Chapter 21: The Listening Session
Saturday, July 25, 2015
Michael walked up the stairs, conscious of the three pairs of feet following him. It was the first time he had brought anyone into his space. It was a strange sensation.
"It's here," he said, opening the door to what used to be his father's office.
Leo, Sam, and Nate entered the room, and stopped.
"Dude, what did you do to this room?" asked Sam, looking around in amazement.
The room was a "do-it-yourself" mess. Michael had done what he could with the money from his job. The walls were covered in an irregular pattern of charcoal-colored acoustic foam panels, stuck on with tape. Old, heavy sheets hung from the ceiling, a desperate attempt to soundproof.
In the center, on an old wooden desk, was his "arsenal": the second-hand MacBook Pro, the red Focusrite interface, the Yamaha monitors, and the AT2020 microphone on its stand.
"It's my studio," said Michael, feeling strangely exposed. "This is where... I make things."
"This is... intense," said Leo, touching one of the foam panels. He could appreciate the effort.
"Dude, you have real monitors!" exclaimed Sam, his geeky eyes shining. "This is professional!"
Michael felt a pang of nervousness. It was one thing for them to see the equipment. It was another, very different thing, for them to hear the music.
"Sit wherever you can," he said, pointing to the carpeted floor. There were no extra chairs.
The three of them settled in. The room went silent, the anticipation was palpable. It felt as if he were about to confess a secret.
"Okay," said Michael, sitting in front of the laptop. "Don't... don't make fun, okay? It's... different."
"Relax, Zombie. Show us what you got," said Leo, crossing his arms.
Michael took a deep breath. He opened Ableton, selected the final file for "Ghost Boy" and hit play.
The sound filled the room. It wasn't a phone speaker. It was studio sound. The ethereal guitar floated in the air, followed by the lo-fi beat. And then, his own voice, processed and melancholic.
Sam, Leo, and Nate listened in absolute silence. Their expressions changed.
They were used to radio hip-hop. To aggressive beats, to lyrics about cars and money. This wasn't that.
It sounded very different from anything they had heard. It was slow, sad, almost narcotic. They could hear the lyrics about feeling invisible, about turning off the phone.
Leo raised an eyebrow, his usual cynical expression replaced by genuine intrigue. Sam was completely still, his knee had stopped bouncing. He was analyzing the sound. Nate just stared at the speaker, his face impassive.
When the song ended, the silence that remained was heavy.
Before they could say a word, Michael spoke, his voice fast from nerves. "And this is the other one I finished."
He pressed play on "Star Shopping".
The acoustic guitar, slightly out of tune, filled the room. It was a similar vibe, but the pain felt different. More direct. More romantic.
The three of them listened to the second song entirely, from start to finish. They recognized the same voice, the same style, but a different emotion. This confirmed that "Ghost Boy" hadn't been a fluke.
The last note of the guitar faded out. Michael stopped the music.
Total silence fell. He didn't dare look at them. He kept staring at his laptop screen, waiting for the verdict.
…..
Michael stopped the music. The silence in the small room felt incredibly heavy. He didn't dare look at them. He kept staring blankly at his laptop screen, his ears ringing from the music, bracing himself for mockery or, worse, pity.
Sam was the first to break the silence, as always. He let out a slow, loud sigh, almost like a whistle.
"Dude..." he said, his voice unusually quiet.
Michael finally looked up. Sam's eyes were wide, his usual nervous energy replaced by a kind of awe.
"What the fuck was that?" continued Sam. "That was... amazing! Seriously! It sounds... I don't know, like the soundtrack to a super sad and dark video game. But with a beat that slaps! It's crazy."
He leaned toward the laptop, as if he wanted to see the music.
"The second one, 'Star Shopping'. That guitar melody... dude, it got stuck in my head instantly. It's super melancholic, but cool. It's my favorite, without a doubt."
Michael felt a small knot of relief loosen in his chest. Sam's opinion was good, but the one that really mattered to him was Leo's. Leo was the artist, the purist.
Leo rubbed his chin, still processing what he had heard. He looked at Michael with a new expression, one Michael hadn't seen before: respect.
"Not bad, Zombie," said Leo. "Not bad at all."
Coming from Leo, that was a god-tier compliment.
"I don't know," continued Leo, more to himself than to the others. "The second one is good, it's catchy. But I liked the first one better. 'Ghost Boy'."
Michael raised an eyebrow. "Really? Why?"
"It was darker, weirder," explained Leo, pointing at the speakers. "The guitar sounded like it was broken, in a good way. And the voice... I don't know, it felt... genuine. Like you were truly fucked up. Most music today is pure manufactured shit. That felt real."
Michael nodded slowly, absorbing the compliment. He turned to Nate, the final and silent judge. Nate was simply there, with his impassive expression, as always.
"Nate?" asked Michael.
Nate thought about it for a second. His deep voice filled the room. "The guitar on 'Star Shopping' was good."
Sam laughed. "That's what I'm telling you! It's great! And it's very different from what you've heard," said Sam, now addressing Leo. "What you said at school, about rap being stagnant... well, this isn't stagnant. I don't even know what it is."
