Editor’s note: The following was transcribed directly from the notes of Mr. Troy Kelleher, a professional adman and moonlight-journalist. All dialogue has been preserved in its original state, and the event timeline kept intact. As always, Mr. Kelleher has held tightly to the highest code of journalist ethics, despite my protests at his liberal use of authentic names and identifying details. He is stubborn and prone to violence (claiming he has a background in law to “squash potential ‘suits”), so I allowed him to publish his piece in its original form. Do not contact him directly for legal inquiries.
Part I: The Duty of a Journalist
“Journalism largely consists of saying ‘Lord Jones is Dead’ to people who never knew that Lord Jones was alive.” – Gilbert K. Chesterton, English writer, critic and rabid cynic
September 15, 2015
5:18 PM
A cavernous basement with poor lighting, The Chronicle headquarters is a rough place to be — even when the deadline isn’t looming. Feeling mildly claustrophobic, I rolled aside the stone and stumbled into the cave. I had just cut a day of heavy ad work, my mind reeling and delirious, my tie a limp noose.
When my eyes finally adjusted, I was met with a whiteboard canvasing the wall, covered wholly in red marker, rays of white shining through. Ah, yes, the assignment board for Issue 1 of the student newspaper, a place for The Chronicle’s topics to be auctioned-off (and sometimes outright stolen) by these ravenous student-journalists. Each assignment was branded with an elaborate signature, a Hancock-ian claim.
They were as good as written. But not all. Several of the ugliest concepts were orphaned far at the board’s bottom, so low you had to enter a deep crouch to get eye-level with them. From the whiteboard’s disheveled look, it was clear there had been some frantic sort of skirmish early in the day — between editors, staff writers and the lonely “practicum” writer swine (a vicious bunch of mercs hunting for a few college credits, the kind of people to be avoided at all cost.) Each one had already marked their kill, and they were no doubt scrambling for contacts and hassling local dignitaries for the interview, the mark, the quote.
Above ground, the frenzy for leads reached a bloodlust. These journalistic zealots were tracking the hottest, bloodiest breaks… and here I stood in the pit, drooling slack-jawed and hunched, begging on my knees for some scrap of an assignment. I was already buried.
The editor grimaced when he saw me, and looked to the board for a straggler. He ran his finger over Sports, scoffed at the prospect of me writing Campus News and finally stopped at a dark corner. His eyes began to water. His face turned nauseous. Stunned, he stretched a shaking finger to the board, pointing to a dingy scribble.
The thing was smothered in the depths of the “Art” section — already the lowest subject of any paper — deliberately placed in poor lighting. Crafted with bizarre hieroglyphics and exaggerated form, the assignment was clearly written by a lunatic.
I shuddered and clutched my notebook. The editor wouldn’t look at me. He muttered something ominous beneath his breath, along the lines of “good luck” or “God have mercy,” and ran from the cave.
There came a hiss from behind, and I whipped sharp, expecting a massive serpent … something that had taken shelter in the newspaper caverns, hiding from the fury above. Finding nothing, I turned to my assignment and squinted through the harsh light. Oh, Christ…
“Concert Review: Night Beds,” it read.
“Goodness,” I said. “I don’t know the first thing about this concert business!”
“Therefore the Lord God sent him out from the garden of Eden, to cultivate the ground from which he was taken.” – Genesis 3:23
Part II: In the General Vicinity of the Garden
10 Days Later
September 25, 2015
10:15 AM
Email
I finally reached out:
“Hello, I’m writing a Night Beds concert review for the North Central College student newspaper, The Chronicle. Would it be possible for me to talk briefly with Winston before/after tonight’s show? I appreciate your help — feel free to shoot me an email or call my cell at the number below.
Looking forward to it,
Troy Kelleher”
I received the following response:
“Your message to info@theunionnetwork.com couldn’t be delivered.”
At this point, I took to the Internet — a journalistic weapon more powerful and drenched in gore than any pen or sword — and tracked The Union like a wounded elk. Its contact page was weak and unattractive, so I took to Facebook. Social media is a low form of communication — grating against the highest code of professionalism — but I sent a Facebook message anyway. As a great mentor often said, “I’d rather have my hands bloody than empty.”
10:25 AM
“Hey Troy! It’s Alli Nazorek. You’re more than welcome to as long as the band confirms it. (…) The manager’s name is Konstantin. Just let us know what they say so we can make sure it can happen!”
10:31 AM
“Hi, Konstantin,
(…) I’m writing a Night Beds concert feature. (…) Would it be possible for me to talk briefly with Winston before/after tonight’s show? I appreciate your help —(…)
Looking forward to it,
Troy Kelleher
614-325-XXXX” (Editor’s note: phone number omitted. Do not attempt to contact the adman directly.)
