I was engulfed in a cloud of music. Everything was together, the drums, the bass, the vocals, the rhythm guitar, and of course, the lead guitar. Chills raced down my spine as the song was winding down. My fingers raced between strings, bending them every few notes and throwing in a few vibrato harmonics to liven up the outro solo. It felt like magic. And with a few cymbal crashes and a couple power chords, it was over. I heard the echo of the last note ring through my basement, and it only added to my pleasure. A smile shot across my face as I turned to face the others, who had similar looks on their faces.

“That was AWESOME!” I shouted. Band practices were a major factor in my half-deafness. “I loved those drum fills during the bridge, Joe!”

“Thanks, Steve. I liked your solo there at the end,” he returned, “It really adds to the intensity.”

“And Alex,” I continued, “Way to go on those lyrics. Not bad for writing them thirty minutes ago! We are going to rock that Battle of the Bands competition in two weeks!”

“No kidding! Now we just need to come up with a band name.” Corey, the bassist, said while chuckling. All five of us had debated countless hours on the subject, but could never pick a name. We had been practicing for a few weeks and made a lot of progress. We had written about seven solid songs, all with powerful guitar riffs, good beats, and deep lyrics, but none of us could come up with a good name that hadn’t been taken. Sensing the conversation coming up again, Zack, the rhythm guitarist, spoke up.

“Oh boy. Here we go again. I gotta leave before we start off on another hour-long argument. I work in twenty minutes. You guys can practice without me if you want”

“Nah, I think four hours of practice is enough.” Alex said. “My throat’s burning anyways.” Everyone started their daily routine of turning off all the power, unplugging everything, and putting the gear away. Since practices were always in my basement, they usually just stored the instruments in the back corner. While I was rolling up some guitar cords, I heard my phone vibrating on top of my amp. I rushed over to it and grabbed it just before it bounced off the edge. My heart skipped a beat as I realized that I just got a text from Tori. I usually don’t get caught up on one girl for too long, but I’ve had a giant crush on Tori for as long as I had known her. We didn’t talk much at all, though. She was pretty much the most popular girl in the school, and I was just the metal-head nobody. Playing in a band doesn’t have the same effect on popularity as it used to, ever since Auto-Tuned voices with computerized instruments took over the popular “music” genre. She wouldn’t even know who I was if I hadn’t sold her my old acoustic guitar. That being said, I never got the opportunity to really make a move on her before, so I was always looking for a way in. Excitedly, I opened the text message and read it.

“hey steve. i was jw if u wanna hang out w/ a bunch of people at the mall. we’re meeting at the food court in an hour. u in???”