At the beginning of this year, my buddy Steve Z. told me about a Ramones anthology that Fahrenheit Press was putting together. He had submitted something, and encouraged me to do the same. So I did. In late May, I found out that my story had been rejected. Trying to make me and the other poseurs feel better, Fahrenheit said they might put out a second Ramones volume, thereby doubling our chances to be rejected!
I've been a Ramones fan since my late teens; I saw them four or five times during my college years. My college band, The Toastmen, played "Blitzkreig Bop" at many of our shows. I own just a few Ramones albums, but really, isn't that all you need?
Fahrenheit wasn't looking for stories about the Ramones or even featuring the punk godfathers from Queens. What the publishing house asked was for writers to use a Ramones song as an outline or the theme of a story. There needed to be a connection to the song. "Keep it punk and keep it stripped down: 2k to 4k words only," the publishers said. "Preference is for clean narratives. This is punk storytelling. Don't over intellectualize it."
Below is "Blitzed," the story I submitted. It references "Blitzkrieg Bop" and features Scarlett, my favorite character from my short-story anthology, (C)rock Stories: Million-Dollar Tales of Music, Mayhem and Immaturity.
Blitzed
By Dave Brigham
“Yankee-boy, we’re coming to get you,” Scarlett whispered as she slowly rolled the El Camino down the litter-strewn alley behind Sniper’s Lounge. Her brother, Ray, rode shotgun, nervously caressing a pair of their daddy’s handcuffs.
“I can’t believe he’s headlining Sniper’s,” Ray said, pushing his platinum-blonde tips out of his eyes with manicured, black-lacquered fingernails.
“Of course he is, dipshit,” Scarlett spat at her brother. “He’s the fucking best there is in this town! He’s gonna clear 200, 250 bucks tonight. And then he’s gonna go for a little ride.”
Parking behind the graffiti-scarred dumpster, Scarlett pulled her cigarette holder from her purse.
“Eh hem.”
“Oh, Jesus, Scar. Why did you bring that goddamn thing?”
“A lady always needs to be delicate,” she said in her baby-girl voice, fluttering her eyelashes. “Now put a fucking Misty in my ox-horn cigarette holder!”
Scarlett flashed her headlights. A van parked 50 feet down the alley flashed back, then drove toward the club’s back door.
Through the swirling smoke from Scarlett’s extra-long cigarette, she and Ray watched as the heavy, black door swung open. In an instant, their two hired goons bolted from the van, grabbed the tall, thin guy who walked out and shoved him in the van. After a minute, the driver stomped on the gas and floored it toward the El Camino.
“What just happened?” Ray asked his sister. She slapped him.
“Those monsters you hired just abducted the bus boy.” The van pulled up to Scarlett’s side of the car.
“You stupid morons…” Scarlett yelled. Just then, Ray grabbed his sister by the shoulder – something he immediately regretted – and turned her toward the Sniper’s rear exit.
“Look!”
“Yankee-boy,” Scarlett whispered. “Alright, Raymond Justice the Third, it’s time for us to right the wrong committed by your large and idiotic friends from bridge club, or wherever it is you found them.”
“What about this guy?” one of the lugs in the van asked.
“Drive him around the block and drop him in front of the DQ,” Scarlett snarled.
Turning to her brother, Scarlett tingled with excitement and rage. “Don’t you, my younger and completely inferior brother, ever touch me. Ever.”
“Relax,” he replied, sweat rolling down his back.
Leaning closer, she whispered, “Ever,” in his ear, then grabbed the handcuffs off his lap.
“Let’s go.”
###################
Scarlett and Ray’s band, Fey Raye, a glam-punk quartet that rolled makeup train cases into their gigs before amps or guitars or keyboards, had been grinding for five years. Some local critics – “sad mama’s boys with too many glasses and not enough balls,” Scarlett said – used words like “annoying,” “shrill,” “god-awful,” “pretentious” and “hairspray-infected” to describe Fey Raye.
They had plenty of fans, though, among the record-store crowd, theater nerds and those looking for something a little dangerous. They played out a few times a month. Their one album, two EP’s and five singles sold well enough to keep the band members from having to get more than three part-time jobs apiece.
