The Three Signs - Book 3 - JanelleChapter 7: The New Album Takes Shape free porn video

After the New Year’s Eve gig, we had a very lazy New Year’s Day. I think I slept in until close to noon; and did nothing that afternoon until Janelle came around just before dinner time. Or breakfast time for her ... stupid shift hours. We had time for a quickie, before she had to eat, and get ready for work. She promised that she would spend more time with me over the weekend.

With the New Year’s gig out of the way, it was time to concentrate on the extensive schedule that Fifa had for us all through January. Next week was full on; three nights at the Antler, follow by two nights at Millers Manly Vale. The rest of the month had at least three nights a week; The Lifesaver, Selinas, Chequers. Then a few nights at Gosford, at the Central Coast Leagues Club. February would be busy, too – back at the Antler for three nights, then two weeks in the studio.

I heard from Jack, he was back from Hobart pretty pleased with how the race turned out. Rags came in eleventh across the line, and tenth on handicap; he said it was a great race; challenging, but a lot of fun. He told me the yacht ‘New Zealand’ was getting both line honours and handicap wins.

At university, we started preparing for enrolment time; early numbers indicated just over three hundred full time students would be doing first year computer science subjects. A far cry from when I started, there were maybe forty or fifty of us back in ‘76. There would also be another sixty or so part time students. We decided the easiest way to handle it would be to have groups of fifteen, with a two hour introductory session, every morning and afternoon for the two weeks in the middle of January. David, Claude and I would then talk with a smaller group of five students each; answering their specific questions and advising on subjects and course choices. Fitting in time for the part time students would be a challenge, given my schedule of gigs during that time. I could make the Monday night of the second week; but the others said they could cover; there wouldn’t be that many in comparison.

We spent the week working on a set of handouts, lists of helpful contacts in the school, a map of lecture and tutorial rooms – also the location of the First Year offices. We didn’t want to replace material that would be handed out at the start of each subject, but things that would apply across their whole first year.

The day after New Year’s Day I returned to the Melanoma clinic to have the stiches on my back removed. The doctor checked out where he had removed the troublesome mole, and was happy with how the incision was healing. He had Traci remove the stitches; I had to remove my shirt, and lie face down on the table. It didn’t hurt, just a little bit of tugging as she removed the sutures. I could feel her pressing on my back with a soft pad, and when she was finished, she applied a fresh dressing.

“There you are, all patched up,” she said. “Same rules as before, don’t get it wet for 24 hours, I’ll bring some fresh Band-Aids tomorrow, and you probably want to change then every day. There might be a little weeping from where the sutures were, but that should heal in a day or two. Once that stops, you won’t need to keep it covered. No heavy lifting or straining your back for a week, okay?”

I thanked her for first of all noticing that I had a mole that looked potentially cancerous, and also for the gentle way she treated me when removing the sutures. She seemed pleased with what I said, and helped me get my shirt back on.

“You should probably come back in another six months, for another check-up,” she said. “With your complexion, and all the time you’ve spend outdoors, you’re at a high risk for developing skin cancer. I can check your body out, if you want me to; but I’m not as expert at finding them as the doctors here.”

Personally, I thought having the very attractive Traci examine my body on a regular basis would be a great idea. I would have to make sure Stewie wasn’t worried, though. On a more serious nature though, I would have to take skin cancer more seriously, I was probably lucky that that mole had been detected early, before it had developed into a full-blown melanoma. I had seen some of the photos they had on display in the clinic, and if I had let things go too long, it wouldn’t have just been a small, two centimetre area that needed to be removed.

On the next afternoon, after our regular rehearsal, Janelle came around, and she looked at where the mole had been removed.

“That’s healing pretty well,” she said. “The doc did a really good job of removing it, and stitching you back up. What if I put some Vaseline on it, so the scar tissue doesn’t get too hard? Who took the sutures out? It looks nice and neat.”

“Traci took them out yesterday around lunchtime. She was pretty gentle, too.”

“She’s pretty good I think,” Janelle said. “In that sort of practice, she gets to do a lot of minor surgery stuff; assisting the doctors there.”

