Solid Gold Rock ‘n’ Roll present: No More ‘Ring Rats’

Excerpt from the Solid Gold Rock ‘n’ Roll Wikipedia

Members

 

Current members

• Trent ‘Electric Boots’ Sadikaj – vocals, harmonica, tambourine (2013-Present)
• ‘Boogie’ Barry Delgado– bass, backing vocals (2013-Present)
• ‘Long’ Don Skaroupka– lead guitar, sitar (2020 – Present)
• ‘Riff Tannen’(Tunde Genaro) – rhythm guitar, lap steel, violin, zither (2015-present)
• Rich Savage – keyboards (2018-Present)
• Samira ‘Iron Sam’ Atkinson – drums, percussion (2019-Present)

Former members

• Rand Danklinson – lead Guitar (2013-2014)
• Brad ‘Too Bad’ Montpelier – rhythm Guitar (2013-2015)
• Clark St. Jock – drums (2013-2015)
• Dr. Elvin Perez – lead guitar (2014-2015, 2016-2018)
• Caroline Graves – lead guitar (2015-2016)
• Jack ‘Stumpy Joe’ Dackley – drums (2015-2016)
• Captain Maximum – keyboards (2015-2017)
• Hank Onita – drums (2016-2019)
• Jacqueline ‘Hot Keys’ Hoff – keyboards (2017-2018)
• Saul Pepperidge – saxophone, flute, fife, bagpipes (2016-2020)
• ‘Nuclear’ Vadym Hutz – trumpet, trombone (2016-2019)
• Freddie ‘The Bard’ Menard – lead guitar, lute, hurdy gurdy (2018-2020)
• ‘The Electric Maidens’(Louise Schatz, Hortense Dean, Zoe Marie Buckingham ) – backing vocals (2018-2020)

Crews run but can you really say that they’re a family?

I get it.

Forged in battle, stronger than ever, give me all the fancy terms to say “We fought together a whole bunch”, to you that’s a team.  That’s a family.  But you and I both know you’re lying to yourself.  It’s deeper than that.  A real team is a family.  A real team will fight and bicker and have each other’s back regardless.  It’s a fuckin’…covenant.  It’s puzzle pieces, who cares if one piece shows a man’s bell-end through spandex and the other is the corner of a mustache so long as they interlock?

Boots: Motherfuck, babies, that was pure uncut!  Give it to me, c’mere.

Boots embraces with a number of people.  Roadies, musicians, hangers on?  It’s not apparent, and what is apparent is that Boots don’t care one whit.  He considers this a team sport, and they’re all part of an ecosystem that makes rocking and rolling happen.  Hell, the sound board guy gets a hug, and he works for the venue.

Boots: And last but never least, my beautiful starchild, my Golem of Prague…

Boogie bursts through the crowd, cannon fire at the bowling alley, and picks up his much, much taller lead singer.  He spins him, hoists him like they’re skating doubles at the winter olympics, then sets him down.  These men are coated in sweat, Barry’s chest hair hangs matted across his expansive, Conan the Destroyer pectorals.  Trent looks…well, Trent always looks like he’s been prepped for a photo shoot.  Imagine if Jim Morrison always looked like that sex god poster.  It’s some peacock genetic response to being perceived where he gets the plumage going subconsciously.

Boogie: Hot damn man, we laid them to rest!

Boots: Full slay daddy, speak on it!

Boogie: We romanced them!

Boots: Yes!

Boogie: Caressed them!

Boots: Preach!

Boogie: We knock them out the frame with them rock and roll flames!!

Trent does an extended stomping 360, part testifying baptist preacher, part war dance.

Boots: Ay-yay-yow!!  Alright babies, let’s get the equipment boxed and Huw, do us a favor, Electric Boots got a hankerin’ for redheads, send back something Christina Henricks-y in like a tight 30?  A tight 30.

The crowd disperses to their various roles.  The guitarists and the drummer crack open cold ones and take over a couch, eating a Safeway deli tray and talking shit about the show.  Their keyboardist does something so illegal that the video feed actually blurs him, but we know it gave him the sniffles.  Roadies haul gear.  Road managers find trim.  Money men talk on phones.  It’s a sort of chaos, but one that has the feeling of ballet, as all these various pieces interweave and somehow never get in one another’s way.  And at the center of it, a two-part nucleus of beef and lean, the length and the girth of this band, are Barry and Trent.  Trent, who is preening and adjusting himself–always good to make sure you’re putting your best bulge forward, after all–and Barry, who is sauntering to a corner of the backstage area, clutching his trusty Molson.

Boogie: Yo, Boots.  Over here.

Toweling his face off, the Electric Warrior floats his way to the isolated corner.  They get in each other’s personal space, and when Boogie talks, he’s speaking very sotto voce.

Boogie: Listen, you know that this is in our blood.  You know we couldn’t not rock any easier than a big cat couldn’t not stalk some prey.  But the thing is…

He nods his divine golden mullet to the crew, their guitarists, their drummer.

Boogie: …they don’t get the other thing.  Do they?

Boots: Barry Baby, Low-end Messiah, Stallion to my Stud…well…they don’t.  But they don’t have to, dig?

Barry nods, takes a pull.  He indicates to the viewership.

