RUNNING THE SOUTHERN COMFORT

Part One—RETROROCK RULES!

      Club Forbidden is a “flying V”. Never in the same location twice. All permanent-standing concert halls in the south came down close to 2015. Tonight Forbidden took over an abandoned hanger at Miami International Airport. The sonic booms overhead masks signs of the Retro beat. The appearance of the hangar is of a relic of better days. Thick dust prevents the aluminum walls from reflecting the sun setting over the condo sprawl of the old Seminole Indian reservation. The polished luster of the mile long terminal and the glass design of the new docking bays dwarf the hangar that died long ago. From outside you’d never guess what was going on inside.

      The dull indigo glow of the black neon lights along the stage rim reflects off the dark plating. Two 1500-watt strobes kick in time with the thrash drum roll. Feedback forces its way on the stage, met by the roar of the crowd. The band moves in stop motion, until the strobes are cut by the guitars. The Bends start their set. The front row headbangs at the stage rim. The rest are a sea of jumping bodies. Pits spontaneously pop up in the aisles. Vendors sell the shirts with the Bends’ infamous drowning man logo at the back of the club. At thirty bucks they still sell like wildfire. The two-thousand seat hall is stretched wide for a surround sound effect. Lifts support makeshift balconies one story above the moshers. Smoke rises and, trapped by the reinforced plasti-steel roof, hovers over the audience and plays around the spotlights. All is kept to the beat. Four single prop engines angled from each ceiling corner pushes air to the ground below, barely helping to break the heat. Temperatures rise with the thrashing bodies. Sound reverberating, the ceiling, doubly insulated with acoustifoam and sound conductive mesh, keeps everything hidden from ears of the law. This soundscape is a haven for those living here temporarily. These two thousand criminals take in what they can for the next few hours. When it is over they will take some of the free world back into the real world. Club Forbidden is open for business.

* * * * *

      When the culture wars heated up, everyone was polarized. The “if your not with us you’re against us” program was in full effect. Every level of society was touched, but none suffered more than music. Have and have nots, mainstream and underground; same thing. Divisions got bigger splitting fans and the industry alike. Bands walked a tighter tightrope—sell out or true believer, take your pick. Failure of the indies to organize made them easy targets for “culture warriors” looking to make a name for themselves to their flocks. Pick on the usual suspects—hardercore rockers, hip-harders, ultra-indie neo-punks—and you were the darling of the right-wingers. They were easy marks with ultra explicit lyrics and music clocking over 180 loud BPM’s. What no one expected was how the fans helped speed the downfall. What used to be groupies morphed into hooliganism. There was no fine line between fan loyalty and rioting. Subculture thugs further subdivided into band thugs, harassing the posers and starting fights outside the shows. Random violence attracted ratings for the media, ammunition for the anti-hardercore lobbyists. Authorities blamed the fans, activists blamed the music, bands were caught in the middle. The music industry fended off attacks as well as it could, constantly on the defensive. The indies fragmented into niches, too disjointed to put up a united front. Mainstream music distanced themselves from the looting playing everything safe and profitable, always one step behind the trends.

      The gang rape of 20-year-old Senator’s daughter at a hip-harder concert riot was a final straw. The “Ig’Nanz 10”, as dubbed by the media, were brought to trial. Music took center stage. Ig’Nanz band members were put on the stand for the defense to back up diminished capacity claims. Their antics in the courtroom, complete with their lead singer whipping himself out and pissing on the judge’s bench, became a gladiator spectacle for the music industry. The guilty verdict gave fuel to the culture war fire, and activists demanded something be done.

Where the federal government were slow to act, local officials moved fast and harsh. Florida passed legislation giving local authorities a say in which bands could play concerts in the town in the name of “public safety.” People cried censorship. The Congress said it wasn’t, but would only be accepted on a state level. Musicians, recording executives and fans hoped that the Supreme Court would do something. It upheld the Florida action. Florida became the leader in entertainment regulation. When they passed laws, most other states used their precedent to pass similar laws. Florida put explicit album covers and lyrics under pornography laws. Bringing such CDs into the state were prosecuted under RICO statutes. Georgia, Alabama, and Louisiana passed similar legislation, and the Southeast became a blockade that distributors could not cross without risk of revocation of licenses. The area became known in the industry as the “Southern Comfort.”