We went out for dinner – more like breakfast for Janelle, since she had not long woken up. Again, we ate in the dining room at the ‘Longy’; I regard it as my ‘local’, I knew most of the staff by face, if not their names. After our meal; Janelle was still wide awake (of course), so it was back to my place for a night of wild sex.

The next day all of us started to prepare the equipment we would need for the gigs in the upcoming week; three nights at the Antler followed by three nights at Millers Manly Vale. Peter, from Alberts, was arranging for the PA and lighting equipment; so all we needed to bring were our own instruments and amps. Under Mary Beth’s direction, we made sure everything was in top condition; we checked our guitar strings; I replaced some that were looking a little worn out. Murph helped us overhaul and clean the pots and connectors on the amps; we didn’t want anything to go wrong.

Finally, we went over the set lists in detail; making sure everyone knew exactly what we would be playing, confirming the arrangements, and where each person would be on the stage. Fiona, Stewie and Traci hadn’t done a full, standalone gig with us before; not like these ones; so Phil went through how either he or I would give subtle directions. When we would want to repeat a verse, or extend an instrumental break, or when we would end the song. It we decided that we would all meet up here at four the next afternoon, load up the trailer, and head up to Narrabeen. That would give us sufficient time to get things set up on the stage at the Antler, conduct a sound check, before the gig would start around eight.

I felt excited as we were setting up our equipment at the Antler; it was one of my favourite venues in the Sydney area. Maybe because it was close to where I grew up, or how you got pretty much instant feedback from the audience how much they liked the music; it was an ‘honest’ venue. Plus, you could guaranteed a huge crowd every night; full of energy – even if that energy was directed into drunken brawls.

“Hey, Will, are you going to warn Stewie about what to expect from some of the girls we’re likely to get in the audience?” Paul said to us.

“What about them?” Stewie asked.

“Will can tell you, there will be all these hot, lovely ladies, lined up along the front of the stage,” Paul said. “They like to flash their ‘assets’ at you.”

“Not just flash,” Mary Beth said. “Didn’t you get showered in panties one time, Will?”

“Yeah, even had one caught on my mike stand. I wasn’t game to touch it and remove it, either.”

“You could have just shaken the stand,” Phil said. “It would have fallen to the floor with a big, wet ‘splat’ sound when it hit.”

“Oh, gross!” Fiona said. “Do they really do that? And pull their tops up?”

“And their skirts,” I said. “The ladies up here are classy, that’s for sure.”

Fiona just shook her head, not knowing quite what to say to that.

We finished setting up; time for a quick sound check before having a meal. By seven-thirty the room was filling up; we wanted to make sure we were ready to start right on eight. The crowd looked at bit restive; we didn’t want to risk a bar fight starting. Just before eight, we headed out from the Green Room to the stage; Murph raised the lights and Phil stood in front of his mike.

“Narrabeen! G’day, welcome on this Monday night! I assume you know us, we’re the Roberttones, and we’re going to blow your socks off tonight! Are you ready for some good old rockin’ blues?”

The crowd responded with cheers and yells, Phil turned to us; making sure we were all ready.

“Okay, first stop, we’re going to NUTBUSH CITY!”

Allison looked at me, and gave me a big wink. I blew her a kiss, as Phil started the intro. Stewie and Paul had the whole horn section cooking; and Allison strutted out across the front of the stage; belting out the words. She was amazing; oozing sexiness and sultriness. Traci and Mandy were standing behind her, singing and performing the dance moves that Traci had worked on. Stewie’s soprano sax break was excellent; I could see the audience dancing in their places, bopping up and down, some of them doing that special dance that seemed to go with the song. There wasn’t much room on the floor; but several groups had organized themselves into clusters. ‘The Madison’, I think that’s what the dance was called.

When we finished, before we could start the next song, everyone yelled out “Again! Again!” Phil looked at us, covered the mike, and asked “Shall we?” We all nodded, and he stepped back to his mike.

“You all liked that?” Huge cheers. “Okay, one more time, now maybe you can get your dance groups together...”

This time, maybe the front third of the room were all lined up together, we started the song; Allison seemed to give it even more than she had the first time; she was really developing into a dynamite performer. By the time we had finished the song for the second time, it looked like at least half of the room was all lined up, dancing. Not everyone was completely in sync, but it looked impressive from the stage.

