"He Drinks Red Bull"
A Heavy Metal Show that I Ran
”Um, I have to run the show at the Schooner Tavern, can you do the St James show?. This time I’ll pay you. Which means you won’t have to pay rent this week”.
My rent was $60. The show would probably be five hours. And I’d have to deal with Chuganaut.
I didn’t mind running shows. But this was a bit dodgy, for three reasons. One, there were no other helpers, no one on sound, no one on the door, only the bar staff. Two, I’d been told this the day of the show. And three, once I met the headliners, I realised that they were…fairly demanding.
Their bus (yep, they had their own bus) chugged in early and took over the back lane behind the Saint James. We were just using the Grand Circle upstairs, the old foyer. It was a cool venue, but you had to go up stairs.
“Ah, whaddaya mean we gotta go up stairs?”
“Nope, we are going to take over the bottom bit, let’s just do it in there”
“What is this place”
Thing was, they weren’t really the headliners. It was just kind of a metal night. They’d booked like anyone else. But they had it in their heads.
“Where’s the sound guy. WHAT?? There isn’t one'“
“Ok then we’re having a rider. I want this drink. And HE drinks red bull”.
“He” was their roadie, and he was cool. He invited me in the bus while the rest of the band (including their manager, a Dad I presume), tromped around moaning. Inside the bus he smoked pot and made me feel welcome. I heard later that he’d passed away - I mean not that night - a year or so later. Rest in peace.
Turned out the band were all bluster and the night commenced as planned upstairs. I had to man the door, so I didn’t see anything. But I heard the odd gripe and insult - often from the stage.
“You motherfucker” etc, etc.
Luckily, one of the other bands had someone that could do sound. Additionally, the show was well attended, as metal shows usually are. I ended up almost enjoying it. Once the Chuganaut folks chilled a bit, of course, they were just regular people. But they had to keep up their tough, Hamilton exterior. They were tight and into what they were doing, for sure.
There was quite a bit of money in the end. Malevolence played - they drew the crowd, not Chuganaut. I remember Dero, the main man, coming to collect their cd sales money. He let me keep some of the profits off them - and I mean, that’s not fair. What a nice guy.
”We’re outta here” yelled Chuganaut as they sloped down the stairs.
The bar manager came over and the tab was only something like $60. Wild - if it was me, I’d have been ordering up large. I paid up. Hang on, that’s the same as my rent money.
The Dad remained behind. “Good night eh? Here…this is for you”. He gave me a Chuganaut CD-E.P. Something about a wolf. I probably still have it somewhere. The bus honked and off he jogged.