Just For One Day by Louise Wener

Author:Louise Wener
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781446407929
Publisher: Ebury Publishing

THE DEVIL’S HAIRCUT

It’s been a steep learning curve already and I’m ever so slightly disillusioned. More than this, I’m disappointed that I’m disillusioned. It seems ungrateful – and I don’t want to seem ungrateful – but I’m not prepared for the romance to be over quite so soon. I am all about the romance; the romance is why I am here. It’s hard to be romantic with the feeling that, six months in, you’ve already got everything wrong. First wrong thing: I play in a band whose very core is founded on a relationship that’s disintegrating. Things are approaching crisis point. When we come home from gigs or rehearsals these days, Jon and I disappear to opposite ends of our flat. Our flat only has two rooms, which means its opposite ends are quite close together. Jon avoids the tension by smoking dope and playing guitar and I deal with it by sitting in the bedroom writing songs. We need to address what’s going on, but neither of us can pluck up the courage. How does this work after we break up? Does the band carry on if we don’t? Maybe it’s better the way it is. At least the two of us are used to it.

Second wrong thing: I have the faintest suspicion that we’ve signed to a duff record label. Indolent is a mock independent, one that affects to be an ‘indie’ but is financed and backed by a major label. This makes no difference to me, I’ll take anyone’s money, but it turns out to be significant to other people. Indie labels are credible in the music press but our label isn’t credible since it’s clearly and clumsily a fake.

Never mind that. Swings and roundabouts. We might lose out in the credibility stakes but surely we’ll make up for it by reaping the benefits of BMG’s well-oiled, corporate machine? It seems not. Indolent is a boxroom at the end of a corridor and receives funding and backing commensurate to a small village bun shop. No one in the parent company gives two hoots about it.

Third, and most important, wrong thing: I have fatally failed to comprehend the geography of the indie-rock landscape that we’ve wandered into. It’s my error entirely; mine and Sade’s and Bananarama’s. I’ve naively assumed that the indie world – which peddles itself on its rebellious, anti-establishment nature – will be the free-thinking, equal-opportunity, emancipated centre of the musical universe. Big mistake. Huge. This gang are deeply conformist: Smithers-Jones would have felt right at home.

Here is what I’ve learned about things so far:

1) To flourish in indie world, it helps to be deemed ‘credible’ by the music press.

2) To be deemed credible by the music press it is recommended, nay essential, that you sign to an independent record label (see things we got wrong, number two).

3) To further prove your commitment to the indie cause, you must adhere to its code of practice at all times. Your first single should be a limited-edition run

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