We then went into ‘Midnight Hour’, ‘Treat Her Right’, and the remainder of the opening set. The new songs seemed to get a pretty good reception; from the audience reaction, none of them appeared to be duds. We took a break, had some cold, refreshing drinks.

“Fuck, that was a great opening,” Allison said. “They were so wound up, I think they liked it!”

“You nailed that song, Alli,” Traci said. “Damn, you were so HOT, you had me lusting after you!”

“Everyone did great,” Phil said. “The new songs were fine, we can talk about them after the next set.”

When we got back out on stage, I could see about five or six women lined up right at the front. I pointed them out to Stewie, and told him to keep his eye on them. We started the second set with the two Easybeats numbers, ‘Good Times’ and ‘Make You Happy’; before we were halfway through the first song; two of the women lined up along the front of the stage had pulled their tee shirts off, and were waving them above their heads. One of them in particular was rather well-endowed; and I could see her large breasts swinging back and forward as she moved to the music. By the end of the second song, all six were topless, much to the delight of the other people around them. I looked across at Stewie, he had a huge grin on his face.

The remainder of the set went well; the topless women remained topless, and we finished off with the Stones set. For an encore, we decided to do ‘Nutbush’; this time at least half of the audience were dancing. We extended the song, maybe playing at least twice as long as it would normally last. People wanted us to continue playing, but it was right on eleven, and the pub had to close. We really didn’t need to pack anything up, since we would only have to set things up again for tomorrow. We shut everything down, and headed back to the studio to discuss how things went.

Once back in the studio, we talked about how the new songs had been received. We all felt they went okay; not as well as ‘Nutbush’ or some of our older ones; but there was nothing fundamentally wrong with them. Maybe because they were new and people hadn’t heard them before was the reason their reactions were a bit subdued. Phil, Stewie, Bruce and Mandy sat down, and discussed arrangements and other ways to liven up each song.

Stewie suggested that on the first instrumental piece we play, ‘Spring Evening Blues’, I play rhythm guitar, rather than the Rhodes. He suggested a strumming pattern, using my thumb to pick out the bass notes. I had an acoustic guitar in the studio, I tried out his suggestions, and it seemed to work. I wrote out the chord patterns and would practice it tomorrow morning at work.

There were some other suggested changes, too; mainly in how the horn section would accompany each song; how the instrumental breaks in each song would be handled. We would try the changes out tomorrow night. It had been a long day; I headed off to bed, slept well, and got to my office at the university somewhat later than usual.

I spent the morning reviewing the handout material that we would be giving the first year students; in between that I practiced my new rhythm guitar part while singing the lead melody in my head. By lunchtime I felt I had it worked out; maybe we could run through it as part of our sound check later in the afternoon.

Tuesday night’s gig was even better that our first night at the Antler; the crowd seemed bigger, and our minor changes to some of the new songs appeared to work. Maybe it was because we were getting more familiar with playing them, but they sounded better, at least to me. The big hit was still ‘Nutbush’, it seemed like a lot of people returned just to hear that and dance to it as we played.

After the gig, we felt that we had made some positive changes to the new songs. They still weren’t perfect, but getting there. Wednesday night there were even more people, the place was completely packed. When we finished the final encore, we told the crowd that we would be back for a few more nights at the start of February, they all cheered. We started to pack the equipment up; since tomorrow we would be at Millers Manly Vale. We didn’t bother unloading the trailer, as we would only have to pack it up again the next afternoon.

The next three nights at Millers went pretty well; the crowd wasn’t quite as fired up as they were at the Antler (meaning – no busty women flashing their tits at me in the front of the audience). We continued to make minor improvements and refinements to our new songs each evening. When I got home on the Friday evening, Janelle was waiting for me; despite being tired, we played around for a few hours before exhaustion eventually set me asleep. At least I could sleep in on Saturday morning, I didn’t surface until close to lunchtime.

Janelle came with us to watch for our final night at Millers; it capped off a pretty good first week of our ‘new sound’. After we got home and had unloaded the trailer, it was to bed, for some more sex before sleeping.

