The telltale art
With a vividness that rivals even the latest High Definition plasma technology, I dreamed a house made of stone and mortar that for me was the only home I seemed able to know. The other orphans in the home wore practiced faces copied meticulously from Dickens and Dahl, designed to emote both pity and potential. But not Marshall. The oldest by far, he deliberately ignored all visitors and wiled away the daylight hours locked in his basement studio, allowing no child to cross the sacred threshold. We were fascinated by him. He had, it seemed, no interest whatsoever in adoption. "The only family I need" he told us time and again "are my brothers Mic and Table". He was right, too. Marshall had it all. He had fans in every country, and a recording contract that could keep him rolling in whatever he chose to roll in for centuries if his heart was able to keep up. None of us knew why he continued to live in the orphanage. Perhaps it was because he remained unmolested, able to turn out chart topper after chart topper with no fear of interruption or micro management. Perhaps it was because he reveled in our idolatry. The way we lined the halls, hoping to catch samples of lyrics or 808 tracks, clinging to what seeped through the walls as if it would fill the holes in our lives... it was pitiful, really, but fame is a drug just like any other. It's potency catches the young like after school cigarettes and erodes sensibilities like so much lung tissue.
Though he paid us little heed, and shared none of his wealth, we worshiped him, blindly. For all his faults, his presence certainly broke the monotony of selling ourselves to the occasional born again Christians, sterile yuppies and self imagined philanthropists. For one thing, there was the elaborate tunnel system that he'd installed, which he used to discreetly slip to and from his helipad whenever he had important meetings, shopping trips, drug runs or concerts that called him away. We were strictly forbidden from using the tunnels, but what child do you know who could resist such temptation, especially when the only authority around was senile and painfully naive? We loved Mr. Kessler as much for his dedication to finding us families as for his blissful ignorance of all our misdoings. It was a rare occasion indeed when he meddled in Marshall's affairs, or our own for that matter, and in keeping with this, he played little more than a walk on role in this dream. At any rate, neither Mr. Kessler nor Marshall himself seemed to care too much that we ventured into the tunnels. Some rules are flexible, more for show than anything, but the kabbash on entering the studio was one that both men emphasized would bear serious consequences, as witnessed by Junior, who was summarily dismissed into the downward spiral of foster care after he was caught attempting to lift a print from one of the blow up dolls our peroxide drenched idol left deflating in the dimly lit corridors.
It could have been fascination that drove me to break Marshall's cardinal rule. He would have chalked it up to fanatic obsession, for his fame had made him blind to the cycle of power that drives us to rebel against those who dominate us. It was jealousy, plain and simple. He had found the secret that had eluded all of us. He was needed, or at least was told as much all the time, and every instinct that would have kept me alive in the remotest of jungles screamed that his secret lay behind that padded door, guarded only by a fingerprint reader locking system. For all his power and influence over the minds of the young, he was arrogant and believed that none of us would be so daft as to attempt to enter the shrine for fear of his wrath. If he could have seen the true colour of our hearts, I am convinced he would have guarded himself much more carefully, but we were experts at the art of facade, more so than fans, execs and managers combined, and for this he saw only a gentle red where green glowed in the shadows.
It was simple really. He was always careful when he left home for meetings, rendezvous with escorts and other such malignancies. But when he was late for a gig, which happened all too often, he was careless, turning corners before the door had a chance to hermetically seal. It was one such night, his cape trailing out behind him like jet lag that he exited with telltale haste, leaving us in a haze of half chosen words about whatever city he was off to entertain - Hartford I believe it was. I, however, was way ahead of him. The slobbery blob of Trident was slipped into the latch unnoticed and the door fumbled with itself clumsily, granting me passage even as the din of distant rotor blades faded into the suburban normalcy.
It was smaller than I imagined. The crew of Cribz would have had to choose their angles carefully and cut to commercial much quicker than normal if they'd been able to find this place, and would undoubtedly leave humbled and disappointed. There were luxuries, to be sure, just not that many: a solid gold jukebox with an impressive collection of '45's ranging from Aretha to Zappa, a real working Star Trek replicator, which I used to conjure up a steaming cup of Earl Gray (hot) and a recording setup like none I'd ever imagined. This was a far cry from Terrance Howard's basement. It was the real deal. I fingered the 76 track mixer reverently and eyed the Sonic noise-limiting unidirectional mic hanging from the ceiling hungrily. It called to me and I crossed to it impulsively, but was given pause mere steps away, by something unexpected in the corner. What was an archaic oil painting doing here? Why was the self appointed king of Caucasian rap painted into a Victorian picnic, surrounded by surrogates and work horses? Why did he look so old and tired? It made no sense. A strange sensation awoke within me. In all the years of rejection and false hope, I had known frustration. It had hung like a mariner's albatross around my neck, stooping me away from the gaze of the successful, making me unwillingly penitent in the temple of the whole. This was deeper, more carnal than jealousy and frustration. For the first time, I felt rage, inexplicable and blinding, filling my empty spaces, giving me the unparalleled strength of the bowflex infomercial models. It was my first drink from the elixir of the powerful, and it sold me to their devilry just as it had to all those who tread these passages before me.
Knowing nothing of why or what for, I raised the frame above my head and let it fall over the sharpened spires of the platinum microphone. A feedback loop screeched through the air as the canvas ripped, and faraway on a stage piled high with roses, an icon fell silent, his rapid aging and disintegration at first celebrated as elaborate stage theatrics, then written into the annals of history as another unexplained fall from grace. A staged suicide? An early retirement, well concealed? Alien abduction? The theories bounced off chat room walls for months before fading from memory, like so many unshuffled MP3's. The truth remains a secret between you, me and the devil.
My third album is due out in August of this year. My Lear jet awaits on the tarmac eager to sweep me through my west coast tour. My own portrait sits in the corner. I am following well worn footpaths. What separates my destiny from that of my candy coated predecessor? I, for one, share all I have with the other orphans, for they are family, and family is everything. Besides, you never know when the very roots that feed and support you will wend their way into a poison that they may send skyward with the same vigor they always had for satisfying the thirst of the high and mighty, whose thirst they long to make their own. Then I woke up.

















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