      Performers began to rally around the country with the same fervor that the “culture warriors” had. They were determined to stop the censorship. Their music got even harder to fit their means. The media dubbed it Retrorock due to the “back to basics” sound, reaffirmation of older, harder, faster musical styles, and more notably the older punks coming out of the woodwork to join the political rallies. Retrorock got sampled, newer bands put their stamp on the style and made their voices heard. Indie labels signed them on like wildfire, the Southern Comfort wouldn’t let it into the region. An underground movement grew in the south through downloads and bootlegs. Legislation passed the Southern Comfort Senates put Retrorock under racketeering statutes. When the Supreme Court upheld that decision as well, Rockin’ RICO arrests swept the region like locusts. No Southern rock band could tour, they closed the clubs, and musicians were arrested. Many local jails were overcrowded with Retrorockers. The Retros dove further underground to play concerts for the fans. A new Prohibition was in place with it a new breed of “gangsters.” Enter the Flying V’s. Modern day mobile speakeasies for the Retro crowd.

      Getting in is easy, finding them is hard. Locations are secret until twenty hours before ‘lights up’. Twelve if the band’s hot. The clubs work the cities on the net and scout locations for concerts—always indoors, always inconspicuous. Sound proof it, set it up, they send out the word all along their “Circuit”—an encrypted system, computer linked sat-fi systems with scrambler/jamming capabilities. Elaborate and very defensive set up by the clubs, the hackers and the northern activists trying to bring the music to the southern masses. Backing them up, are the “Roadies.” Heavily armed and resourced mercenaries used for everything from standing guard at concerts to creating escape routes in case of raids. Teams of varying skills and finances ran the southern comfort. From militia gun wonks to fully-funded former military, these teams were a lynchpin in which concerts happened. Not having them could mean death for bands and fans alike.

* * * * *

      Club Forbidden is swamped tonight. Ten hour show deadline. A scorcher: the Bends as an opening act for the return concert of Johnny Montross and the Heathen Deities. After a five-year stint in an Alabama prison, Johnny is back and is playing his old stomping ground—with five outstanding warrants and parole violations on him.

* * * * *

      An old locker room substitutes nicely for a dressing room. Crews continue to dust off some of the benches, but nothing can be done about the water-damaged ceiling or the peeling paint from the gray walls. Though not insulated, the walls muffle the music fairly well. Johnny leans up against the only sliding steel door into the room. He can feel the concert upstairs through the door. Drum and bass make the door resonate. Guitars sends a warm tingle through Johnny. There is no sound except for a faint hum, but Johnny can feel the music in his head, back, arms, extremities. He lets himself go and allows the music to play through his entire body.

      “The last thing you want to do is go on stage all jizzed up, Johnny. Get off the door.”

      Johnny opens his eyes to see that derisive smirk on “Turbo” Trancer’s face. Turbo stands in that defensive/offensive white-trash homeboy stance. Arms crossed, fingers spread wide, head cocked forwards, eyes staring straight ahead. The high curving sweep of his neon orange Mohawk makes him a mockery of a rooster. Johnny knew Turbo was only joking, but it was that gleam of enjoyment in his eyes that always pissed him off.

      The band waits for Johnny to do something. Moss Mason lets out a deep “Oooooh!” and as he watches Johnny and Turbo face off, his chuckling makes him shake like a Marshall stack. His lanky arms stretch around the neck of his bass, as if it were an extension of his chest. Facial stubble, combined with his ashen-brown skin, six-foot-nine frame and an evil smile to make Nicholson and Ozzy jealous gave him a certain walking dead ambiance. Caz Sexton stands against the edge of a gray locker, smiling at the confrontation. He shakes his head and suppresses his laugh, never breaking the smile. His dimples dig deeper into his cheeks under the rims of his aviator sunglasses. He fingers his aviator sunglasses back onto his face, waiting for either of them to make a move. Half of the crew look on with worry, for their jobs security than for the security of the band. The others laugh with the band, recognizing the posturing. Where two dominant personalities rule the band, better to have minor, even fake disputes, to relieve tensions. Let the reactor vent once in a while to prevent any further buildup.

      As if to answer the challenge, Johnny pushes himself off the door. He stands there staring at Turbo, scornful yet humorous. If he weren’t the best drummer I’ve ever seen... Johnny thinks, before letting out a “Sit and spin, Turbo!” and extending his middle finger.

      Turbo breaks stance and cackles out loud. The nervous crewmembers smile cautiously. The others laugh louder. Johnny walks over towards Turbo, who raises a hand in a high five gesture. Johnny goes to slap his hand, then changes course. His slender left arm wraps tight around Turbo’s neck, his right hand yanking Turbo’s wrist across his shoulder blade. Moss howls like the air horn of an eighteen wheeler. Caz’s smile breaks open letting air in to enhance his laugh. The laughter reverberates around the room.

