Page 7 of Next Time I Fall (Excess All Areas 2)

“Well. Welcome to Bexter Records. Jimmy is super excited to have you here for the next month. I’ll just take you on a quick tour. Here are passes for you to get in and out of the studio.”

She handed one to him. Their fingers touched, hers warm against the chill of his own.

“This whole place is next-level,” Alex muttered.

Jase took in the rich, deep orange sofas, the gold, the giant pieces of art on the walls. There was something to catch the eye and inspire everywhere he looked.

Yet somehow, he found himself glancing back at Cerys. How she stood on the balls of her feet and moved as if dancing to invisible music.

“Over there is food and snacks, and most importantly, coffee,” she continued. An old felt black board with white peg letters on the wall behind her caught his attention.

Don’t let your yesterday fuck with your today.

Cheesy sentiment.

Ever so slightly out of place in the state-of-the-art studios, but bang on the money as he thought about his own situation.

He followed Cerys and the rest of the band to Studio Two, which Cerys said they’d be using. Matt walked confidently ahead of him. He inhabited the space as if he’d been born into it. Somehow, it still felt foreign to Jase, like the first day of school.

He caught sight of his profile in the glass, catching his natural swagger, the set of his shoulders making him look like the confident lead singer. Yeah. The wordfraudpopped into his head.

Cerys pushed the studio door open, and Jase noticed the little strip of skin between the waistband of her jeans and the hem of her T-shirt. “I think you’re going to love this,” she said, as she let him pass ahead of her.

Holy fucking shit.

“It’s actually the largest of the studios we have here,” she said. “Ben and Matt, we’ve got an array of guitars depending on your sound preference. There’s everything from a Gibson ES-335 to a Fender Mustang to a Charvel acoustic. You name it, we’ve probably got it or can get our hands on it. Luke and Alex, for drums we’ve got everything from a vintage Slingerland from the late 1930s, which sounds so big and warm, to Gretsch Catalina, if you want a more classic tone, to Yamaha, Tama, and Pearl.”

It was like a fucking sweet shop. Equipment was meticulously lined up and labelled against the wall.

He ran his fingers along the neck of the Gibson, and then tapped his fingers on the Zildjian cymbals.

She turned to Alex, who looked as shocked as Jase probably did. “Alex, we’ve got a Yamaha C3 grand piano in here, but it can easily be switched out for the Bösendorfer 170CS grand in Studio One. And we’ve also got keyboards like the Baldwin Fun Machine.”

Alex’s eyes lit up. “The 1970s polyphonic-type synth, right? Makes all those sound effects.”

Cerys laughed, and Jase couldn’t help but notice her entire face just radiated joy. “Totally. Squelches and beeps, and you can even add a foxtrot rhythm to them if you want. But we’ve got a whole storage room full of unusual equipment, like a vintage Star Instruments Synare drum synth that totally sounds like an eighties arcade game. Anyway. Go. Take a look around. Play with whatever you want. Today is just about settling in.”

While Matt and the rest of the band began to pull out instruments, Jase remained rooted to the spot, overwhelmed. As a kid, when Nan would take him into a posh shop, she’d warn him about keeping his hands by his side because he’d have to pay for something if he broke it. He could hear her voice in his head.

“What’s your preference, Jase?” Cerys asked, as the others moved away.

“What?” he asked, shaken from his thoughts.

“Equipment? Come with me.”

He followed her out of the room with a quick look over his shoulder at the rest of the band. They were so fucking excited, but he just couldn’t feel it.

Cerys opened a huge cupboard. “Ta-dah,” she said, accompanying it with cheesy jazz hands. “Which do you like?”

He’d never seen so many microphones. AKG, Beyerdynamic, Neumann, Sennheiser, ART, Flea, Telefunken.

“Whichever makes me sound best,” he answered. He didn’t want to admit that he didn’t really have a clue. The one he used for gigs had always been good enough.

“Do you want my opinion?”

He looked down at her, guessing she was nearly a foot shorter than his own six two. “You’re the expert, right?”

“Shure.”

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