Boogie: Right, but we’re here.  The cameraman is here.  He’s gonna want us to say something about the thing, right?  For the website or whatever.  For the YouTube.

Boots: Barry Delgado…who gives a hot damn if they don’t get what we do?  That ain’t for them to get.  The world don’t exist for everyone to get everything.  All that should matter to you and me is you and me–and all that sweet wrestler groupie leg.

Boots lays has head back against the wall, closing his eyes, visions of sugar plums and conquests past, likely including a woman named Sugar Plum, dancing in his head.  Barry chuckles and says something offhanded.  Something offhanded that changes the energy in the room.

Boogie: Ring rats.

Boots: Pardon?

Boogie: They call ‘em ring rats.

Trent looks to his partner.  Frowning.  Aghast.  Horrified.  Mortified.  He crosses his arms and leans close, his eyes concerned and furious all at once.

Boots: That’s…that’s so extra not the vibe I ever wanna foster.  You telling me some pretty thing bakes me cookies and gives me some comfort after a night of combat and I’m going to call her…’rat’?  No.

He straightens his posture.

Boots: No, that ain’t gonna do, Boogie Barry.  I enjoy wrestling, I enjoy the adulation and the love and the fight energizes me like nothing else.  But I’ve never felt like what we were doing had a greater purpose.  A higher calling.  Something to bring awareness to.  A cause.

He looks off, past the camera.  Magazine-quality good looks are one hell of a thing–he barely looks like he just spent 90 minutes on stage, and any negative things that may be happening in his look seem more like happy accidents.  The late night giving his stubble more form.  The slight smear of his mascara.  He looks like he’s on a magazine cover, and he’s approaching his Bono era.

Boots: We have to change things.  It’s 2022.  ‘Rats’.  It won’t stand, Barry.  It cant.

While Trent poses for an imaginary photoshoot–his standard mode for deep in thought–Barry eyeballs him.  He takes a moment to scratch his chin before his eyes light up, and he smirks before he taps his lead singer on the shoulder, leaning in close.

Boogie: …you know who I heard call ‘em ‘rats’ in a real disrespectful way?

Boots: Who?

Barry has the hook in his mouth–now it’s time to reel.

Boogie: Those guys we gotta face.  The Bandits, the Two-Become-One.  They said they ain’t worth nothing, just something to love and leave.  That big fella said, and this isn’t a direct quote but like, the vibe is right? “You can treat them poorly and they’ll just keep coming back.”  It’s a shame, man.  These women are part of an ecosystem, right?

Boots: They said that?

Boogie: They said things similar to that, I’ve been told.

Boots: That’s good enough for me.

He looks the camera dead on.  His volume shocks the rest of the goings on into relative silence, because he goes from conspiratorial to rock god bark in zero time, no adjustment, just the rock.

Boots: It’s gone on long enough.  Bandits?!  Two Becomes?!  ‘Bout to call you the Has-been’d-it’s and the Two Who Never Was!!  See beating you…hell, daddy, that’s what Solid Gold was born to do!  But now it’s personal.  You’ve touched on something that I hold near and dear to my heart, and when you get that close it’s a live wire!  You want to disrespect these beautiful angels?  Then I have no choice but to disrespect you with the chrome heel of my boots!  Boogie Barry ain’t got no choice but to disrespect your entire skeleton right through that mat until you’re lying on foundational concrete, baby!  ‘Ring rats’–when Solid Gold is finished with you, you ain’t never ever ever gonna call a lover that again!

Boogie: Stallion and the Stud, buddies.  You know us by name.  You know us by look.  You know us by the cheers.  You know this pedigree.  You can be anything you want except for Solid Gold Rock and Roll, and when we lay the beating on y’all it’s gonna be for a higher purpose.  Deal with that! 

Boots: A higher cause, a higher purpose.  You four have been put on notice, but all of PRIME been put on notice too–hell, baby, the world!  You call them beauties ring rats again, you got a date with the Solid Gold!  Barry!

He shouts for him, but his partner is right there.

Boogie: Trent!

Boots: The Stallion and Stud ride, we fly on the wings of the eagle, and we’re about to change the world!!  Starting…with the Bandits and Two-become-one.

They clasp hands, and the silence backstage breaks out into a cheer.  Boogie hands Electric Boots a bottle of Southern Comfort, and they clink glasses before taking a mighty guzzle together.  Friends, brothers, soldiers in the trenches of love.  They saunter over to the couches, and the buzz on conversation is thick as molasses–a condition that only worsens as Huw Ollie returns with a few choice babes for the band to enjoy.  As a brunette that’s primarily cleavage settles into his lap, their keyboardist cuts through the conversation with a simple question in his amazingly thick Estuary accent.

Rich Savage: What is it ya call them, then?

Trent, two decidedly Christina Hendricks-grade baddies on either arm, turns.

Boots: What’s that?

Rich Savage: Well, you says you ain’t want to call ‘em ring rats.  What is it you wanna call them, then?

The entire collected organism of Solid Gold Rock and Roll waits in anticipation.  Trent looks to the ceiling, pondering for a few, before grinning wide and laying down the message.

Boots: Call ‘em “Courtiers”, baby.

Black.