Chapter Three
The Phoenix Club was on the second floor of a two story building on Strassburg Street, a narrow alley of trendy shops, cafes, and clubs off Platnerska Street, not far from the University. The doors opened at nine.
St. James spent the day hanging out at cafes and visiting the National Gallery, sitting for two hours before a little-known Hieronymus Bosch, which at first glance appeared to be a pastoral scene in a meadow but upon a closer look revealed scaly, pointed creatures lurking in the grass, feeding off the carcass of a crow, obscenely thrusting their spiked tongues at the viewer.
Metaphor for life, St. James thought. It was best not to look too closely—in the gutter, at your fast food, at people’s faces. You might not like what you see. He did a few sketches. The uniformed guard gave him the hairy eyeball. At a quarter of seven, the guard came by and made a shooing motion with his hands.
“Out, out, museum is closing.”
St. James wasted two hours over a cup of coffee in an Internet cafe surrounded by intense twenty-somethings hunched over iPads, Nooks, Blackberries, and Droids. St. James felt like a caveman. He’d been unable to check his Hotmail account in days, dependent as he was on the generosity of others. Usually, he would casually amble in through the side door of a big hotel, the kind with free Internet business center for its guests, hover and time his visit.
Occasionally, a man in uniform would inquire if he were a guest.
The Internet cafe was across the street from the Phoenix Club. St. James watched as a group began to gather beneath the small marquee advertising FOR ONE NIGHT ONLY! THE LEGENDARY BANSHEES! Soon there was quite a throng. St. James glanced at his cheap digital watch. Nine fifteen. They should have opened up by now.
As if reading his thoughts, a man appeared inside the glass door leading to the stairs and opened the door. There was a nip in the air despite being the middle of June, and the crowd hastily entered, forming a queue on the stairs. St. James left ten korunas, slipped into his backpack, grabbed his guitar case, and headed across the street.
He had no place to spend the night. At the moment, he wasn’t concerned about that. What concerned him was that some band was illegally benefiting from his dead father’s good name and work. Certainly there were no Banshees revival bands, but the songs still got played on college radio stations, there was still some attraction. Witness the crowd which continued to flow into the narrow stairs behind him until it backed out into the street.
Why were these kids there? The Banshees weren’t their music or their generation. These kids dropped ecstasy and boogied to Mika or German electronica. Like jazz-rock, heavy metal had had its day. The attraction these days was mainly ironic, witness the Osbournes. The man who once snorted a line of ants reduced to mugging for Letterman. The stairwell smelled of hair spray and body odor. A sign near the top said in Czech, German, French, and English: “ABSOLUTELY NO RECORDING DEVICES OR CAMERAS.”
The creature collecting money and stamping hands at the top of the stairs looked like an ex-con with his shaved head and jailhouse tats. He grinned wolfishly as St. James forked over fifty korunas.
The man stamped St. James’ hand and said in a Russian accent, “I don’t think they’ll welcome anyone from the audience,” indicating St. James’ guitar case.
St. James smiled self-consciously. “I’m just lugging it around.”
The ticket taker slowly waved a finger in the air. “No recording. Enjoy the show.”
St. James entered the long, low-ceilinged club. He looked at his hand. The ink stamp was of a hand making the devil’s horns—the Banshees’ trademarked insignia. A dozen little round tables filled the floor with five booths at the back—toward the street—with windows looking out. The back of the room away from the street held the stage, which held three expectant black microphones, a drum kit, guitar, bass, and Yamaha electronic keyboard.
St. James quickly took the last empty booth, setting his guitar case and backpack on the bench seat across from him. He looked out on Strassberg. Tuner VWs and Hondas blipped up and down the street as kids continued to arrive, some by bicycle.
At nine-thirty a tall woman with lavender-colored, dandelion hair and a purple dress took one of the mics, which squealed like a stuck pig. Seconds later, the feedback died down. St. James glanced to his right where a man controlled the sound system from a small booth set against the far wall.
The woman spoke in Czech over the booming PA system which modulated before she finished a short statement. In English, she said, “Welcome to the Phoenix Club! I have a few announcements. Next week, Friday, we are featuring Pander Bear and Fool’s Gerund. On Saturday, we are hosting a benefit for International Hunger Relief with five bands.
“Now I would like to present to you some very talented folks from right here in Prague, Greta and the Garbos!”
There was some clapping as three girls dressed in black with black eyeliner, one with jet-black hair, one with bright yellow hair, and one with orange hair took the stage. They carried their own instruments except for the drums. The lead singer and guitarist shrieked in Czech while the bass player and drummer struggled to keep time. St. James reached into his backpack and removed a set of Flent’s Ear Stopples without which he would have lost all hearing by now.
St. James leaned back, pulled out his sketchpad and a pen, and sketched what he saw, which was the club. He worked his way methodically through three Zatec Pale Ales. He sketched an odd little fellow who looked like a troll, squat with a full gray beard, rimless glasses. The man wore a safari jacket stretched tight over his medicine ball belly and had to be in his sixties. Go figure. For the first time that day St. James began to feel better. His hangover had finally withdrawn. Hair of the dog.
Greta and the Garbos drove a dozen people from the club, and those that remained were not reluctant to share their opinions. Boos and catcalls filled the air. This only seemed to goad the three Goth girls to greater displays of sonic intransigence, until at last, the tall woman in the purple hair strode smiling to the lead singer and wrested the microphone away.
She spoke in Czech, then in English. “Let’s hear it for Greta and the Garbos, ladies and gentlemen!”
A cacophony of boos and catcalls filled the room. Purple Hair tamped it down with her hands. “All right, we all know what you’re waiting for. The Banshees will be up shortly.”
Cheers and whistles.
It was past midnight, and the crowd was getting surly before Purple Hair reappeared with the same shit-eating grin plastered across her puss. “Thank you for your patience!” she said in Czech.
The audience hooted and cursed.
“Fuck you!” someone yelled.
Purple Hair smiled and said, “And now, the legendary Banshees!”
Everybody started whooping and got to their feet. Whistles, stomping, incoherent exhortations. St. James couldn’t see the stage, but from the reaction of the audience, the Banshees were taking their places. A minute later, a deep electronic hum permeated the room and faded away. The drummer played a tight descending rhythm and the band launched into “Camel Toe,” pure metal raunch as Paddy expertly stroked the keyboard and Cunar laid down bass as big as the Continental Shelf. They started off a little ragged, but by the time they hit the bridge they had it down.
They sounded exactly like the Banshees. St. James had only heard them on record and in old videos. When the band segued seamlessly into “Black Cat Fever,” he heaved himself to his feet and tried to see over the bobbing heads, at least a hundred.
St. James got up on his bench seat and stared through the haze. Where was that smoke coming from? He saw the three Banshees bent over their axes, the drummer’s head tilted back in ecstasy. The audience spontaneously clapped to the irresistible beat.
When the song ended, the audience responded with wild applause, whistles, fist pumps, and shouts of enthusiasm. For a moment, the drummer paused beaming at the audience. He could not have been older than twenty-seven.
That’s him, St. James realized. That’s my father.