an’ down the stairs at least 10 times during their rehearsals on account a he had ta fetch the band’s drugs, an’ they’d laugh at him the whole time. Then the singer died an’ the band had ta break up so he wuz sold ta Motley Crue fer a bottle a Jim Beam, a gram a heroin an a cock ring.
When he went ta Motley Crue, it got even worse. They used ta use him as sorta an all purpose tester. For example, whenever Nikki Sixx got some smack from a dealer he didn’t know, he’d call up Roger an’ make him shoot up, just ta test the drug an’ make sure it was okay an that he wuzn’t gonna like O.D. from it or anything. But it wuzn’t just drugs that he’d test, there wuz other shit, too. Like whenever there wuz a really questionable-lookin’ groupie, one that looked like she mighta been rife with disease, they’d force him ta have unprotected sex with her before any a the guys in the band did to see if she was safe or what not, an’ remember, this is Motley Crue we’re talkin’ bout, they ain’t really known fer havin’ high standards, so you know them chicks had ta be reaaaally skanky. So he ends up gettin’ all kinds a nasty shit.
“So today my penis is just one giant pus-filled blister,” he announces.
Roger pauses an’ looks down at his watch. “Gentlemen, I’ve gotta go take a shit, so I’ll turn the proceedings over to our Vice Chairman of Planning Things, Harold. Take it away Harold.”
Roger walks off an’ this guy in a old t-shirt with the word ‘Quarterflash’ across the front of it stands up.
“Thanks Roger,” he says. “Now before we begin I have an announcement to make – I fucked my wife last night.”
Everybody around the table starts clappin’ their hands and cheerin’ him on. “Heyyy! Alright!” “Good for you.” “Attaboy,” they all say. Harold smiles, soakin’ up the applause.
“Yeah, in fact I was so good that, now get this, she actually forgot my name,” he laughs. “yeah, she actually called me Steve. I mean can ya believe it?”
The applause is cut short an everybody looks at Harold
standin’ there proud as a peacock with this his chest all puffed out an’ this big grin on his face. A coupla guys clap, not knowing what else to do. Then some guy in a Loverboy t-shirt says “erm, that’s…great, Harold.”
“Yeah,….uh, nice work?” pipes in some dude wearing a ancient Doobie Brothers shirt from their 1978 tour.
“I mean, c’mon, Steve. Hah! That’s not even CLOSE to Harold. Christ I must be a DYNAMO in the sack!”
“Ummm…that’s great Harry…so do you wanna tell us about this plan?” asks one a the guys that picked us up in Colorado, the skinny guy in the Marlins cap an’ Grateful Dead shirt; Steve I think is what he told me his name wuz.
“Oh yeah, anyway you guys, this is the plan – we’ve got plants, a whole network of people working on the inside for the enemy. Not necessarily roadies, but the people that work behind the scenes – electricians, gaffers, stagehands…people like that, people who are sympathetic to our cause. These people have agreed to smuggle you into their respective bands…bands that are touring all over the country and the world over. You’re basically gonna tour with these bands until they make a stopover in your hometowns or as close as possible an’ then once your there, you’ll just be cut loose.”
Then, Tyler raises his hand. “Excuse me, sir, but won’t these bands know we’re not part of their normal road crew? I mean will we not get caught?”
“No,” Harold replies. “You’re entering these bands through the backdoor, kinda like how I did my wife last night. You’ll be travelling incognito and you won’t be travelling with the actual band members themselves, it will be with the entourage, the hangers-on that follow.”
“I dunno, I worry,” says Dong.
“Listen guy, it’s not the inner circle you’re penetrating here - which is exactly what my wife said last night, by the way– it’s the people that follow in the band’s wake: the merchandise sellers, the stage hands, the lighting technicians, the sound board engineers, the band members’ wives and children – the people that don’t have any actual interaction with the members of the band. Shit, chances are you won’t even see the band except on stage.” Harold pauses to take a sip a Pepsi Free. He burps an’ continues. “Although that’s not to say that you still shouldn’t keep your head down and maintain a low profile…just to be on the safe side.”
Tyler, Dong an’ me all look at each other then at Harold. Don’t think any of us are convinced that this is gonna work. The last thing any of us wanna do is get caught out an’ forced inta bein’ roadies fer the rest of our, ‘cos some a these bands actually sound worse than Huey Lewis, an’ that wuz a nightmare!