Sunday was the “Two Island Race’ at the sailing club; this was always a challenging race; the winds were generally light and fluky in the area between Bayview and Scotland Island; and the swells rolling in through Broken Bay were challenging for ‘Koolong’. We sailed a pretty good race; avoided any problems in the shallow waters behind Lion Island, and ended up finishing second over the line. I was completely exhausted by the time we had finished; I didn’t wait around to see what the handicap results were. At least we were only playing three nights in the coming week.

Monday evening – a night off from playing – we all gathered in the studio to have a post-mortem of last week’s gigs. We all agreed that concentrating on the one genre of music – the blues rock style – was a success. We went through the set lists, and decided that we really didn’t need to change much at all. The cover versions we had in the sets – ‘Nutbush’, the two Easybeats ones, the Stones songs – all went over very well. The same with ‘Treat Her Right’ and ‘Midnight Hour’. This week we had four nights at the Lifesaver; George and Harry (and maybe some of the others) would be attending for one of those nights, just to hear how the new songs were turning out.

“What’s this place like?” Fiona asked. “Is it as big as where we played last week?”

Those of us who had played there before told her what the place was like; the crowd was quite different from how it was at the Antler and Millers.

“So, no line-up of chicks flashing their boobs at us?” Stewie asked.

“No, but plenty of guys who would find you desirable, Stewie,” Allison said. “You might want to wear some tight jeans, show off that bum of yours...”

“Thanks, but no thanks,” he replied, laughing. “Not really my thing.”

We then discussed some of the other venues around town; the following week we would be at Selinas for three nights. That was always a great venue; however before that we would be at Chequers, in the city – a place we had never played before. That would be interesting; I knew a bunch of other groups had played there, including AC/DC. Following the Australia Day long weekend we would be up at Gosford at the Central Coast Leagues Club.

Just as I had thought, the crowd at the Lifesaver was quite different from the crowd at the Antler. It was more like at the Lifesaver, they had come out for a night of listening to a band, with a bit of drinking, rather than going out to drink (and for quite a few, get drunk) and maybe listen to a band. The composition of the audience was different; being close to Paddington and the inner East, there were a large number of what I assumed were gays; and none of the skanky women lined up along the front to flash their tits and pussies at us.

As Allison had also predicted, during the break a number of the gay guys in the audience were lining up, all wanting Stewie’s autograph. When he could get away and rejoin us, Allison teased him.

“I told you that you would be very popular here,” she said.

“Once they go black, they never go back,” I said, repeating what Ros had said.

“Where was that from?” Stewie asked. “I can follow the meaning, but I’ve never heard that before.”

“We teased our friend Ros with that,” Allison said. “She met up with a black guy, from the States. The morning after the first night they slept together, we gave her no end of teasing.”

“And Alonzo was a big guy,” Mandy said. “Not just tall, but BIG.”

She stretched her hands apart to emphasise just what she was implying. Much further apart than Alonzo’s length actually was, but still.

“I felt for her,” she said. “She said for the first week or so, she could barely walk ... And her only experience with a guy before that was with Will. Not that he’s tiny, but in comparison...”

“Has Will slept with every girl in or associated with the group?” Fiona asked.

“Just about,” Allison said, laughing. “Megan, Jillian, myself, the Tracy we had previously, Ros, even Wendy, who does the costumes. Not forgetting Lori, who was the original manager, and Mary Beth.”

“Allison!” I said, a little pissed off at her. Don’t tell EVERYBODY about who I have slept with!”

“I didn’t know it was a State Secret,” she said. “Most of us know, anyway.”

“Everyone but Rachel, Mandy, Traci and me,” Fiona said. “So what’s wrong with us?”

“Nothing,” I said. “Rachel and Mandy are in steady relationships, and that’s a rule I won’t break. You don’t sleep with a Mate’s girlfriend. And you and Traci have only been here a few months, and I’m trying to change my behaviour.”

“Oh, bugger!” both Fiona and Traci said in unison, pouting.

“Anyway, Traci, you’re with Stewie, and I’m not going to sleep with a Mate’s girlfriend,” I said.

“But I’m not anyone’s girlfriend,” Fiona said. “So I shouldn’t be off limits!”

