We and Me by Saskia de Coster

Author:Saskia de Coster
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: World Editions
Published: 2019-05-20T13:39:50+00:00

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SARAH 1998

The Lady Di’s have closed the curtains to banish daylight from the studio. Five days ago they worked together writing the lyrics for their new song, ‘Waterfront’. It was like a dream that’s vivid, exciting, and meaningful the minute you dream it, but afterwards none of the Ladies can understand much of what it’s about. At the insistence of Sarah the Adrenaline Bomb they practise another song. They’ve rushed through almost all her songs this afternoon, but not a single one is good enough to be recorded. The other Ladies think she’s too critical and that she exaggerates things.

They had already resigned themselves to the fact that first they’d have to invest all their time and money in making an expensive demo before any of the record companies would beg them to sign a contract. That’s how it was with the Seattle grunge scene, too. But thanks to all the contacts that MH’s sister Jules has in the music world, a short cut has opened up to them. Tonight a real producer will be paying The Lady Di’s an unexpected visit. This is what they were working toward all those months; this is why they’ve been rehearsing twice a week at the castle.

Jules is a shining example for all four of them, the expert who knows how to act around the record company fat cats and at the interminable parties where the deals are made, the unofficial Lady who’s never afraid of expressing her frank opinion about the official Ladies. She tells Emily that a thick layer of make-up to make her skin look smoother wouldn’t be a bad idea. She tells MH that she’d be much prettier if she dropped half her weight. ‘Fat isn’t cool. Meat Loaf is fat.’ She advises Suri to trade her fairy-tale rags for a sleek suit. Jules can say anything she likes because at age twenty-two she’s already built up considerable experience, and mainly because she thinks the Ladies should leave the songwriting to Sarah.

They’re wild, fragmented, tormented, shabby—just what the nineties dictates. Their music bridges the gap between grunge and electronica. Sarah’s father has come around three times with chord diagrams for Dylan songs, but Sarah will have nothing to do with them: insipid human-rights guitar-strumming folk music, eighty planets removed from the world of The Lady Di’s.

They have everything a group might need to make it. Sarah and MH come up with absolutely brilliant lyrics and musical finds. Suri is the creative daughter of Björk; she drags in empty cheese containers and old toy pianos and magically produces the most original sounds with them. And even though Emily has a little trouble keeping up with the hyped-up rhythm of the drum section, chaos is part of their world.

‘Come on, let’s do the first lines one more time,’ Sarah urges MH. Normally her voice is like the blow of a sledgehammer, but today MH is almost incomprehensible. She keeps fidgeting with her left ear lobe. A couple of days ago Suri jammed a hot needle through MH’s ear ten times to produce ten little holes.

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