Tusk: The Story Behind the Story

[CarneVaca]

[The year is 1979. Lindsey rushes into the studio, tape in hand.]

"Mick, Mick. Hey, guys. Listen to this. I was working on this track last night in my bathroom."

Mick stumbles in. The roadie follows. Mick stops. The roadie climbs on a step ladder, Mick turns his head up, opens his mouth. The roadie pours in half a bottle of Bud. Mick swallows with gusto. Wipes his lip on his sleeve.

"What's this, Lad?" he says to Lindsey who, unable to contain himself, has popped the tape in. "Listen..."

"Hmmm... What, what is it that awful percussive sound?" Mick says.

"Oh, it's just a cardboard box. Cool, huh?"

"Cardboard? Oh, OK, we'll tape my part over that, then erase it," Mick says.

"No, no, no, Mick, see. I have this great idea. Let's keep the song just as it is, cardboard and all."

"Well, I'll be. This is majorly disappointing, Lindsey. I've been replaced by cardboard." Mick looks up again, and opens his mouth. The roadie rushes in with the ladder and beer.

Lindsey lights a spliff. For a second, he wishes he were Bob Marley. Then he goes back to wishing he were Elvis.

[Meanwhile, from an adjacent room, some sparse, off-key piano notes spill out. In the room is Stevie, wrestling with a Casio keyboard.]

"I'll eat my eggs before noon," she intones. To herself, she mutters: "Eggs before noon? That's no good. I gotta come up with something else that makes no sense but sounds good." She tacks away on the keyboard. "Hmmm. How about, Be my sisters of the moon? Hey, that's pretty good. I think I'll make that the chorus."

Back in the sound room, an overindulgent Lindsey is rewinding repeatedly to the parts of the song he particularly likes.

"Cardboard box. Crazy bugger," Mick mumbles, while he picks stray coke dustings from his vest and then sucks his fingers. "Little runt, thinks he knows everything. I have a good mind to slap his silly mug, or, or... kick him off the band. I wonder what Clapton is doing these days."

John rushes in. "Lindsey, Lindsey, hey, Liiiiiiinndsey!"

Lindsey barely looks up from the mixer.

"Lindsey, I gotta sing on this record. Come on, you promised last time. You said, 'On the next record, you can sing, John. Come on, I gotta sing, don't you see?

"Hmmm. Yeah, John let's talk about this later. Meanwhile, I want you to redo the bass part on The Ledge. You gotta make it simpler, man. Otherwise, you're going to outshine my guitar parts. We don't want that."

Deflated, John picks up his bass, and saunters off to the booth.

[What will happen next? Will John get to sing? Will Stevie finish her song? Will Lindsey trip on his own ego? And, where's Christine? Tune in next week for the next episode of TUSK: THE STORY BEHIND THE STORY.]