Through With Smoke
an excerpt

Since Shrink Wrap, the headliners, were an unsigned act from Sheffield, a town only about forty miles away, the standard for the first support act tonight was set pretty low, and from this point of view they didn't disappoint.

“All right, Stoke,” mumbled the singer to the ten of us assembled in the pub, “we're Uvn, and this is our first gig.”

He pronounced it like 'oven'.

“Oh, Jesus,” said Lexi in my ear. “You never tell them it's your first gig.”

“Good thing there aren't enough people to really boo them off the stage,” I said.

The drummer counted in to the first song: “A-one, a-two, a-one, two, three, four!” And then started up a beat that bore no relation to what he'd just counted.

I groaned and sat back. They sounded like this was their first practice, let alone their first gig.

“Oasis,” I said to Lexi.

“Yeah, but everyone's doing Oasis.”

“A bit of the Bluetones, maybe?”

“The jangly guitar is ripped right off of them.”

“What are you talking about?” Melanie leaned in and tried to work her way into the conversation.

“We're trying to figure out who they're ripping off,” I told her, since Lexi didn't seem inclined to throw her a bone at all.

“There are other bands that sound like this?” said Melanie in horror.

“Not exactly, thank God,” I said.