some more energy. I couldn’t even hear you through the second chorus.”
“Noted,” was all Rick said before he sat on an amplifier and lit up a cigarette.
“Shane.” Micah turned his back to me, but his voice carried. “You were on point, but I imagine that’s because you’re performing for someone.” Shane shot me a glance with a cheeky eyebrow waggle. “Keep it up.”
Noah shook his head. “Of course, he’s on point. He’s hoping to get laid.”
I hit stop on the video. I didn’t like where this was going.
Shane just laughed. “Projecting much?”
“Fuck off, Shane.”
“Say please.”
Micah held up a hand. “Can you guys flirt later? We’ve got a setlist to figure out.”
Noah said, “Whatever.”
They worked through a couple more of their regular songs and a cover of “Little Black Submarines,” which was one of my favorite Black Keys songs.
Unlike at their shows, Micah stayed planted at the mic, playing and singing like your run-of-the-mill front man. The energy was low, like they were going through the motions, like they’d forgotten some of this would be posted on the Rock Paper e-zine.
Micah said, “Layla, are you ready to record?”
Then I realized he must not have known I’d been recording the entire time. I wasn’t sure what to do with all that video. They hadn’t told me not to capture it. “Yeah. Are you going to do your new music now?”
Noah’s eyes widened dramatically. “She’s not going to record our new songs.”
“Why not?” Micah clearly didn’t take any shit from any of them. Of them all, he probably had the least to lose if the band fell apart. He had his solo gig, and he had the highest profile of all of them. He could probably replace any one of them and the band would continue on. Micah was the band.
“Look. I get that she wants to hang out and take pictures to show her friends. I get that Shane’s all gaga over her. But come on. Isn’t it enough that she’s getting a personal concert? Do we have to let her leak new music?”
“Noah, stop being a dick. You never gave a shit about fans leaking bootleg. What’s the difference? Are you worried you didn’t put on your makeup today?”
I snorted and covered my mouth when Noah shot me a nasty side eye.
“Okay. Fine. Let’s start with ‘Sugar Rush.’ ”
Micah heaved an exhausted sigh. “Good.” He shot a glance at Rick then Shane. “Ready?”
Shane answered with a “One, Two, Three, Four!” Then they all came in at once.
The song was heavy, grungy, with a throwback sound. Jane’s Addiction, maybe. Noah brought the electricity, playing his guitar like he’d been injected with a dose of adrenaline. He prowled the stage area and even moved out in front, toward me, pursing his lips in a kiss he might have blown. He smoldered into the camera, and I could almost feel the hearts exploding all over the Internet.
While he kept hogging all the attention, I leaned a little to my right and framed Shane in the view, zooming closer to capture his relentless attack across all the drumheads. I pulled back and focused tight on Micah since the majority of fans would want to examine his every expression. While he could go as bananas as Noah, Micah had the ability to completely disappear into a song, too. When he did, it was like the song consumed him. He’d gone there now. His eyes closed, and he made love to his guitar.
I gave Rick some air time, then zoomed back out so I could record Noah strutting around like he was the star of the show. If I didn’t know better, I might have thought so. His ass looked mighty fine in those jeans. He made sure I had ample opportunity to immortalize his posterior for posterity. But he’d been so ugly to me, I’d rather kick him than kiss him.
They played three more new songs and finally took a break. Micah sat on the sofa beside me, dripping sweat everywhere. Shane paced in a semi-circle a few feet away, like he was waiting his turn. Noah took off for parts unknown, and Rick just sat on an amplifier with another cigarette.
“Can I see how they came out?”
I handed Micah my camera. “I got some earlier songs, too,” I confessed. “And the covers.”
While he played back a few seconds of video, Shane moved closer, and I lifted my eyes to his. He crossed his arms, tapping his fingers against his biceps, still drumming, and my gaze