      “Shit man!! Leggovme man, leggo!!!” Turbo yells half in pain, half laughing. Johnny turns Turbo towards the door, guiding him by his arm. Johnny runs full speed to the door, slowing down just enough to let Turbo get his face out of the way before the rest of his body slams into it.

      “Johnny, don’t hurt him. Much.” Moss says, in a voice that rolls out of an abyss. He adds another howl as a final exclamation point.

      “Yeah, we may need him. Won’t miss him much, but we might need him.” Caz says in his steady middle-C voice, and flashes another wide grin.

      “Keep playin’ it, Caz man. Be right ther---yeoooowh!” Turbo threats until Johnny moves his wrist another half inch up his back. Turbo glances back at his bandmate’s eyes—he ain’t laughing. “C’mon will ya! I was just kidding. Now leggo!!” Johnny releases his arm and Turbo lies against the door, laughing in between profanities.

      “Fuck off, Turbo.” Johnny walks past Caz and they exchange high fives. Moss and Caz laugh at Turbo.

      “Music’s stopped.” Turbo says still slouched against the door.

      “How can you tell.” Caz laughs.

      Turbo pushes off the door and faces Caz. “You wanna get in on this too?” he threatens. Turbo gets right up on Caz, foreheads pressed together, cursing and goading each other on. The laughter suddenly dies. The crew moves fast to break them apart. Even a few feet from each other they stare each other down, neither refusing to break the contest. Theirs is less of a rivalry as much as a cold war. Johnny likes this tension for the band, until moments like this.

      “Later will you?” Johnny says. They stare a moment longer before they break off clean. Everyone breathes a little easier. “We ready?” Johnny asks.

“Almost.” Moss bellows from across the room.

“Rock n’ roll.” Caz taps against the rust spot on the locker as if playing a running scale. “Hmm. Acoustics aren’t bad.”

      “I’m always ready.” Turbo says coldly. He struts past Johnny and high-fives a crewman.

      Johnny moves over to a cracked full-length mirror. His dark auburn hair spiked over the top leads to a rattail extending to mid back. The blue streak across his temples flows into the rattail. His faded brown Harley-Davidson leather vest with an eagle on the back. The wide black leather wrist straps. The high-top sneakers scribbled with metallic markers. He was set. The vest was a gift from his dad before they hauled him off to the Jacksonville state pen on Rockin’ RICO charges. Johnny’s a third generation punk. His grandfather, Michael, once opened for “The Clash.” Johnny remembers a picture of “great uncle Strummer” and Dee Dee Ramone that his father used to keep in an old CD case. Michael got his son, Dante, into the business at 17 who started his own hardercore bands: Divine Comedy—Dante Montros on lead, Michael the road manager. When grandpa died after the turn of the century, Dante took a 12-year old Johnny on the road. Johnny remembers the two cities-in-one-day gigs, the state capital rallies, the clashes with police. He grew up Retro and there was no turning back. When Dante was sentenced to 15-to-life, it was time for Johnny to take up the reigns.

      The door slides open and The Bends enter the room followed by two armed Roadies. The faint sound of the applause sounds like the radio static driving up the Florida Thruway.

      “Bends back in the fold. Montross up and set in two,” one of the Roadies says into his headset. These grunts serve with Roadies known as the Daemons, one of the few true military Roadies to run the Southern Comfort. Their original crew chief was a guitarist who lost his hand in Najaf. When by the time he got the prosthetics allowing him to play again, the Southern Comfort was fully functional. In protest he formed the Daemons to guard musicians running the I-95 corridor. When Captain Barret took over after the foounder’s death, the Daemons continued after just that.

      Turbo smiles maliciously as he talks to the Bends’ drummer. They drummers dap forearms and laugh. Johnny found Turbo in a dingy Flying V in Tallahassee. Part-time drummer for a lousy local, Turbo was the standout. Johnny was never sure if Turbo’s wild man attitude all the time was an extremely well played act or if he was really like that. Turbo's father was a drummer with a neo-punk band, until a state trooper ran over his hands for possession of an illegal album. Turbo took up drums to join a Retro band—his way of getting back at the system. Johnny knew that part of Turbo's talent was a raw determination and an unadulterated passion. Johnny always admired it, but never told him that. Their friendship based on mutual jealousy couldn't stand respect like that.