Michael finally relaxed completely. The tension disappeared from his shoulders. He had crossed the bridge. They hadn't laughed at him. They had understood.
"Thanks, guys," he said, his voice low. "It means a lot."
"No, seriously, Mike," said Leo, leaning forward, his sketchbook forgotten on the floor. "Do you have more?"
Michael felt the tension leaving his body. He leaned back in the creaky chair, a genuine smile on his face. "Thanks, guys. Seriously."
Seeing that they understood him, that they respected him, gave him a new boost of confidence. He no longer felt like a weirdo showing them his secret diary.
"Actually," he said, turning back to the laptop. "Those are the ones that are already finished. Look at what I'm working on now."
His friends leaned forward, expectant. Michael opened his most recent project. Sodium_v3.als.
He pressed the space bar.
The sound that filled the room was completely different. There were no melancholic guitars. There was no obvious pain. Instead, a slow, hypnotic, and narcotic beat filtered through the speakers.
It was a soundscape. The kick drum was soft, almost muffled. The hi-hats sounded like static, and the main melody was an ethereal synthesizer that sounded like it was underwater.
Sam, Leo, and Nate looked at each other, their expressions a mix of confusion and intrigue.
"Dude, this is very different from the other two," said Sam finally. "It's... weird. Super lo-fi. But I like it. It's hypnotic."
Michael nodded. "Yeah, that's the idea. It's a different vibe. More like Bones."
He paused, making a decision right then and there. "And for this one... I don't want to just upload it to SoundCloud. For this song, I want to make a music video."
Sam's eyes lit up instantly. "Yes! Totally! Dude, that's great! I volunteer to film it! I have my new phone, it records in 1080p, we can make it look super professional!"
Michael smiled and shook his head, enjoying his friend's enthusiasm. "I appreciate the offer, Sam. But for this song, 'professional' is exactly what I don't want."
He got up, went to a closet in the corner of the room, and took out the object he had bought at the flea market. He held the heavy Panasonic VHS camera as if it were a treasure.
"I plan to record it with the retro camera," he said. "He shows it to them."
Sam looked at it as if Michael had just pulled out a dinosaur. "Are you kidding? That's VHS! It's going to look terrible! Grainy and with lines!"
"Exactly," said Leo, who suddenly understood the concept. A wide grin spread across his face. "Oh... that's brilliant. A lo-fi video for a lo-fi song. It's perfect. Mike, you're a fucking genius."
"That's the idea," said Michael, feeling a wave of pride. "I want the image to fit the sound."
"And when are we making this... movie?" asked Nate, clearly interested in the project.
"Next week?" suggested Michael. "I still have to record a few things and fine-tune the song so it's perfect. But next Saturday night, we could record it."
"Done," said Leo. The others nodded.
…..
The creative energy in the room dissipated, replaced by a sense of camaraderie. Michael leaned back in the chair. The plan was set.
"Great. So, next Saturday night," said Michael, closing the "Sodium" project.
"But don't get too excited yet," he added. "I still have to record a few things and fine-tune the song so it's perfect. The base is there, but the vocals are missing."
Sam clapped, a loud gesture that broke the silence of the studio. "Excellent! That means the 'business' part is over... and now we can play video games!"
He jumped up and grabbed the duffel bag he had left by the door, treating it as if it were gold. "As promised! I brought my PS4! And four controllers. And Mortal Kombat X."
Michael smiled. Sam's plan had been obvious from the start. "Good idea. Let's go to the living room."
They changed the subject instantly. The group walked down the stairs, arguing about who was going to pick Scorpion first.
The scene in the living room was a comical contrast. Sam, with the seriousness of a surgeon, disconnected Michael's old DVD player and connected his shiny modern PS4 to the old tube TV.
"Dude, seriously... how can you live with this relic?" asked Sam, fiddling with the three-colored RCA cables. "The picture is gonna look terrible."
"Shut up and connect it," said Leo, who was already in the kitchen, opening the backpack that, as Michael had suspected, was full of bags of chips and sodas. "It's retro."
In five minutes, they were set up. Leo and Nate occupied the ends of the sofa, while Michael and Sam sat on the floor, closer to the screen.
They spent the rest of the day there. The sound of Michael's lo-fi music was replaced by shouts of "Finish Him!" and the frantic tapping of controller buttons.
Nate, who had been quiet all afternoon, turned out to be a monster at the game. He chose Sub-Zero and destroyed Sam and Leo in relentless silence, with almost robotic efficiency.
"That's cheating!" Sam yelled every time Nate froze him. "You're spamming the same move!"
Leo complained that the controller was broken, even though it was new.
Michael, who hadn't played video games in what felt like an eternity, was terribly rusty. He lost almost every match. But he was laughing. He was laughing for real, heartily.
They ordered two large pizzas, with extra cheese. The boxes piled up on the coffee table, next to the empty soda cans.
The house, which was normally a silent sanctuary of his pain and his work, was now full of noise. It was a different kind of noise than that of parties. It wasn't chaotic or superficial. It was the noise of friendship.
Michael leaned back on the rug, waiting for his turn to play, watching Leo and Sam argue heatedly about why Scorpion was a character for beginners.
For the first time, this house didn't feel like another family's grave. It felt, almost, like a home.