Adult-FanFiction.org : Celebrity

Thom/Beck	By : VinylTap Category: Singers/Bands/Musicians > Radiohead Views: 2950 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not know Beck or any of the members of Radiohead. This story is a work of fiction, and I make no money or profit from it.

Chapter List
- 21
- 22
- 23
Recording was a nightmare in a different way than touring was. Touring was probably worse on an absolute scale, but after you’d spent months rehearsing the same songs time and again, you came to really hate that, too, and hate everyone you dealt with all day. Thom thought he’d made it clear enough to Nigel and John Leckie he wasn’t, contrary to what EMI would have them think, “a bloody whore”— but there he found himself nevertheless playing the part.
It was too much pressure, the whole band felt overwhelmed and exhausted, Thom didn’t like playing tricks for Mtv or “any of those other cunts.”
It brought out the worst in him. Several months into the sessions, he was spitting fire at anyone who had the misfortune of crossing his path, to where John had put him in time out alone with his guitar.
They’d all gotten sick of each other. It became the sort of draining familiarity where all is forgiven and nothing is sacred, and tact spirals deliriously into an incestuous pit of pestilence. Jonny had inwardly marveled he’d worked so closely with Thom he’d actually begun speaking freely, bitter and irritated enough to overcome his own profound horror. It was somehow a brilliant thing, actually believing Thom was human. Jonny wasn’t certain if he really were so vastly annoyed or if he’d only convinced himself so because it gave him courage.
Everyone’s beauty had vanished, Jonny would stare fascinated at Thom, chin propped by one hand, consumed in a sick sort of pleasure with the fucks they’d stopped giving—
At how he knew none of them had shaved in days, that they’d skipped meals and slept at the studio, and even the untouchable Thom had reached a point where his magic had faded. It felt an awful lot like they were at eye level now. Thom had permitted himself to hurl expletives at Jonny without shame, no longer sparing his virgin ears what for years he’d dished out to the others. Like a ritual of induction.
Colin had stopped protecting his brother from this. They’d all come to know things of each other that were so sickly intimate none could be arsed to spare effort to care. Thom had told Nigel directly he wanted to fuck him; Nigel wasn’t fazed.
“After this record, I’ll let you.”
Thom couldn’t be arsed to argue that after this record would never bloody come.
Nigel rubbed at his eyes, sighing from over the control board. “Right then, Thom, I need you to focus—”
Thom was strewn across a swivel chair in some convoluted way, in general effort to achieve a position where his muscles didn’t ache like they had. He was slowly turning half-circles on the swivel, head tilted back, staring at the ceiling, guitar slipping weakly from over his abdomen. His fingers toyed with the handle under the seat that made the chair go up and down.
Nigel regarded him tiredly, patience diminishing.
“Come listen to this.”
“I’m listening.”
“Sit up, I need your attention.”
Thom sighed theatrically. His limbs began slowly to unfold and rearrange, he cracked his back and shoulders and scooted tiredly to Nigel, like asking this of him had been somehow inhumane. He had all this stubble going on. He’d cut his hair shorter and it was a spiky mess, he’d got even thinner than before.
As difficult as Thom had been to work with sometimes, he really had tried very hard. Nigel observed him with a mixture of annoyance and compassion, both of them equally young and innocent in their respective work. Nigel sighed. He leaned closer to Thom, who was trying to hold himself up from over the back of his chair, and kissed him lightly on the lips.
“I’ll help you make this record even better than the last.”
Thom’s eyes closed tiredly. He was clearly still exhausted, but the gesture had him visibly subdued, like it would hold him over for now.
“I don’t care about the fucking record anymore.”
“Yeah, you do. Let’s work, come on.”
***
Jonny had always felt most at home among his hoarded instruments and wires. As the months passed and he’d grown too weary for self-conscious reserve, he’d gradually spread out more, with equipment laid out on the floor in an approximate radius around him of where he could reach without crawling too far. That Thom would curse him for it after tripping multiple times was to be expected, but even the gentler among them had gotten annoyed, with Phil keeping a tight rein on his temper as he asked if Jonny couldn’t at least move it all farther away from the door.
Not two seconds after that, Thom stepped into the room, one foot slipping directly into a tangle of wires mid-stride. You could tell he was immediately angry with himself, because how had he somehow not seen this coming— he hopped within the wires a few times while trying to shake them from over his foot, spitting profanities more or less coherently at Jonny and Phil.
Phil was trying to get him to stand in place. He was only making it worse. Just stand still so I can… there you go… now the right foot… other right…