11:09 AM
Text: “For sure- text me ”
“I think before might work better? Will def work it out, thanks!”
4:56 PM
Text: “Hey it’s Konstantin with Night Beds – feel free to pop in at the union whenever you want to do the interview”
At the time of this text, “Fun Friday” was in full-swing at the ad agency. I was feeling heavy and my jaw was stone. Here I sat, clutching another beer and staring fearfully at this complex and highly expensive camera equipment, this thing that was supposed to be a phallic extension of myself — which I had no idea how to work and no time to learn — and this Konstantin was howling about “popping in” for “the interview.” What? Who was this man? Ah, yes, that’s right … I suppose I asked for this.
5:16 PM
I set down my beer and, with a face of grim duty, embarked for The Union.
“Duty is the essence of manhood.” – George S. Patton
Part III: The White Apple
Editor’s note: The following account was written live, as the events occurred to Mr. Kelleher. His work adheres to the high ethics of Gonzo Journalism. Notes have been edited for grammar.
6:01 PM
Perched on a stone by the chapel at town’s end, and there’s a haze about. The red sun sets, but it’s fighting hard, lingering, and its tongs scorch my page a bright yellow, sending clouds of ink to the sky. Getting stares from the staff but I keep writing as fast as possible. I must catch up to these other Chronicle brutes who submitted their first-issue stories days ago.
A boy eyes my camera with lust. Should’ve bought the cheaper one, but here we are.
Several punk-types in black t-shirts, black jeans and black hair (black shoes, too) pass without a word. I’m writing furiously — some awful poetry, the kind you read above — and a man stands over me.
“Sup, man!” he says, casting a flat-bill shadow over my notes, the notes you read at this very moment. “You gotta be Troy.”
You gotta be Konstantin.
“That was Winston that just walked by you, man,” he says. I nod vigorously, recalling that Winston Yellen is, in fact, the man I’m scheduled to interview.
Konstantin gives a wide smile, revealing rows of sharp teeth. He points to the church — which is, in fact, the concert venue. Ah, yes, here we are.
6:07 PM
I’ve been reassured by Konstantin and an off-putting number of Union staff members that I will, in fact, be interviewing Winston. I’m now preparing a list of questions, as I intend to dig mad-deep into the psyche of this prolific man.
“Blah … blah-blah-blah-blah, blahh,” Winston’s voice comes bleating from the stage. He’s doing sound-check with a large Union staff member, who stares perplexedly at an imposing control panel … periodically walking to the stage, where he stares perplexedly at the speakers and woofers. Staring and being perplexed: a fixed pattern.
The speakers spark and flair like a poor cigarette, making bleeding dog noises that send the Union man into a spiral. Sound-check has been a bust up to this point, apparently, and things are getting tense as concert time approaches. It’s taboo in the performance industry to do any tech work in front of the crowd, and the Union man keeps glancing to me apologetically.
“I’m gonna get some food, man, I’m hungry,” Winston’s brother, Abe Yellen, blurts from across the chapel, leaning against the dry bar. Like the others, he’s cloaked in black, and his voice has a western varnish.
6:15 PM
“I’m kind of like a DJ that sings,” says Abe. His brother is fighting the sound equipment and swearing quietly.
I’m wrangling my camera and its stand — a foreign, unwieldy beast — trying to get the thing to stay calm, when Konstantin’s arm coils around my neck. I reach for my camera tripod, a brutal club I keep nearby for self-defense, but his voice soothes me. Konstantin is a proper P.R. man. He assures me that I’ll get an interview with Winston before this thing starts.
“Certainly,” I say.
Abe hops on the altar and imitates a heavy British accent. “Let us have a cocktail and come back at once,” he croons. Konstantin grins. His eyes are still and quiet, occasionally curling to the side, his flatbill hat now backwards in degenerate fashion. The P.R. man — “no, it’s ‘manager,’” he later reminds me — leans close to me, arm constricting my Adam’s apple. He makes a request of your humble reporter.
“Listen, man … would you be able to get me some **** or something? Would you know anyone that could get that for me?” Konstantin asks, unblinking. “Actually, no. What about ********?” “Yes, of course,” I say, not wanting to miss the interview, my reporter instincts turning rabid. “We’ll get you that interview, man — don’t worry,” he says.
I look to the altar, and there’s Abe, bobbing his head and lofting the Mac for all the chapel to see. Its apple burns white-hot, tempting. Its light has a touch of red, bleeding. Konstantin cackles and slithers away.
“Sometimes paranoia’s just having all the facts.” – William Burroughs
The following occurred a short time later. I did not record the time, and I refuse to construct a lie.
Konstantin has left me with a lit cigarette on the church’s porch, and I consider taking a drag from the thing before he returns and snatches it back from me. Winston and company have made their way to the downtown area a few blocks away, getting drinks and thick food at Ted’s Montana Grill on Jefferson. We prowl their way. Konstantin moves like a serpent — lithe and cunning — and he isn’t an easy man to match at any pace.