“Yeah, except I’m cutting way back on my activities in that regard,” I said. “It caused me too much trouble when I would sleep with almost anyone, now I’m just sticking with one person, which is Janelle.”

It was time to return for the second set; the new songs seem to be well received; and everyone loved the encore of ‘Nutbush’. The remaining three nights were pretty much the same; we were getting quite comfortable with the sets and the new songs.

As we were setting up the next day, I pulled Stewie to one side, to speak with him.

“Mate, I hope I didn’t offend you last night, with that comment about once they go black,” I said.

“Nah, it was fine; I thought it was really funny. I know you’re not racist; there’s not a prejudiced bone in your body. I can tell you, I know racist comments as soon as the person opens their mouth, even the ones who start with ‘I’m not a racist, but... ‘ You know they are about to come out with some solid racist shit. And there are those who say stuff that offends, but they are ignorant about why it’s offensive. Anyway, thanks for being considerate, and asking if I was somehow offended by your comments, but no, I wasn’t. I consider you a good mate, and if we can’t laugh and joke about shit together, life’s pretty screwed up.”

I put my hand out to shake his, and rather than grip mine in the conventional manner, his fingers wrapped over the top of my wrist.

“Special Bro handshake,” he explained. “You’re more than just a mate, you’re a bro – short for ‘brother’ – it’s like you’re accepted into the tribe.”

I put my other hand on his shoulder.

“Thanks, Mate ... Bro ... that means a lot,” I said. “That’s why I told Traci what I did, about not sleeping with her. You don’t do that to your mates, at least I don’t.”

“Hey, if you did, that’s not a problem. I know she’s keen for it, she’s even spoken to Janelle about having a threesome,” he said. “She told me how disappointed she was when you said you wouldn’t sleep with her.”

“She wasn’t the only one!” Fiona said, interrupting. “And there’s no excuse for not doing me, unlike you have with Traci!”

“Hey! I’m just some prize stud animal, just here to service any horny woman,” I said – probably a little too harshly.

Fiona was taken aback, and started blushing.

“I wasn’t meaning ... I’m sorry Will, I didn’t imply that I expected you to...”

Fuck. Once again, I had said something too rashly, and upset someone.

“Fiona, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to imply that’s what you were thinking. Got a minute? Can we talk privately?” I said to her, pulling her to one side and leading her to the rear of the backstage area.

We sat down on some crates, and I took hold of her hands.

“I’m sorry I said things the way I did,” I said to her. “I’m just trying to get my life back under control, and not let random sexual encounters distract me.”

“That’s okay, Will,” she said. “I was just being silly, and I guess I took things too far.”

“Well, I should be flattered that you, and Traci for that matter, want me that way. And I am, don’t get me wrong,” I said. “Six or nine months ago, I would have gladly take you up on that offer.”

I explained to her about the counselling I had been getting, how I had tried to change my behaviour and seeking out emotional intimacy, not just looking for easy sex. I talked about how it was important that it was for both parties to have the same level of expectation.

“And that expectation can change for one or both after they have sex,” I added.

“Yeah, tell me about it,” she said, looking said. “I thought this guy was the one for me, he said all the right things, we went to bed, had sex ... then he dumped me. All he wanted was just sex with me, nothing else. I felt horrible, like I had been used, just like a cheap tramp.”

“I’m sorry to hear that, Fiona,” I said, squeezing her hands. “He must have been an idiot, not knowing what he was giving up.”

“Yeah, well ... story of my life; my sex life at least. I seem to have a built in dickhead attractor; the only guys that are interested in me are guys like that, they just want to fuck me, use me, and move on. All the decent one; like you, they aren’t interested in me. Not in that way; just as ‘friends’,” she said.

“You’ll find someone,” I said to her. “At the moment, I can’t give you what it is that I think you want, but there will be someone there for you.”

It was time for us to get changed into our stage clothes for the night’s performance; the crowd was slightly larger than the night before. Again, Stewie had a number of young guys wanting his autograph; as they lined up, all holding a piece of paper or a book out, I caught his eye and smiled at him.

George, Harry, Jim, Beeb and Graeham were there on the Friday night, just to listen and see how the new songs sounded. They were fairly pleased, but wanted to come around to the rehearsal session on Saturday, as they had a few suggestions for us.