Thom had one hand on Phil’s shoulder like a child having his shoelaces tied, other hand pointed at Jonny accusingly.
“Pick one instrument! One at a time, like normal people…!”
Jonny gazed tiredly from under his hair, offended but largely desensitized to Thom’s tantrums— or anyone else’s, for that matter. To the extent that he still cared, he’d always felt a little thrilled inside when Thom’s temper was directed at him, because there they were at eye level, and Thom must really have cared.
Not only had Jonny not worked with one instrument at a time, but he’d worked with multiple instruments of each kind at a time. He had four or five electric guitars against the opposite wall of the room, for two fucking weeks, and wasn’t even using any of them for the record.
As Phil was escorting Thom out of the room, vague cries could be heard of “I don’t even know what half that shit was…!”
In the weeks following the recent tour, Jonny had spent long periods of time thinking of everything that took place between him and Thom and Beck. No matter the heartache, it was hands down the best night of his life. Remembering how Thom had looked at him, what it was to be so intimately close— even if nothing would come of it and even if Thom had regretted it after, Jonny would not take it back. He’d spent hours playing it back in his mind, it was the sort of magic that set contrast between routine and why life is worthwhile.
It was a horrifically painful thing, as well, wretched and mentally consuming, and which, worst of all, was entirely beyond his control— but it almost made romantic relations seem like a waste of time if they didn’t feel like that.
This sort of obsession never really goes away. Not really, it might remain contained eventually as you become consumed with other things in life over the long term, but it lives on dormant as the fantasy wherein it originally stemmed.
None of them were happy during the time spent recording, the pressure and workload had got so routine they’d almost learned to turn emotion off half the time, because it was too draining to live through.
As for Beck— he’d been the sort of guy who’d deliberately played small venues like basements of delis and backs of vans; he’d totally lose it on stage like he somehow forgot folks were watching, they used to call him farm boy and cram outside the deli entrance because there wasn’t enough room for everyone inside. He’d decided randomly when he wanted to go fly abroad, he’d decided when he wanted to bring a boombox on stage that had a disco ball come out the top, and when he had to sit down quietly to work on a record, he had to somehow chill himself out and try somehow to focus.
He had good control of himself half the time, like it were a habit he’d developed through having to deal with his own inattention through life. Then his own enthusiasm would wash him over in an encompassing burst of courage, and he’d lose it, and he’d have to control himself and sit down and figure out what he was going to do.
By the end of the year, he’d got some songs done. Then he changed his mind. Then he changed who he worked with. The whole studio was a terrible mess of boxes and wires and cables and machinery, it got hot in LA, they had the sun streaming in through duct tape and coffee stains and newspapers no one threw out. Beck wore sunglasses indoors and whatever inflatable pool toys the Dust Brothers had in their garage, in all their fluorescent 99-cent kitch.
He had no idea what the hell he was doing half the time, and he’d get inexplicable courage to make big decisions without knowing how things would pan out. He was very naturally social then— then he’d completely deflate and go back to working alone.
If you asked him about it, he’d smirk at you like there was something wrong with you for asking. He never liked being asked about personal stuff.
He’d answer your questions with whatever images randomly moved through his mind at the time, and that’s also what he did with his songs, which made it harder to have to stop improvising when he had to focus.
And with all that in his head, he was the one in charge of the record, really. And it was going to suck, and that’s the picture he got from everyone who gently tried to convey this to him, until he decided that’s just how it was going to be and maybe it would be a learning experience, or something.
Bibbe Hansen ran her hand affectionately over her son’s head, moving briskly through her kitchen as she put things away while getting ready to head out. “Did you want me to get the month parking pass for you?” She asked, not really listening for an answer, and Beck didn’t really look up from over his Lucky Charms.
“What parking pass?” he asked around his spoon, but Bibbe already was out the door, vaguely calling something to him. He didn’t live with his mom anymore, but she wanted him to. She liked having her sons around, even if her second husband was ten years her younger. Beck hunched over the kitchen table, reading the back of the cereal box while he ate, trying to figure the maze out.
(On to chapter 23)
- 21
- 22
- 23
You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.
Report Story

Thom/Beck