Yankee-boy and his band, Northern Army, became the darlings of the scene from the moment they moved to town. With his preppie good looks, tight wiffle and D.C. street cred, Yankee-boy drew crowds at every gig, anxious just to be near him, to scream along to his lyrics calling for revolution and to thrash to his bandmates’ tight hooks and pounding rhythms.
Scarlett didn’t like him, but deep down admitted to herself that he had an important magnetism. She was confrontational with him, just as she was with everybody else.
“Alex,” she laughed the first time she was introduced to him. “That’s about the most boring name any of God’s creatures ever did give an offspring. You talk like a fancy boy who went to Yale and learned about chromosomes and how to set proper margins on a typewriter and quadratic equations and laying down a bunt and using salad forks and how to find Ursa Major and Ursa Minor.”
She took a drag from her Misty.
“You probably skateboarded with people calling themselves punks, who were, in reality, rich kids who’d been kicked out of Georgetown row houses.”
Alex laughed.
“I do believe I’m going to call you Yankee-boy,” Scarlett said.
Alex was always nice to her, finding any small nugget of promise to encourage her band.
“Maybe we can cut a single together,” he said one night after Fey Raye opened for Northern Army. “Cool, right? You’ll be on the B-side, of course.”
“That ain’t gonna happen,” Scarlett replied, the air thick with exasperation. “Y’all are too pretty, too nice, too stuck-up, too tweedy. Our band is the real shit. We scrape our insides out and show them to our fans and they love us for that. You boys talk about revolution, but you already had yours. You ‘northern’ boys. We’re gonna blow up, soon. You’ll see.”
###################
As Ray chatted with Alex about Fugazi’s Repeater album, Scarlett snuck up behind the tall, muscular singer. Grabbing his left wrist, she slapped on a handcuff. He wheeled quickly, knocking her to the ground.
“What the hell?!” he yelled.
“Grab him, Raymond!” Scarlett demanded.
Ray jumped at Alex, but bounced off his right fist. Scarlett jumped on Alex’s back and began pummeling his head. In an instant, Alex flipped Scarlett over his head and on top of a charging Ray. The siblings sat there, stunned.
“What the hell?!” Alex yelled again. “What are you idiots doing?”
“Oh, Yankee-boy,” Scarlett purred. “We just wanted to take you to a party. Do you wanna go to a party, hun? Our band is playing and we were hoping you might deign to accompany us and maybe sit in for a song or two.”
“Well, why didn’t you just ask? You know I love to sing!”
“Do you need to help your band break things down?” Ray asked.
“Do you need to help your band break things down?” Scarlett said in a mocking, sing-songy voice. “Of course he doesn’t, you lily-livered sack of pancakes.”
“Scarlett’s right,” Alex said, laughing. “I carry those guys every night; they can spend a little effort to pack up my mic.”
Ray’s hired goons showed up and joined Alex in the back of the El Camino. Ray passed a bottle back through the sliding window.
“Want some Bop?” Ray asked Alex.
“What the hell is ‘Bop’?”
“Blitzkrieg Bop!” Scarlett screamed. “It’s Jagermeister, Goldschlager and Rumple Minze. It fucks you up.”
Alex took a long slug, passed it along. The goons drank deeply, too. Pretty soon all five of them were screaming and laughing at the top of their lungs as they headed deeper into the woods toward Scarlett and Ray’s father’s house.
“Whatta we want!?” Scarlett yelled from the driver’s seat.
“Punk rock!” the rest of them answered at full volume.
“When do we want it?!”
“NOW!!!”
“Gabba gabba hey!” Ray yelled. “We accept you one of us!”
“Lame!” Scarlett retorted.
Alex started rolling around in the El Camino’s bed, bouncing off the two goons. “Mosh it up, assholes!” he yelled. Then, standing up, he started pogoing and then slamming himself to the hard metal of the truck’s bed. “I love the Bop!”
“Yeah, Yankee-boy!” Scarlett yelled through the window. “He’s losing his mind – I love it!”
