The Rock 'N Roll Detective's Greatest Hits - a Spike Berenger Anthology (15 page)

Before boarding the train, Berenger phoned Remix and asked him to hack into the IRS server (which he had done on numerous occasions) and get the scoop regarding Joshua’s claim that Carol Merryman was being investigated for tax evasion. Remix added it to his “to do” list. Berenger then got on the train and reflected on his meeting with Joshua Duncan. It had gone about as well as he expected. What struck him the most about Joshua was that the young man seemed to be terribly unhappy. This was a kid who had everything—money, opportunities, a bright future—and yet Joshua Duncan exuded an attitude of defeat. Perhaps it was just the lad’s introverted personality to which Berenger reacted, but there was shyness and then there was
shyness
. Berenger believed Joshua to be clinically depressed. Of course, the boy had just lost his father so that might have something to do with it.

Berenger arrived at the studio a little after noon. It was located in a commercial district on Sixth Avenue at 39
^th
Street. He went inside and up the flight of stairs to the second floor, into the makeshift lobby, and through the door marked “Private.” This led into a corridor that separated the studio and control room from the main office, kitchen/break room, and washrooms. It wasn’t a state of the art studio by any means but it had all the necessary accouterment.

Kenny Franklin sat at the mixing board, puffing on a cigarette and concentrating on a guitar riff that Dewey Wayne was attempting to perform. The other members of the band—Zig Rubel, Corky Clark, and Chas Miller—sat in the studio with Wayne, watching intently and staying silent.

“Hi, Spike,” Franklin said, not turning his head. “Come on in, we’ll be able to take a break in a minute.”

“No rush, Kenny.”

Berenger stood and listened. Wayne was playing a Gretsch Electromatic Hollow Body guitar and it sounded good. The piece had a Spanish flamenco feel and Berenger was curious how the rest of the song fit with it.

“Dewey can play,” Berenger commented.

“Sure he can,” Franklin answered. “He only got to play bass in Flame’s band ‘cause Flame was the guitarist. Dewey’s doing double duty on guitar and bass on these recordings.”

“So they’re carrying on without Flame?”

“Yeah. Dewey and Zig asked me to come in and act as engineer today. They’re trying to put together a new act and wanted to know what I thought.”

“Do they have a name?”

“Not yet. But they’ve got some good material. Stuff Flame would never let them play. We laid down a track this morning that was kick-ass. We’re working on number two now. They’re hoping to put together a demo with four or five songs and then flog it to managers around town. Al Patton said he’d give it a listen but I don’t put too much hope there. He says that to everyone and then never does it.”

Wayne finished the riff and asked, “How was that, Kenny?”

Franklin turned on the mike and spoke to the band from the control room. “That was good. I think we should take a lunch break, though. I can tell you’re tired, Dewey. Let’s have some grub and I bet you’ll do a better take after some rest.”

“Okay.”

The guys came out of the studio and met Franklin and Berenger in the break room. It was equipped with a microwave oven, refrigerator, vending machines, a couple of couches, and two small tables and chairs.

“Hi, Spike,” Wayne said. “Whatcha doing here?”

“Hi, Dewey. Sounded good in there.”

“Thanks.”

“I’m here to ask you guys some questions about Flame, if you don’t mind. Kenny agreed to talk to me earlier and I figured I’d kill several birds with one stone, if you know what I mean.”

Wayne shrugged. “Sure, I don’t mind.” He turned to the other band members. “You guys know Spike Berenger?”

Berenger had never officially met the other members but they all knew who he was. After a series of handshakes and “nice to meet you’s” the men sat around the room. Two of them retrieved sack lunches from the fridge and another bought a Coke from the vending machine.

“You gonna eat, Kenny?” Miller asked.

“I thought I’d go out and hit McDonald’s or something after we talk to Spike.”

“I’ll go with you.”

“This won’t take long, will it, Spike?”

Berenger shook his head. “Shouldn’t think so. I just have a handful of questions.”

“Spike here is working for the defense, just so you know,” Franklin explained.

Berenger felt a sudden coolness in the room. He felt obligated to say, “Just ‘cause I’m working for Adrian Duncan doesn’t mean I don’t sympathize with you guys. Flame was a friend of mine, too.”

At first no one said anything but then Zig Rubel snorted and replied, “I wouldn’t say we were really
friends
with Flame. Would we?”

The others shook their heads.

“What do you mean?” Berenger asked.

“He treated us like second-class citizens for the most part,” Rubel continued. “Like he could always go out and get another backup band if he wanted. He was always holding that over our heads.”

“Is that true?” Berenger asked Franklin.

The tour manager nodded. “Yeah, Flame was a hard guy to work for. He was a perfectionist when it came to his band.”

Chas Miller spoke up. “But it was okay if
he
made mistakes on stage.”

The others murmured agreement. Rubel continued, “Look, I probably speak for everyone here. We’re sorry about what happened to him, we really are. The guy was a legend and we all had a lot of respect for him. But… well, hell, I don’t know. He was getting sloppy, wouldn’t you say?”

Dewey Wayne agreed. “Yeah. You were at our last show, weren’t you, Spike?”

“No, I’m sorry, I wasn’t.”

“Oh. Well, Flame was really off that night. He messed up a lot.”

Corky Clark chimed in. “No one noticed but us, though. The fans didn’t care.”

“No, the fans cared more about
what
we were playing rather than how we were playing it,” Rubel said.

Berenger used that as a lead-in to his next question. “Are you saying you didn’t agree with Flame’s current musical direction?”

