Rock Opera by D.J. Tyrer

Rock Opera

By D.J. Tyrer

A small pub in Deptford wasn’t Rob’s idea of a place to make history, but as Staples said, the history of rock belonged to such places. But, still, a rock opera in a dingy back room with an audience of around twenty? You wanted Wembley Stadium and thousands of adoring fans.

Still, there was a vibe, and not just the hum of a dodgy amplifier, either.

“One-two, one-two, screw the Milk Snatcher.” Rob gave the mike a tap, making certain it worked.

Despite the grandiose term ‘opera’, it was a small affair. Doubtless, if they ever reached Wembley, there would be a huge chorus of singers and a multitude of backing musicians, but tonight, it was just a simple affair. There was Rob on bass, Knicknack on drums, Rodders on sax. Staples was both the lead guitarist and lead singer, which mainly meant narrator here.

The other singers were Amy and Trish and Staples’ younger brother, Slug. Slug couldn’t really sing, but his rasp was just perfect for the terrified voice of the priest, Naotalba.

Rob took his guitar and began to strum. The others joined him on stage. All, save Staples.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” called Rob in his best theatrical voice; the crowd grunting back, impatient. “Prepare to enter realms whimsical and strange as we present to you the diabolical entertainment that is…” The lights fell and Knicknack pounded out a terrifying beat. “The King in Yellow!”

Staples strode out onto the stage, his trademark facial ironmongery and orange hair hidden beneath a yellow robe converted from an old nightie and a mask crafted from a cornflake packet and papier-mâché. Rob had always thought it a ludicrous costume, not that he’d ever dared say so, but now, in the semi-darkness, with the terrible sound of the intro swelling about them, it was surprisingly impressive.

Staples began to sing. Despite the mask, his voice wasn’t muffled, but powerful and raw.

He set the scene, the doomed city of Alar and mysterious Carcosa upon the far shore of a lake. Staples had based it upon some musty old book, yet had made it entirely his own, a cri de coeur about all the flaws riddling Thatcher’s Britain, relevant yet alien, earthly yet surreal.

They wandered along pathways of song, borne upon strident notes that fell away, at times, to a chilly near-silence, as they explored the backways of a rotting city and its secret power-struggles. What might’ve been banal was stirring and strange.

Then, came the climax of the show as the girls sang them into the ballroom of the great palace at Alar.

Rob could almost see it. It was almost as if the dingy room in Deptford were merging with the haunted city of Carcosa, just as Alar had done. The music seemed to become visible, swirling about them in golden-yellow notes, twisting together in strange tripartite symbols.

They continued to play, the music reaching a discordant crescendo, as if about to become an orgasm of sound, only to cut away so that only the soft baseline accompanied the words.

“Sir! Sir! ’Tis time to unmask,” sang Amy.

“Yes, sir, unmask,” Trish sang.

“We have all unmasked, but you.”

The music soared for just a moment. “Unmask! Unmask!”

Staples inclined his mask towards them and, in a low voice, proclaimed, “I wear no mask.”

Silence. Not a sound. No-one breathed.

Then, the music roared back to life as the two realms merged, Carcosa subsuming Alar – swallowing it whole.

The audience screamed.

Discordant chords broke free and vibrated through the walls, sending cracks spider-webbing through the plaster as the room seemed to twist and reshape itself about them.

Rob tried to stop playing, but his fingers wouldn’t obey – the music was too wilful to control.

The walls fell away, followed by the ceiling, to reveal not a damp Deptford evening lit by cheap street lighting, but a black night beneath a sky of dead and darkened stars. And, still the music echoed and coiled about them, pulling them further and further out from their reality and into another.

“Stop it!” Rob shouted. “You have to stop it!”

“I cannot stop it. I am the music and the music is me.”

Rob understood the meaning of that cryptic line that came at the climax. Staples had become the mask.

The music flowed through them all, reshaping them as it had reshaped the room, vibrating atoms apart into new and transcendent forms.

Towers of translucent glass soared high above them, lit by blazing inner light. All fear vanished from Rob. Like Staples, he was no longer himself, but someone, something else. As the music moved through him, he felt the strangest sensation of arriving home.

The singer turned to Rob and looked at him with eyes like dead stars. The guitar had vanished from his hands, Rob had no idea where to, and now, Staples reached out with one hand to grasp his mask and the other his robe.

Everyone stared at him in a moment of sublimely-soaring chords.

Then, he tore them away, mask and robe vanishing into nothing, revealing nothing beneath, just leaving the echo of the song.

Rob blinked and he was back on the low stage in the little room that smelt slightly of damp.

Staples was gone. Amy, Trish, Rodders, Knicknack, the small audience, all stared at where the singer had been. There was no sign of him, his outfit, his guitar, just an empty space and the faintest echo of a note.

People looked at one another in confusion, at walls which were standing as if nothing had happened.

Sobs filled the silence, and Rob realised he was one of those crying. Music had roused in him a rage and had him dancing for joy, but never before had music moved him like this.

Was it real or illusion? Rob didn’t know. But, he did know he’d experienced something amazing, something terrible, yet uplifting, too; a world quite unlike this one. A world that, perhaps, was better.

He wished he could remember the tune.

This story was previously included in Issue #4. Purchase the full print issue here: https://www.etsy.com/listing/639457118/the-rock-n-roll-horror-zine-4

See more of D.J. Tyrer's work here: http://djtyrer.blogspot.co.uk/