“I’m from L.A.,” he reminds me, unprovoked, for the third or seventh time this evening. He removes his cackling cigarette now and then.
Konstantin, Night Beds’ P.R. rep — or “manager,” he corrects me again — hails from Los Angeles, “right at the heart of Hollywood, man.” He represents several bands, and made north of $150,000 (!) last year. He’s making upwards of $3,000 for this night alone.
“I got (Night Beds) onto NPR the other day,” he says, taking a deep drag and holding it in. (Editor’s note: he’s telling the truth.)
While navigating the throat-slitting industry of public relations management, Konstantin was conscripted by a major entertainment conglomerate. Their relationship was short-lived, faltering when Konstantin came clean about “a side gig with a $50,000 starting bonus.”
“It’s hard to argue with figures like that,” I say, scribbling dutifully.
We round a corner and are met by the amber glow: Ted’s Montana Grill. Ah, there they are — the prolific brothers. Cain and Abel — scratch that, ‘Winston and Abe,’ I mean — are shaking my hand and passing a lighter about. It hisses with each strike.
The brothers are exceedingly cordial, asking questions about the locals and inquiring into personal matters that aren’t often shared between reporter and subject. I ask what parts of Chicago they’ve visited. Muttering about a red-eye flight the night before, they regretfully inform me that they’ll be heading westward the following day. They are men that move. I worry we may miss a chance for a proper interview, but I push my fears aside. There’s a bigger issue at hand.
Their show is starting in minutes. A crowd of unruly North Central students — known statewide for their impatience and violent tendencies — is milling about the white church, no doubt growing ravenous and vile in the cramped space. The show must go on — but first, the show must wait.
We’re on the hunt for a wine shop.
6:43 PM
“I didn’t even check your I.D. — you could’ve been 18!” says the store clerk, a large woman with an intense focus on Abe. She does not blink, and her breath is heavy.
We burst into the shop moments before, eyes blood-red and dangerous. The clerks looked about with wide-eyed despair, and we circled the edge of the place, hounding the staff and ransacking the aisles for pinot grigio. I nearly knocked one woman unconscious with my leather-bound notebook when she approached at my shoulder, barking a sharp order to “let (her) know if (we) need anything.”
They muttered about phoning the police until the bravest and brawniest matriarch approached us. With a stately tone, she demanded to know what we, this gang of darkly cloaked degenerates and a noble reporter, wanted from her and the wine shop. We told her. Oh, my reader, we told her.
“I think we have it, but nothing’s chilled here,” she sputtered nervously.
“We don’t need chilled,” said Abe.
Finished with his cigarette, Konstantin snaked through the doorway. He reassured me that I’d still get the interview.
6:48 PM
“No, wait until we get outside!” Winston says.
His brother unwraps the pinot grigio and swigs it as we stumble through the entrance. The street is busy with small children and their worried parents. Ted’s Montana Grill is clearing out. The sun has nearly set. As the brothers trade pulls from the wine, Konstantin declares that it is now time for my interview.
I ask a series of standard questions — about their greatest influences, their technique and what it’s like to be on-stage with nothing but your brother and a Mac.
I learn nothing of note, and I refuse to bore you, the reader, with any of this dribble.
7:02 PM
We arrive at the church and it’s pulsing. The stain-glass windows have fogged. The wood sidings exhale with an elderly wheeze. The doorman is quivering with terror. Clearly, the crowd is on the verge of a hellish frenzy. We rush inside to give them what they need.
7:54 PM
Chanting with monkish reverence about “whiskey” and old love, Winston holds the mic close, nearly kissing it — the audio issue resolved, the auto-tune coming to his aide with every pitch. His brother is more hype-man than musician, and he bounces about the Mac, occasionally tapping a space bar and adjusting the pitch, I believe.
There’s another group accompanying them — a group we cannot see … one my camera never captures. It’s this howling choir that leeks from the Mac and its heat, this horrible thing that winds down the tangled chords and leaps into the audience through the well-adjusted speakers … this ancient whisper that nestles into their skulls, making them shake their hips to the ethereal beat. This cruel, old flame, sparked by a common man.
Photo taken by Troy Kelleher
I’ve never seen the Union crowd move this way — all these college women with a few men and their clouded eyes. They turn and gyrate in large groups, syncing deeper and sinking further with each word this priest mutters. They demand the others to join them, and before long, I’m churned through the crowd without thought. Without will.
It thickens, a fog casting over us, the light outside snuffed cold long ago. We no longer have use for sight. Konstantin watches us from the corner, a thin smile forming across his lips. He is barely visible from the dark, except for his eyes.
We converge, silence unspoken, moving ever closer to the white-hot glow.