Rubel shook his head. “I’m not sayin’ nothin’ like that. We’ve been playing with Flame for five years and we’re happy to have the work. I’m just sayin’ the
audience
might have preferred he didn’t play the religious stuff.”

Berenger addressed all of them. “Is that how all of you feel?”

They shrugged and murmured affirmatively. Chas Miller added, “We were hired guns. We had no vested interest in the band other than a regular paycheck. But now since Flame’s gone, we thought—hey, we have something good going here. We click together. Instead of just going our separate ways, why not give it a shot and continue? We’re a band and we decided to run with it.”

“I take it none of you are members of the Messengers?” Berenger asked.

That elicited more snorts and chuckles. Corky Clark said, “Hey, I’m a Christian but I’m not sure what to call
those
people.”

Rubel spoke again. “Actually Flame wanted us to join. That was another thing he hung over our heads. He told me flat out that I needed to join the Messengers during the break between tours or I might not be coming back to the band.”

“Really?” Franklin asked.

“He pretty much hinted the same thing to me,” Dewey Wayne answered. “He didn’t give me an ultimatum like that, though. It was more of a ‘I sure wish you guys would join the Messengers and I’d feel a lot better about keeping you in the band if you did.’ It was a subtle threat, I guess. I actually went to one of their services to check it out.”

“What did you think?” Berenger asked.

“I thought it was bullshit. I mean, I’m not a very religious person to begin with but I believe in God and stuff. I had no idea what they were talking about. They wanted me to sign up and go on a retreat in Jamaica with the group before I could ‘fully appreciate’ what the Messengers had to say. I didn’t want to spend another hour with those freaks, much less go away for a week with them.”

“Is that usual?” Berenger inquired. “Going away on a retreat?”

“Yeah, apparently all the new members go to their founding church in Jamaica.”

“And Flame went, too?”

Franklin answered him. “Yeah, he went way back at the beginning. Right after he got out of rehab in 2000.”

Berenger found that interesting. He’d have to find out more about the Messengers’ so-called “retreat.”

“All right,” he said. “I want each of you to think about this before answering. Is there anything you know that might indicate someone else’s guilt in Flame’s murder?”

The men looked at each other, shrugged, and shook their heads. Rubel said, “I wasn’t surprised when I heard they’d arrested Adrian.”

“Me neither.”

“Same here.”

“Tell me about that night at the last show,” Berenger said. “Everything you can remember.”

Franklin spoke first, vividly recalling that last concert at the Beacon Theater.

H
e was overseeing the many tasks associated with pre-show setup. When Franklin saw Dave Bristol come through the stage door accompanied by the other two Flame’s Heat members, Brick Bentley and Moe Jenkins, he knew that trouble was brewing. Still, Franklin greeted Bristol as an old friend, just as he should. The two men embraced and slapped each other on the back.

“Dave-o, my man,” Franklin had said. “I didn’t expect to see you!”

“We’ve been recording,” Bristol explained. “Al said we could drop by. Maybe Flame would let us join him on stage for a number or two.”

Franklin frowned. He hated when Al Patton did shit like that. Unfortunately, there was not a whole lot anyone could do to stop one of the most powerful music moguls in the world from doing what he wanted. Like everyone else, Patton was terribly unhappy that Flame disbanded Flame’s Heat and geared his music in a different direction.

“I don’t know, Dave,” Franklin had said. “You know how Flame feels about it.”

“Well, can we at least talk to him? Where is he?”

“He’s in the dressing room, meditating, or whatever he does in there before a show. Brenda’s in there with him, too.”

Bristol rolled his eyes. No one had to express the general opinion of Flame’s latest girlfriend, the one they blamed for turning Flame into a cult fundamentalist.

“Any of those other Messenger freaks around?” Bristol asked.

“Of course,” Franklin said. “They’re like groupies. And Flame is their new messiah.” He gestured with his head further backstage. “You’ll find a couple of ‘em outside the dressing room, standing guard.”

“Shit,” Bristol said. “Well, we’ll give it a try.” He turned to Bentley and Jenkins and said, “Come on, let’s go interrupt the Last Supper.”

Franklin continued helping Louis rig the monitor board so the band could hear each other with the In-Ear devices. Technology for touring bands had improved immensely in the last ten years. Franklin had been at it since the mid-seventies, just as Flame had disbanded Hay Fever and gone solo. Franklin stayed on as tour and production manager through the rest of the decade and into the beginning of the Flame’s Heat period. Those had been the years, when Flame’s Heat was one of the biggest bands in the world. But ever since Flame went religious on everyone, Franklin had considered moving on to work for someone else or perhaps even retiring. At fifty-seven he figured that he was probably too old to be doing this stuff but he truly loved it.

“As soon as you get that working,” he told Louis, “you better start the guitar checks.” As monitor and guitar tech, Louis was an invaluable member of the stage crew. Flame wanted no one but Louis to touch his precious Hugh Manson custom-made guitar from the Manson brothers’ shop in Exeter, UK. Flame’s rig had been fairly constant for the last several years but it was a bitch to set up. Pumped through an Ibanez Tube Screamer, which produced less auxiliary noise than most sustainer/compressors, and out of Soldano Decatone amplifiers, Flame’s signature sound was one of the things that made him a guitar god. That, and his uncanny songwriting ability.

Ten minutes later, Franklin heard shouts from Flame’s dressing room area. Apparently Bristol’s request wasn’t received very well. When the three musicians walked back past him with their tails between their legs, Bristol simply shook his head at Franklin.