The road turned to dirt, the trees stooped menacingly close to the roof of the El Camino. The moon beamed onto Alex’s white t-shirt; everything else was black: Scarlett’s hair and dress, Ray’s leather jacket, the goons’ jeans and boots.
Ray jammed a cassette into the player. “This’ll heat shit up,” he said.
“Keep your hands on the wheel / But you’re playing with my stick / “I can’t help it if I slip / Keep your hands on the wheel”
“Is that Ram Jam?!” Alex yelled at Ray as he bent down to the window. “Turn that shit up!”
“Hell yeah, Yankee-boy!” Scarlett howled. “Get crazy!”
Scarlett drove past a few dozen cars and pulled into the driveway. There was a bonfire in the front yard, with people scattered around eating, drinking and dancing. On the expansive front porch, some dudes were plugging in amps, checking mic levels, setting up a drum kit, taping down cords, fixing a small spotlight. Paint peeled all around them.
Alex and the goons hopped out of the back of Scarlett’s car. A buzz pinballed through the crowd as more partygoers recognized the tall lead singer of Northern Army. Scarlett and Ray walked up on the porch; they talked with an older guy for a minute or two, then plugged in.
The older guy approached the mic, held onto it loosely with a right arm covered in tattoos.
“Hello, shitheads!” he yelled out. About six feet tall, with a pot belly barely hidden under a Link Wray t-shirt, the master of ceremonies was clearly Scarlett and Ray’s father. He had the same head of untamed black hair and crooked grin as his kids.
“Happy to have you here,” he said. “Don’t wreck my house or shit on my lawn. And if I see you mistreat my dogs – you know who I’m talking about, you two meatheads – I’m shooting first and asking questions later.” People clapped and whistled.
“OK, here’s Fey Raye.” And he jumped off the steps in a lame attempt at a stage dive.
“Jam out the kicks, motherfuckers!” Scarlett yelled and the band flew into a manic rage, the porch sagging under the heavy boots stomping away to the beat. Scarlett played guitar and sang; Ray was on keyboards and backing vocals; a skinny, longhaired guy in a Husker Du t-shirt attacked the bass; and an athletically built guy with a GBH shirt and a pink Mohawk pounded the drums.
The small crowd pulsated in the front yard, mesmerized by the music, stoned out of their minds, drunk on Blitzkrieg Bop. Alex stood on the fringe, pushing people back into the makeshift mosh pit, yelling encouragement, pogoing in place.
After three songs, Scarlett stepped back from the mic, shook sweat off her hands and took a long swig of something. The liquid sparkled in the stage lights.
“Let’s hear it for the Bop!” she yelled.
“Don’t hurt yourselves out there,” Ray said as he adjusted his mic.
“Fuck that,” Scarlett snarled. “They are revved up and ready to go!” The crowd whooped and screamed. “Alright, you idiots. This next song is a cover, and we’re gonna drag someone up here to sing it” A few hands shot up in the air, as if they were at karaoke bar rather than an illegal backwoods club run by a possibly psychotic punk and her gun-toting father.
“Yankee-boy, where are ya?”
“Nah, nah, Scarlett, this is your gig,” Alex called out through cupped hands. He took a few steps back, careful to avoid the dog shit. Lifting his plastic cup in the air, he saluted his rival: “To Scarlett – true punk, madwoman behind the wheel, mixologist extraordinaire!”
The crowd roared.
“Yankee-boy, don’t be rude. Don’t refuse a lady’s entreaty.”
People were getting restless. A few people yelled at Scarlett to play another song. Ray told her to forget it. Others, the drunker ones, started chanting, “Alex! Alex! Alex!”
“Where are Ray’s bridge-playing friends?” Scarlett said, all sugary sweet. “Get your fat asses moving, and get that boy up here!” she commanded.
The two lugs appeared out of nowhere, hands on Alex’s back, shoving him toward the stage. He fought them for a few seconds, but then, like a true professional, put on a big smile, jogged up the steps and wrapped Scarlett in a bear hug.
She stepped back, yelled something in his face then, after windmilling her right arm, launched into “Jet Boy” by the New York Dolls. Ray scrambled from behind his keyboards to grab his guitar and catch up with his sister.
