Lights come up on a
nearly empty stage just a few instruments & microphones on stands set up.
"Ladies &
Gents, presenting our opening act the cover band "Toothless" for your
listening pleasure." The crowd
begins to yell out obscenities at the band as they come on-stage. But the band keeps coming and the lead singer
stops turns to his bandmates, smiles and begins to pump his right fist in the
air. The band begins to play the Lynnrd
Skynnrd song "Simple Man." The
crowd begins to boo and suddenly the singer opens his mouth and begins to sing
anyway, the crowd gets deafly quiet as the toothless singer makes his point
clear, he can sing.
By the time he
reached for fourth or fifth song in the set they are all cheering & dancing
along with the band who were clearly enjoying themselves despite being a
"cover band" for a bigger band.
By the last song in their set the girls were all standing next to the
stage singing along with the singer, Toothless and flirting with their
eyes. He ignored it all and walked off
when they were done not even stopping for a bow.
The bigger band
walked on and began to play not even acknowledging "Toothless" as
they passed in the side-stage area. But
that was alright with the guys as they clearly knew what they were there for,
to get the people going, drinking and enjoying the show ready for the name
brand band to play their new album for them.
As the band played the cover band went to the bar for a drink and
suddenly were swarmed by men & women alike thanking them for playing before
"these sell-outs."
Toothless was as
polite as possible knowing full well that if most of the women weren't
consuming alcohol he would just be another guy missing his teeth and paid no
nevermind. He drank his soda since he
stopped drinking booze years ago and went on home to his wife & kids with a
big smile on his toothless face. He
never took a dime from the band just asked that they make sure he could have
all the soda he wanted during and after their show for free, they loved him for
that. It made their continuing to
perform more possible because each could work less at other jobs and rehearse
more with him during the week to get better, to learn new material, etc…
One day he was
sitting at the dining room table reading the sports page and his son walked in,
"hey Dad did you know you are on the internet?" Of course, he had no idea that someone had
recorded that show that night and posted it online and it was getting big
hits. And naturally they were more
interested in the toothless aspect than his ability to sing that well without
his teeth. He would always joke,
"No lisp, no spits, no errors."
Within weeks an
agent called and wanted to meet the band for a possible recording deal but
toothless wasn't interested despite his bandmates needing this big break. "I like what we are doing now and it
isn't my fault that person put us on the web for all the world to fuss
over." They begged and begged till
he finally gave in only to hear, "we need to get you some teeth and then
we can get started on recording your demo." He walked out on the meeting without saying a
word.
Months went by and
not a show was performed as he began playing with his kids band in their
garage/rehearsal studio playing the new music he didn't like that much but it
allowed him to sing and no one asked him to put his teeth in. No one ever asked him why he never wore the
dentures he had or asked if he could sing with them in. Which he couldn't do but since no one ever
asked, he never spoke up.
A year later the
band "Toothless" became "Rocky & the toots" without him
and signed a deal despite him being the real reason they were offered a deal in
the first place. He didn't care he restarted
"Toothless" with new bandmates that included his son on bass, his
daughter on lead guitar & his nephew on drums. They did all the old covers he did with the
previous band but now they played school dances, proms & wedding parties
and the like. He never was recorded
again without his permission and passed away after a show during his daughters
wedding with "Simple Man" playing on the radio.
