Free Rock On by Dan Kennedy Page A

I’ve written them in a fashion that gets across the sober tone of discouraging teens from bringing fully automatic firearms to school, while at the same time still managing to capture the playful, rockin’ tone of the band and their song, “Take Me to the Back Seat.” That’s the song that will be playing in the background while members of the bands are telling the teens not to bring guns to school.
    â€œSo, do you like your job?” one of them asks me.
    â€œYeah . . . you know. Whatever. I guess it’s pretty cool as far as jobs go. Man. Pretty, you know, chill.”
    When I hear it come out of my mouth, it sounds like a tapeof an undercover cop trying to convince downtown perps that he’s not a square. Or one of those cheesy modern dads trying to get his daughters to think he’s cool so they’ll admit to drinking beer on the weekends and then he can lecture them and insist that if they’re going to drink, they do it at home.
    â€œYou know . . . I kinda just do whatever I need to do and nobody really asks me any questions. Yesterday I took a two-and-a-half hour lunch with a friend. Whatever. What are they gonna say? You know what I mean?”
    Just then, the product manager and the vice president or whatever from radio come in from the control room. The product manager is one of the guys that spend a solid four-year stint working his ass off as an assistant before getting the break; one of those guys who started from the ground up to get his job and has wanted it, has tasted it, longer than I’ve even been in the building.
    â€œHey, you guys! You look great! Did you have a good flight?” This, from the product manager.
    â€œYeah, it was good. Kind of tired, we played in Boston last night and today after we do MTV stuff, we have radio stuff, a dinner, and then we’ll play at Irving Plaza tonight.”
    â€œOh, wow! Okay, well this shouldn’t take long, we should have you out of here pretty quick. I see you’ve already met Dan.”
    And that’s when it happened. To this day I can’t remember which one started it. I think it was the bassist.
    â€œYeah we met. He was telling us how he takes two-and-a-half-hour lunches with his friend and nobody says anything.”
    Then the other girls in the band start laughing and chiming in.
    â€œYeah, he’s all, ‘What are they gonna say?’” This from the one who sings the songs about slutting it up in people’s sedans!
    I give them a look while biting my lip, bulging my eyes a little bit, and barely shaking my head “no” in hopes of discreetly stopping this. But there’s no way to get them to turn back. Maybe it looks like I’m freaking out and that’s why they’re saying even more things. I feel like Schwarzenegger before California made him governor, when he’s in that movie where the kindergarten class is getting out of control and he can’t stop it.
Kindergarten Cop
, I think it’s called. He’s like a big lion being harassed by a pack of hyenas or something. Another one of them speaks up.
    â€œYeah, we asked him if he likes his job and he was like, ‘I guess . . . if you gotta have a job’ or something like that.”
    What? Drop it! Jesus, you guys sing about tempting motorists with sexual favors or whatever the hell you’re singing about and
you’re
telling on
me?
    I stand there with a terrified polite little smile frozen on my face avoiding eye contact with the product manager and vice president, waiting for that moment when the three of us would start laughing. After five or six seconds of silence, it becomes apparent that this isn’t one of those moments.
    â€œWe should get started on these,” I say to no one in particular.
    I walk back into the little control room on the other side of the glass so we can get started.
    After a handful of takes, one serious, one sweet, one rocking, it’s time to