“It’s all sounding pretty good, guys,” George said, “with the exception of one of the new songs, ‘Walking Home’. I’m not criticising you Will, normally your vocals are pretty much spot on, but on that, you’re not really getting the essence of the song. Jim? Graeham? Your comments?”

“I think, Will, you’re really not conveying the emotions properly,” Graeham said. “When we wrote the song, we pictured someone who had just broken up with their romantic interest, it was sad, but the final verse has a sense of optimism. I think it’s a little too close to the bone for you, and you’re afraid of putting some emotions into it, because that might open some old wounds.”

“What if we get someone else to do the vocals?” Jim suggested. “That would free Will up to concentrate on the keyboards. Fiona, do you think you could handle the lead vocals on that one? We’d have to pitch it up a bit for you, what’s it in at the moment? A? Say we transpose it up five tones, have it in E, and slow it down a little.”

We thought those suggestions were good; I was never all that happy singing that song; Graeham picked it correctly, it was a little too personal for me to feel like I could really let myself go singing those words. I went through my copy of the sheet music for the song, transposing the chords to the new key, and making annotations where I would play particular parts, now I was playing both the Rhodes and Hammond organ at the same time. Once we all felt we were ready, we started to play, but Jim stopped us after a couple of bars.

“No, that’s still a bit too fast, dial it back, and made each beat, each note flow into the next,” Jim said. “Here, let me demonstrate. Can I sit at the keyboards, Will?”

I stood up, Jim sat at the Rhodes, and played how he envisaged the song to be. It wasn’t just slower, but there was a definite swing to the rhythm that we hadn’t been able to get. As he played the song, the others gradually joined in. Fiona started singing with the verse the second time Jim played it; she sounded rather good – better than I thought I sounded. She seemed to get the right emotional levels for the song; something that I never felt completely comfortable with doing.

We tried it again, this time with me playing the keyboards; I thought we sounded better. I played both the Rhodes and the Hammond at different times though the song; playing just a chord progression during the chorus seemed to be more in keeping with the mood of the song. We ran through it several times, making several changes to the arrangement, until we felt we had it right.

The next week we played every night; the Monday and Tuesday at Chequers, in the city, then a three night gig at Selina’s. Fiona got better with every performance; we felt that we had another lead vocalist ready for recording. At least with Stewie, and Rachel playing trombone every so often, we could rotate people around to perform a vocal role, while still leaving sufficient people in the horn section. It also meant that playing so many live gigs, Allison, Mandy, Fiona, Rachel and I could spread out the singing duties, and that would put less of a strain on our voices.

The Australia Day long weekend gave us all a chance to rest and relax; for once we didn’t bother to rehearse on the Saturday, instead we gathered in the back yard for a barbeque. The outdoor setting that Mary Beth and I had got last year was sufficient to put most of the food plates on, but to get enough seating space for everyone we had to set up the old trestle tables and benches from the garage.

It was a great, relaxing day; lots of good food, great conversation with a bunch of close friends. The thing that amazed me about the group, even with new people in it, was how we were all good, close friends. We got on really well; teased each other, but it was all good natured; they were all the type of friends that you would do anything for.

Sunday was spent catching up on house work, laundry, and checking over my instruments and amps. Making sure there were no worn strings, cleaning the pots and connectors, just general maintenance, so that everything would be fine for the next few weeks. We had two more weeks of gigs, then the studio sessions in mid-February.

Monday, Australia Day, I was up at the sailing club for the Australia Day Regatta. We started with a sail-past; and then there was a combined race with ASC, Alfreds, and the Royal Motor Yacht Club, plus Bayview Yacht Racing Association joined in the dinghy races. It was challenging racing as part of a large fleet; there were over fifty yachts split between three divisions; we were in the middle division; with the larger yachts in Division One. They sailed a longer course, out through the heads into the ocean and back. We just remained in Pittwater, and managed to finish fifth over the line; behind a few other faster Etchells. The races were followed up with a barbeque out on the club rigging deck, and I left close to six, just in time to pick Janelle up from the hospital. She had been sleeping all day after a long night shift.