“Look, I’m telling ya,” Harold says. “I was a roadie for over 20 years. I’ve seen it all, I’ve been with them all Thompson Twins, Berlin, the Buggles, Twisted Sister…hell, I was forced to work as a fluffer for Frankie Goes to Hollywood for christsakes. So I know how bad it can get. I know about praying every night for a merciful death so you don’t have to face another day of washing Dee Snider’s sweat soaked codpiece; and all of us here have similar stories. The last thing we want to do is have you guys get caught. So, trust me this, we know what we’re doing.”
Tyler an’ Dong still look kinda unsure. An’ I guess I’m still not sure either, but the way I see it, what other choice do we have?
“Alright,” I say. “So what do we do?”
Harold pulls this wad a paper outta his pocket, an’ unfolds it an places it onna table. He looks at it fer a coupla seconds then calls us over. I look down an’ notice that it’s a menu fer some Chinese restaurant called the Golden Panda.
Then he starts tellin’ us how over the next few weeks there’s gonna be some bands comin’ ta play in the Albuquerque area. 38 Special is playing inna couple a days, an then they’re headin’ west ta California, then he’s gonna hook up wit soma the wardrobe guys from Hanson as they’re gonna do a tour a Japan an’ eastern Asia.
“Dong,” he says. “I’ve made arrangements for you to hook up with a couple of band’s sound engineers and travel with them.”
Then he tells Tyler that he’s gonna hook up with a coupla guys from Earth, Wind and Fire’s P.R. team when they come to town the followin’ week. The band does two gigs in Baltimore an then he’s gonna have ta hook up with the Scorpions ta get him overseas.
Finally he gets ta me. “Okay,” he says. “A couple of days after the Earth, Wind and Fire concert, Journey is gonna be in town. You’re gonna hook up with the band’s lighting technicians and travel with them to Milwaukee where they’re sharing the bill with Kansas and Asia. Once you’re in Milwaukee, we’re gonna do a swap with the lighting techs for Kansas, so you’ll travel on to New Jersey with Kansas while another runaway takes your place and travels onto Bismark, North Dakota, with Journey. Then once you’re in New Jersey, you’ll meet up with some sound guys for the Fixx who are doing a gig Trenton then flying back to the UK the next morning. You got all of that?”
“Yeah, I think so,” I says, but really I don’t.
After his talk, Harold asks us if we have any questions. None of us say anything. Then Harold says he’s gonna turn the floor over ta Steve, the Grateful Dead guy, for the next item on the meeting’s agenda. Then Steve stands up an’ starts talkin’ bout how the vending machine in the staff break room ain’t givin’ out candy like it’s supposed to when ya put yer quarters in an’ on top of that it won’t give ya yer change back.
“So if this happens, please do not bang on the machines because we rent them from the company and if there’s any damage to them we have to pay for them ourselves,” he says. “Instead, go report it to one of the maintenance guys or Carol at the Customer Service desk.”
After the meeting Roger and Harold pull Dong aside; I guess it’s so they can go over the plans for the 38. Special gig. Tyler and me get to talkin’ an neither of us are too keen on these plans. Then Tyler tells me he’s don’t even really want ta go back to his home.
“I am from Zimbabwe,” he tells me. “Why in hell would I want to go back? If I did, Mugabe’s henchmen would surely have me beaten and possibly killed.”
“Yeah…I have no idea what you’ve just said,” I says. “But I do know that I ain’t too keen on all this travellin’ round an’ hookin’ up wit all these different bands. It just seems too complicated.”
Tyler nods, “I understand.”
“But I ain’t got no bread or even my passport, so what the fuck else am I gonna do? Know what I’m sayin’?”
Me an’ Tyler both agree that the set up seems a bit dodgy but really it’s the only game in town. The one good thing outta this is that we’ve still got a coupla weeks to decide what we’re gonna do – stick with this plan or see if we can figger out somethin’ else.
In the meantime, I’m gonna take this opportunity ta do a little explorin’ on ma own. I mean I’m Albuquerque fer cryin’ out loud...home of the East High Wildcats. Ya only get an chance like this maybe once in a lifetime. So startin’ tomorrow I’m gonna get my head in the game. I’m gonna find what I’ve been looking for. Yep, that’s right, I’m gonna go hang with the cast of High School Musical!
To be continued…………………
Munzly
Does this mean he'll fail to "turn left at Albuquerque" and finish up in Aladdin's cave or a bull-fight as roady for Bugs and Daffy?