Karl Wagner: The Year's Best Horror Stories XXII

“In-fucking-credible!” Long Liz gasped. She shook her head disbelievingly. Her short red hair bobbed and the little skeleton earrings she wore in both ears rattled. “Where’d ya get it?”

Dark Annie (nee Joan Thomas) brushed back the errant shock of purple hair which continually spilled over her forehead. “The shop where Karl works,” she said, “and if it hadn’t been for that last check from Moonlight, there’s no way I could’ve afforded it.”

Long Liz (nee Pamela Elizabeth Jones) passed the guitar back to her. “Just think of all the great gear we can score once we sign to a big label.”

The dressing room door banged open, admitting a blast of cold air and the sound of a stirring crowd. Jackie Slash (nee Tammy Mills) leaned in, smiling. Her long blonde hair was fluffed up magnificently and her wide blue eyes gleamed. “Are you cunts ready to rock’n’roll?”

It was something of a sore point with Jackie and the Rippers that Gary, their manager, had held them back from the public for so long. “You need more time to develop,” he explained patiently, month after month. “When you make your debut you’ve got to be the greatest band this city has ever seen!” He’d not even let them do a video. “The promo photos are all they need to see for now. Let’s keep the suspense building.”

Meanwhile their single on the tiny Moonlight Records label had gone back for six re-pressings, made the dance-rock and alternative/college radio charts for 32 straight weeks, had been voted Single of the Year in both The Village Voice and Rolling Stone’s critics’ polls, and had been licensed for inclusion in no less than three compilation albums. A remixed 12-inch edition of the single (featuring a different and even more provocative cover photo) was due out in three weeks. The only thing keeping Jackie and the Rippers from being the hottest group in the country—and from getting signed to a major label—was one simple technicality.

They had never, ever played a live concert.

Until now.

Sure, they were only the support group—the Wandering Jews were the nominal headliners tonight—but it was common street talk that better than half the audience had come only to see them. Jackie and the Rippers. Hard rock that scraped the cutting edge like a whetstone, and that stung like a razor.

Karl handed Jackie her red Gibson Firebird. “I changed the high E string for you. Hope a gauge nine will do.”

She grinned, nodded, and slung the axe around her arm.

Gary leaned out onstage and signaled the sound and lights crew. Immediately the house lights dimmed. The crowd screamed.

“We want the Rippers! We want the Rippers!” they chanted.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” roared the emcee. “Presenting… for the first time anywhere…”

They sprinted onstage, capes flowing out behind them. Jackie and Annie plugged in their guitars while Liz took her seat behind the drum kit and found her sticks. In the darkness it wasn’t easy.

“… Jackie and the Rippers!”

A single spotlight winked on, framing Jackie’s face in a disc of light.

“ ’Ello, dearies!” she shouted.

The crowd came totally unglued. They shrieked, yelled, whistled. More than 150 different voices shouted the titles of the two songs on their single. One young man with a mohawk haircut scrambled up onto stage and lunged toward Jackie, his hands outstretched. Gary and Karl ran interference.

Jackie beamed. She was basking in it, eating it with a spoon, and loving every sweet precious fleeting sound. “We’re Jackie and the Rippers,” she said, “and tonight, we’re gonna smash you!”

Liz pounded both sticks on her floor toms and laid down a machinegun beat. Annie joined her on the bass, setting up a propulsive rhythm. As the stage lights came up full, Jackie leaped into the air and ripped a savage chord from her Gibson with a windmill stroke delivered while her feet were still high off the stage.

The song was “Smash You,” the fastest number in their repertoire. And it sounded good.

The second tune was even better—a killer cover of the old Blondie song “Sex Offender.” Jackie’s voice had been likened to Debbie Harry’s by some critics, although a more accurate comparison would have been Patsy Cline’s. Patsy Cline, however, never sang anything like this.

And so it went through the set: “Bend Me, Shape Me,” “Let’s Have a War,” “Gotta Keep A-Rockin’,” “I Love a Man in a Uniform,” “Walkin’ the Beat,” “Venus in Furs,” “Slaughter on Tenth Avenue,” “In the Past,” and “Streets of London.” They played hard enough to splinter three drumsticks, snap two guitar strings (something about Jackie and high E just didn’t agree), and pop one string on Annie’s skeleton bass. They played fast enough to keep the crowd in a continuous frenzy. And they played loose and raw enough to make Beethoven roll over.

Jackie and the Rippers closed the set by performing the B-side of their single, “Pretty Maids All in a Row.” It was really a showcase for Liz, a “Wipeout”-style drum piece which let her display some of the most intense percussion work the city’s rock fans had ever witnessed. No Vanilla Fudge tedium here—the tune was fast and musical, catchy and melodic, even though its principal instrument was the drumkit. Jackie and Annie joined in on guitars only during the chorus, where Jackie would deliver the song’s sole vocal: a quick cry of, “ Catch me when you can, Mister Lusk! ” which she let loose when all the instruments simultaneously stopped dead during the electric three-second tacet at the refrain’s end.

The song completed, they marched triumphantly offstage to the tumultuous cheering and applause of the crowd. They hadn’t played the A-side of their record, “Lonely Nights in Whitechapel.” This was intentional. It was a trick—part of Gary’s strategy—a stunt for which an experienced band might be crucified, but one which a fresh, young band could get away with. By omitting their one and only hit from the set, they had guaranteed themselves an encore.

The precaution proved unnecessary; the cheering which greeted their reappearance was harder and heavier than before. It continued for almost two full minutes and might have gone on longer if Jackie hadn’t beckoned for silence.

“This next song,” she said, “is one that I’m sure most of you—”

“Lone! Ly! Nights! In! White! Chap! El!” they chanted. “Lone! Ly! Nights! In! White! Chap! El!”

“—have heard. It’s been out for about a year now—”

“Lone! Ly! Nights! In! White! Chap! El!”

“—and it’s been doin’ real well for us. It’s called…” She paused, smiling broadly, and held the microphone down to a short girl with white-orange-white hair who was almost crushed against the stage monitors by the surging mob.

“Lonely Nights in Whitechapel!” the girl shrieked.

Liz struck up the drumbeat and Annie pumped out the bass line.

Jackie stuck the microphone back on its post and danced around the stage with her guitar, her cape flying out behind, as her bandmates played the song’s hypnotic instrumental intro. As the intro concluded, Jackie picked out a two-note melody on her (freshly replaced) high E string and let the last note hang in the air, lingering like a ghost through the phenomenon of electronic sustain. Then she spun back around, pressing her lips close to the knob end of the microphone, and began to sing:

She chopped out a barrage of eight fast power chords (A-A, A-D, A-D-E-A) before singing the second line: