TWENTY-FOUR
______
DANTE
My creativity—so recently diagnosed with a terminal case of burn out—had recovered, taken flight, and begun to careen out of control. I’d never written this much, or this deeply. Each song was the manifestation of some previously smothered part of my soul, and there were times when the shock of exposure overwhelmed me. Still, I kept going.
I spent more and more of my time in the recording studio. By the eve of my birthday, Phil and I had nailed down a total of twenty scratch tracks. Once I decided which ones to develop, they would be sent to Roger for approval. After I got back to Melbourne, we’d bring in musicians to record each instrument, and I’d record the final versions of the vocals. Then, all the tracks would be layered together and finished off by a mixing engineer. It was only a matter of time before these fractured pieces of my soul, like everything else I’d sacrificed to the music Gods, would be put up for sale.
I closed my eyes whenever I sang now. So I could pretend to be alone, my words disappearing into oblivion, never to be heard again. But then, at the end of each song, I would force myself to look at Phil in the control room. A perfectionist to the core, he worked hard to capture the best sound for every word. “You never know when the magic will happen,” he said as we were finishing up for the day. “One of these tracks could make it to the final album.” I was pretty sure he had the song I’d sung to Sean in mind when he said that.
“Actually, I’ll need to go back and re-record the vocals for some of the tracks before they’re sent to Roger for approval.”
Phil frowned. “Is there something about the sound you’re unhappy with?” he asked. “Or did you want to try some different timings?”
“No, nothing like that.” I fiddled with a pen, unable to meet his gaze. “I just, um, need to rewrite some of the lyrics on these.” Grabbing a nearby list of recorded tracks, I circled five of them in blue ink. Riddled with masculine pronouns and allusions to my disavowed sexuality, they served as a testament to how far into the forbidden I’d ventured. I’d allowed them, wanting to finish the creative process as I’d begun, honestly and without prejudice. But such honesty could be considered commercial suicide in my genre of music. All evidence of my desire for masculinity in a lover would need to be stripped out and replaced with a feminine counterpart. The thought made my throat close up so tight I could barely breathe, but it had to be done. “Roger will never approve those songs as they are,” I told Phil. “May as well make the changes now and save myself some strife down the road.”
A beat of heavy silence followed, and then he asked, “When do you want to rerecord them?”
“Not until everything else is finished.” I’d invited my other self to come and play with me and, despite the years of abuse, it had obliged. My greatest fear was that my newly rediscovered well of creativity would dry up the moment I started to censor myself. I needed to finish the work before I stabbed myself in the back.
Phil’s cheeks hollowed. He was biting his tongue. Now I knew where Sean got it from. “You have something to say?”
“I’m not sure.” He sat back in his chair and regarded me with the fatherly expression I’d seen him use on his son. “Do you want to hear what I have to say?”
I nodded. Over the past few weeks, Phil and I had gotten to know each other pretty well. I’d come to respect him, both as a professional and as a person. If he had an opinion on what we were creating here, I wanted to hear it. “Give it to me straight.”
“All right.” He seemed to consider his response for some time, before he finally spoke. “I understand you wanting to change lyrics if it’s artistically motivated, but the way you’re talking sounds more like censorship. That is what you have in mind, isn’t it?”
I nodded reluctantly. “At the end of the day, Roger still owns the label. Contractually speaking, my artistic soul belongs to him, and there’s no way he’ll allow me to keep those lyrics.”
Phil’s frown deepened. “Why are you here, Dante?” he asked, gesturing to the studio around us. “What’s the point of all this?”
“To make an album’s worth of hit songs?” I muttered with a self-deprecating laugh.
“I didn’t ask for Roger’s answer,” he argued. “I want yours.”
My back stiffened. Did Phil see me as my father’s singing puppet, without a mind of my own? He wouldn’t be the first to make such a claim, but I’d hoped he had a higher opinion of me. “I’m here for the music.”
“Exactly,” he cried, sitting forward in his chair. “And music is supposed to push boundaries and explore new territory. It changes the fabric of society. If a good part of you isn’t scared shitless every time you walk through that door, you’re not making real art.”
“Do you think I’m not terrified of what I’ve done here? I’ve given everything to this album.”
“That’s my point.” Phil threw his hands in the air. “You’ve finally delivered something raw and honest and that’s what makes it exceptional. This album is the stuff that spawns music legends, Dante.” His eyes flashed with passion and fury. “Now you tell me you want to pull it apart and crap all over it. And for what? So you can pretend you’re singing about women when you’re not? What a load of crap.”
“You have no idea what you’re talking about,” I snapped, glaring at him. “You’ve never had your life picked apart, dissected and put on display for anyone with a few bucks to spend on a magazine. There’s no separation between my career and my life. If I destroy one, there won’t be anything left of the other.”
Phil seemed baffled by my words. “Why do you think this album would destroy your career?”
“Because no one would buy it,” I cried.
“Sean would buy it.” My gaze snapped up to meet his unflinching stare. “You underestimate people, I think. And don’t act like you’re the first musician to face coming out of the closet. David Bowie did it decades ago.”
I shook my head with a defeated sigh. “I’m no Bowie. At this point, I’m barely a Dante Sinclair.”
“And that’s a bloody good thing,” said Phil. “There’s nothing wrong with shedding your skin if it reveals more of who you are. People want honesty in their music, even when they can’t face it anywhere else.”
“Honesty,” I scoffed. “I didn’t get where I am by being honest, I got here by being whatever Roger told me to be. That’s who people want to see, and I play my part perfectly.” It was ugly and manipulative, but the only person hurt in the process was me so what did it matter? “I am the embodiment of the bad boy heterosexual rock star. If I throw that away, what the hell is left?”
