“Are you ready? You’re up in five…” came a faint voice from outside the artist’s trailer. She casually wiped a rogue piece of egg from her leather jeans which had previously detached itself from a small triangular sandwich, before reaching for a nearly empty bottle of Maker’s Mark. She was half-cut and had been slurring her words since at least eleven that morning, reinforcing the fact that there is a certain beauty in an ample rider. Although the room was spinning and her vision mired by a mild haze, she was confident of her ability to perform. She was a consummate professional, always had been. There was no doubt in her mind that once she had ingested the remnants of the whiskey and taken a couple of drags on her jazz cigarette, she would rise up like a female rock and roll Jesus and knock this shit out of the park.
“Yup, I’ll be right out.”
Her eyes settled momentarily on the gold top Les Paul in the corner; the guitar that had been her weapon of choice from the start of her long and illustrious career. It had featured on the band’s eponymous first album, the masterpiece that had launched them into the rock and roll stratosphere, and it was a fitting tribute that this instrument would now become the iconic visual symbol of the band’s latest video. It had been a while since she had felt the buzz of being part of such a big budget production and today’s events had conjured a certain nostalgic emotion. In her heart she harboured the sense that this could be the last hurrah, the graceful finale that would provide an ornate, audio-visual bookend to thirty-five years at the pinnacle of the music industry. And if this was it, she was going to milk it for all it was worth. This video would be the spectacle that would burn her image indelibly into the memory of everyone who cast their eyes upon it.
Okay, so the concept was a little unoriginal, cheesy even, but it contained that one optical sensation that would provide the archetypal aesthetic to accompany the band’s latest rebound power ballad: the clifftop guitar solo. And there was only one way this was going to go down; the Gibson hanging low on her upper thigh, legs astride, her long, dyed locks tussled back by a strong headwind barrelling off the sea. Coupled with the wall of sound of the track it would be nothing short of epic. And she knew it. Once the drone footage taken from high above her ended up in the editing suite, her place in rock history was golden.
She took a deep breath and lifted herself off the worn brown chesterfield in the trailer, steadying herself for a moment. Taking purposeful, determined strides, she traversed the short distance to the corner of the room and lifted the guitar, carefully positioning it over her shoulder before walking over to the door. The coastal wind embraced her as she pushed it open and, taking a deep breath she stepped out into the open air. There was a buzz about the place; people and equipment were strewn across the hillside and she could see the drone hovering high overhead. The track was cued and ready and the first few bars came thundering from the PA system as she got herself into position.
By the time the second chorus had kicked in the tears were streaming down her face. The crew assumed that she was feeling overwhelmed, overcome by the sheer emotion of the event, but she knew better; her blood alcohol content was by now irrationally high and the strong wind was playing havoc with her contact lenses. As the second chorus reached its final throes, she assumed the pose she had rehearsed in front of the mirror so many times and prepared to create celluloid nirvana. It was a one take triumph. Her hands mimicking the solo to perfection, her stance creating a solitary beacon of attitude and defiance, a rock goddess battling, and succeeding against the elements. Everyone looked on in awe.
That was her vision, her dream. It was exhilarating, sensational, the culmination of years of careful planning. It was a dream played over and over in her mind until she felt compelled to act upon it. And that’s what it was; a dream. Because at the same time, at approximately the same height on a hill across the harbour, some bloke nursing a pint in a steeply terraced pub garden raised his iPhone, zoomed in and took a snap. And that bloke, was me.