Caz has his axe and already heads for the door. Moss, bass guitar in hand and a good foot taller than the medium framed Caz, nearly runs him over rushing the door. Growing up on the same street in the Northern slums of Miami, Moss and Caz did everything together. They stole instruments and taught themselves how to play. They jammed in an abandoned church and listened to the same groups. When Johnny wanted Moss for the bass, he wouldn't go unless Caz came on. Moss brought a melodic mixture of power funk/metal to Johnny's rhythms and Caz ran roughshod over any lead scales giving the hardcore edge a symphonic treatment. Johnny felt he got the best rhythm section. They all fit that musical groove, letting each other attack the moment without loosing the feel, tight in an anarchic way. It hadn’t failed them after this long.

      Johnny goes to his locker and pulls out his Satriani Special with the sound recall tone chip. He slings it over shoulder rifle style, and meets the Roadies at the door. Zaz, the Daemon’s communications grunt, listens in on his headset. Vonde, sergeant at arms, runs down the drill. “Forbidden’s got five grunts in the pits, four at the rope section. We’re covering the stage. If we’re raided, the main escape is the back of the hanger. Contingency is a trap door stage right behind the drum kits. If you see us fall back to the stage, take off. You got that?” They all nod. One grunt leads the way, the other takes the rear marching the group towards the stage. The hall is narrow and stuffy. The props don't blow this far backstage. They can barely hear a thing besides the audience.

      Moss looks out from behind the speakers. “Packed house,” Moss' voice easily carries over the din. “Pay is goin' to be good tonight.”

      “We should be okay.”

      “Every band on death row said that at least once,” Turbo says.

      The stage lights go dark. The crowd ignites. Turbo gets behind the Mesa Boogie Rotunda—two full drum kits encircling him and rotates. Seven-by-seven foot pedestal of backbeat power. Caz sneaks over to stage left and his set of guitar sticks and effect tape strip. Caz starts out with a low back tone, gradually raising the volume. Doesn’t even sound like a guitar, just tone. Who needs synths when you have a double-grand stick? Turbo gently plays the 30” cymbal building slowly with the tone. Halfway up, Johnny and Moss slide in with harmonics—Johnny on first and fifth, Moss on the octave. A wall of sound builds, growing higher than the roof of the hangar and expanding past the back of the hall. The cries of the audience merge in with this sonic wall creating a force to be reckoned with. Once they created, they tap into the full potential of this mass. On cue, they cut the sound. The audience don't dare breathe. The sound is gone but the wall remains: the heightened sense of anticipation holds it together.

      Turbo sounds the battle cry with a double time, double bass drum and snare thrash syncopation—the sound of an avalanche heading at you with no place to hide. Johnny attacks the power chord in time, Caz dances a double arpeggio around the rhythm chords, Moss picks up the lost low tone adding funk to the speed metal. The wall is shattered, but the sound blasts through with full fury. Johnny and Moss move onto the stage following the attack. The band’s in full form, and the audience approves. Johnny Montross and the Heathen Dieties have returned to Club Forbidden.

* * * * *

      “How are you, Forbidden?” Johnny screams to the club. A group cheer is the answer. “It's been a while since we've been here, so we thought we'd do something special for this occasion.” The applause fills the club. Johnny gestures to the band. They all nod. “Two! Three! Four!”

      The sound of four pounds of plastique blowing the hanger door open is heard before Turbo's feet hit the pads. Shrapnel rips through the room ignoring the fleshy obstacles. Black smoke and the scent of exploded plastique waft around the room. The safe, cool air seeps out through hanger's open wound, warming on contact with the humid Miami atmosphere. 20 men wearing full riot gear with extra ballistic mesh carrying rifles and stun sticks, Florida State Police shield emblazoned on the front of their vests, pour in the gaping hole.

      “Everybody freeze! You are all under arrest.” One of the police officers stands in front of the opening in the door, speaking emotionlessly into a megaphone. Most the audience rushes the cops. The 20 cops can't hold back a sea of two thousand, but they stun and beat quite a few. No one knows who fired the first shot, but bullets start flying from the Forbidden guards and the cops with fans caught in the middle. 

      The Roadies move to the edge of the stage and carefully choose their targets. The band moves backstage full tilt. Turbo leaps over the drum kit and flew into the trap door. Caz waits for Moss to climb down the trap door. Johnny took one look at the cops and took off towards the amps. Johnny doesn't look back but hears everything. The muffled thud and creaking of the floorboards as bodies are crushed against the front of the stage. The soft squish of rubber soled police boots against the concrete floor. The rusty cry of hydraulic lifts toppled over and screams of fans in the balconies as the ground flies quickly towards them. The slamming of steel against concrete and bone. The wail of trampled spectators.

