Rock Starz

4| Band Name & Hit Song

"What did you do Nathan, did you hire him or not?" The four of them were in the basement of Nathan's house.
"Yeah, I mean I had to. He's too good to let go." Nathan flipped over a whiteboard and grabbed a marker to write on. The door opened and Nathan's father came down the small staircase.
"Here they are." James walked in from behind Nathan's father.
"Hey James!" Lynx shouted enthusiastically. James nodded with a smile and put his stuff down on the floor.
"Devon, mate, I've been waiting for your rent for a week now." Devon rolled his eyes.
"And I've been telling you for a week that I won't get paid until Wednesday!" Nathan's father sighed and grabbed the door handle.
"Well, have fun rehearsing then." Nathan nodded to his father and he closed the door to their studio.
"Okay, the first thing we need to do to become famous is change our name." Nathan had crossed out their old band name and was looking at each of the band members.
"Did you do your homework?" Nathan numbered one through five on the board.
"Isaiah, what name did you have in mind?" Isaiah grinned calmly.
"Neon Dreamers." Nathan nodded in awe and wrote it down.
"Devon?"
"The War Boys." Nathan sighed but wrote the name down anyway.
"You're still not over it, are you?" Devon was silent and Nathan moved on to the next name.
"James?"
"Rock Royalty." Nathan chuckled as he wrote it down.
"You might as well say Queen, or Prince." Nathan was already listing the already existing names.
"Lynx?" Lynx smiled proudly at the name he had come up with.
"The Soul Surrenders."
"Poetic." Isaiah remarked. Lynx looked at him.
"Thanks." There were now four names on the board, and there was still one spot left. Everyone waited anxiously for what Nathan had ready.
"Okay, now you can't say you chose names that don't fit you." The boys nodded, that was a fact.
"But my name describes all of us." Nathan stood with his back to the boys and he started writing. Finally he stepped aside and held his hand under the name.
"Rock Starz?" Devon asked. Nathan nodded enthusiastically.
"You want to give our band a name that describes what we want to be?" Isaiah asked and Nathan nodded again.
"I think it's cool." Lynx said then and Nathan pointed gratefully at Lynx.
"It means that we are all stars, but our own stars. We belong together, but we are not each other." Everyone frowned at Lynx after his speech.
"Right." Nathan mumbled.
"What do you guys think?" James nodded.
"I don't think you can go wrong with a name like that." Isaiah nodded his head slightly.
"Yeah, it sounds classic. Like we're going to make history." Nathan got more and more excited about what his bandmates were saying about the name.
"Exactly! So from now on, we are, Rock Starz." Nathan circled the name he had chosen and the band nodded approvingly.
"It's better than The Funkey Monkeyz. Even though you took the z at the end." Devon said and Nathan looked at him with a smile. After that, there was a moment of silence between the band members. Then Isaiah looked at Nathan expectantly.
"So, what do we do now?" Nathan looked at James, James looked at the rest of the group with a smile.
"Now we all have to write songs that can become world hits." The rest sighed.
"Oh, I hate writing." Devon mumbled in annoyance.
"Not me, I love writing. It's so freeing. Sometimes it feels like it's the only thing that I can do in peace, without anyone judging me." Isaiah nodded in agreement with Lynx.
"Same, when I'm high." Devon stood up.
"Great, you guys write songs, I'll go collect my rent in the meantime." Nathan looked at him in disbelief.
"What?! No, Devon, you have to help too." Devon was already walking towards the door, before he could leave the room he turned around for a moment.
"Hey, don't forget I wrote I Wanna F You, right? And James said so himself, it's a good song." James nodded in agreement, Nathan looked at the two with difficulty.
"But, it has no depth-" James raised his finger.
"Just because it has no depth doesn't mean it's not hit-worthy. A lot of songs that you can just sing along to are doing well these days." Devon nodded with a satisfied grin.
"You heard it Nate, well I'm out of here. Bye Rock Starzzz." And he was gone.
"What are you doing?!" Nathan shouted at James, upset.
"I'm speaking the truth. And besides, I've never heard a song by you before. You don't have any reason to judge his songs, when no one knows what you write." Nathan bit his lip and sighed.
"I, uh, my songs don't really fit in with a rock band." James looked at him with interest.
"Then I'll make them fit in, won't I? No one really listens to the lyrics if there's a catchy melody in it." Nathan looked up with a small smile.
"Okay, James. Come on." Lynx looked up from his notepad.
"Where are you going?" He asked as soon as he saw Nathan and James standing by the door.
"To my room, then you'll have space to write." Lynx nodded understandingly and the two disappeared from the basement/studio.
"Okay, so I was thinking about writing about a little man in the fridge who has to turn on the light every time the door opens." Isaiah looked at Lynx with an open mouth.
"I need weed for this." He mumbled as he also walked out the door to light up a joint outside. Lynx was left alone and he started humming.
"Little man, in my fridge, aren't you tired?" He mumbled to himself as he took notes on his notepad.
"Aren't you, tired..." Lynx sighed and thought further.

"When my mother died I seemed broken inside, after half a year I still wasn't myself and the band stood completely still. Then my sister told me I would rockstar my way through it, and that sentence has never left my head." Nathan was sitting on a chair with an acoustic guitar.
"So I wrote this, only it sounds so, uh, gloomy." James nodded understandingly.
"Sing." Nathan felt the tension rising and he laughed awkwardly.
"I, uh, usually only do backing vocals so, I don't know." James waved it off.
"Come on Nathan, sing." Nathan cleared his throat and played a slow intro on his guitar.
"You're gonna rock star through it, you're gonna rock and roll. You're diving face first to it, you're gonna break your fall. You're gonna rock star through it, you're gonna make them scream. Because you can do it, because it's your dream." James watched in amazement after hearing Nathan's voice. Nathan played a short instrumental piece and kept repeating the words you're gonna rock. After a while he stopped and Nathan grinned.
"Nathan you wrote a hit." He then said convincingly, and that grin was infectious.

"Okay Lynx, forget about the guy in the fridge, how about the magic dust that always ends up on my desk after a while?" One joint later and Isaiah had found the spirit. Lynx nodded enthusiastically even though he had to drop his whole theory about the man in the fridge aside.
"And then we'll call it 'Dust to Dust' just like that speech at a funeral! Or was it a cremation..." Isaiah didn't care.
"Whatever it is, it sounds like a hit." And Lynx agreed.

"So if you just play faster and change the Am to a C it sounds a lot more rockable, you feel me?" Nathan played the chords faster this time and he was right.
"Okay, keep repeating it like that." Nathan kept playing and James started singing.
"You're gonna rockstar through it, you're gonna rock and roll. You're gonna forget what happened and clean up your soul. You're gonna rockstar through it, you're gonna jump in the air, and if it all goes to shit, don't worry I'll be there. You're gonna rock!" Nathan started playing an improvised guitar solo and James nodded his head enthusiastically to the beat.

"Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Where did you come from?" Lynx quickly gave up after the first line they had.
"What the fuck rhymes with dust?" Isaiah mumbled and Lynx started thinking.
"Lust? Must? Crust?" Isaiah sighed as he continued to think about how the second line should go.
"But how do you end a line with lust? Or must, or crust?" Lynx thought again.
"This isn't going smoothly enough. Maybe it's not such a good idea after all." Isaiah said as he was ready to let go of the entire plan they just created.
"No, don't give up yet, we just need to think about it a little more." Lynx suggested but before they could think about it any longer, James and Nathan stormed back into the studio, both with sparkling eyes and big smiles.
"We have a hit!" Nathan shouted enthusiastically.