Caz pounces into the hole. Johnny makes a dive for the hole and suddenly finds himself pinned between the amps and a State paratrooper. As Johnny tries to move, the cops fist floors him. Another punch lands across his jaw. The bridge of his nose. His forehead. His temple. Things get blurry. He sees a mass of steel blue and then the pain hits his eyes, with no focus of where he is. All he feels is floor underneath him. Suddenly that disappears, is replaced by a slight breeze brushing his face, then the slamming of his body crashes into the amps. The stacks topples over as the cop moves Johnny's left wrist one inch away from his shoulder blade. He goes limp and tastes the blood filling up in his mouth. He feels the muzzle of a rifle pressed to his head. He wonders if he'll get it the head or the back. The sickening image of Turbo's father in the middle of the Florida Thruway, arms outstretched, the front wheels of a Highway Patrol pressing the bones of his fingers into the asphalt seems frighteningly real.

      “Johnny Montross” the cop says in a distasteful air. “You’re under arrest. Again. You have--”  The cop suddenly releases his grip and Johnny slumps to the floor. Johnny hears nothing for a second or two. Johnny thought he heard a roll of Turbo's snare drum. The shell casing next to him say otherwise otherwise. The trooper falls with blood stained armor next to him. The stream of blood rolls downstage from a hole in the troopers neck two inches above his larynx. A line of cops falls in front of the stage avoiding the Roadies’ cover fire. The grunts have fallen back behind the fallen amps. Johnny lies in the no man’s land of the crossfire.

“Get up!” yells a voice over the gunplay. Johnny doesn't recognize the voice for a moment. Pain and the firefight keep him motionless. Suddenly Johnny is moving again, swept up in someone’s arm and pushed towards the trap door. Johnny brings his arm from behind him trying to support himself. “Fire in the hole!” yells Captain Barret. Ten feet without cover from the wall of bullets from both sides. Johnny feels the recoil of the captain’s rifle across the armor as he fires his rifle with his free hand. Johnny sees the open trap door moving closer towards him, and can feel the wind of flying automatic gunfire. Barret and Johnny sail into the hole, dropping a story straight down. The grunts below prevent them from cracking their heads on the concrete irrigation tunnel floor.

      The light dissipates from the trap door above. The only light comes from the shoulder lights of the Roadies. The firefight muffled from the concrete. The ground is damp but solid. The odor of dust and mold is prominent in the air. Caz and Moss wait further down the corridor. Captain Barret helps Johnny to his feet.

      “You okay?” Captain Barrett asks. Even after all that, hie eyes are focused and stare right through Johnny.

      Johnny tries to clear his vision and stare up at the six-foot Roadie crew chief. Johnny nods, getting his wind back. “Enough to move.” He looks himself over and sees the stream of blood dripping down from his arm to his fingers from a bullet hole through the left tricep. “Christ, I'm shot!” Johnny voice is more surprised than in pain. One of the grunts is on it already, slapping a nu-skin/oxy pressure patch onto the wound.

      “You oughta see what they did to your vest.” Turbo says. Johnny's cursing echoes throughout the corridor.

      “Now what,” Moss asks. His voice echoes even more prominently in the new surroundings.

      “The aqueduct leads to a deserted runway about two-hundred, two-fifty yards west,” Captain Barrett says. “The APC is there for us. Zaz, tell Kepper we’re coming out hot.”

      “What if it's not?” Johnny sounds nervous and in pain.

      “Let’s worry about getting there first,” Captain Barrett says. “It's better than being out in the open.”

“Fine!” Moss yells with a slight shrill in his voice from nervousness. “As long as we get the hell out of dodge, I don't care. C’mon”

      “Cool your heels,” Captain Barrett says. “Zaz, Kirby, on point. Vonde and I in the rear. Zaz, all points know we’re on the move.”

Zaz and Kirby move up to escort the band through the drainage tunnel. Vonde and Captain Barret wait for band to file past as they watch for anyone coming down the trap. The figures move quickly through the dark and the muck. Johnny stares numbly into the black, following along with the silhouettes from the shoulder lights. He hears the footsteps of his bandmates and roadies darting away, syncopated and working together. Johnny jumps as Turbo’s hand touches his good shoulder.

      “How the hell did they get the drop on us?” Turbo asks. “We were covered right? So what the hell happened?”

      Johnny shrugs with his one good arm. “Take it up with Reisman later. Let’s get out of here first.”

      “Shut up and stick together people,” Captain Barrett orders.

      “Man, this is another one for the books.” Turbo says, moving fast and furious.

      “My arm’s fine by the way. Thanks for asking,” Johnny stays a step or two back behind everyone. As they move, the sound of the firefight above echoes a deadly back beat.