Alex bumbled his way through, remembering most of the lyrics and singing some of them in time with the band as Scarlett kept charging faster and faster until the whole thing fell apart.
The crowd went wild.
“What’re we doing next?” Alex said into the mic, a big smile on his face. “Get me some more Bop, dammit!” Someone hustled up the steps and handed him a sloshing cupful.
Scarlett sashayed up to the mic, a big smirk on her face, blood dripping from her string-slashed fingers. “Yankee-boy, I bled for you,” she said, draping her arm around his neck. “Are you having fun?” she whispered into his ear. He nodded enthusiastically.
A girl at the bottom of the porch steps took off her top and threw it at Alex. Not to be outdone, her boyfriend took off his cut-offs and whipped them at Scarlett, just missing her head. Then they clasped hands and ran off toward the woods.
“They’re gonna go make some steam,” Scarlett cracked into the mic. “Yankee-boy, let’s play another song.” She leaned toward the drummer, spoke quickly to him and the bassist. Ray leaned in just a second too late; Scarlett flipped him off.
Again, Scarlett windmilled and then hit the first chord of The Stooges’ “Raw Power.” Alex jumped up and down, thrilled beyond belief to play this one.
“Dance to the beat / of the living dead /
Lose sleep baby / and stay away from bed /
Raw power / is sure to come runnin’ to you”
After the song was done, Alex did a flip off the porch and ran a few laps around the front yard, out of his mind. Most of the crowd followed hm around, pawing at him, yelling encouragement, flailing themselves onto the ground as he passed.
“Jesus Christ,” Scarlett mumbled to herself. “How distressingly messianic.”
Clearing the four steps back up to the porch in one leap, Alex was manic. “Let’s do a fuckin’ Ramones song!” he screamed.
“Take it easy, Yankee-boy,” Scarlett purred. “I call the shots up on this stage.”
“Do you guys wanna hear a Ramones song?!” Alex bellowed into the microphone. The crowd – really only about 25 people at this point, but a hardcore 25 – started chanting, “A-lex Ra-mone! A-lex Ra-mone! A-lex Ra-mone!” while they moshed around the front yard in a circle. He jumped back down and got on the backs of a few bikers and rode around the pit, like a king.
“Shit,” Scarlett said to the rest of the band. “Yankee-boy’s got those folks more riled up than a two-dicked rooster in big-city henhouse.”
“Yup,” Ray said, a big smile on his face. “He’s the fucking best there is in this town, as someone once said.”
Scarlett slowly took her guitar off over hear head, then quickly rifled it at her brother. “This ends now,” she growled.
“Hey ho, hey ho, Yankee-boy has got to go!” she chanted through the mic. “Hey ho, hey ho, Yankee-boy has got to go!” She clapped her hands over her head, turned to get her bandmates to join in. They half-heartedly did so.
“Yankee-boy – come on up here!” Alex came bolting to the bottom of the steps. “Stop right there! That’s close enough,” Scarlett yelled, pointing at him menacingly.
“Yankee-boy is the king!” she yelled. The crowd ate it up. “And I am the kingmaker,” she continued. “Y’all love him so much because he’s crazy and wild like I am. He’s only acting that way on account of the Blitzkrieg Bop we been making him chug. Y’all know that, right?” People started to boo and throw things – barbecue ribs, plastic cups, an El Camino hubcap – at Scarlett.
“Come on, y’all, you know I’m right. I make and break this boy. He was nothing before him and his band of marauding union soldiers invaded our scene and saw how Fey Raye dominated it. He needed someone to compete with, and I gave him that. He’s only so damn good because I made him fight for the title!”
“Fuck you!” some guy yelled. “Play a goddamn song!”
“Alright, alright, you weenies. We’re gonna play a song. This is a new one. I think y’all are gonna like it quite a bit, yessirree. “It’s called, ‘Yankee-boy, You’re Fired!”
Scarlett strutted down the steps and over to the El Camino, eyeing Alex the entire time. From the driver’s side door pocket, she pulled out her cigarette holder, inserted it between her teeth. Then, slowly, she unwrapped a new pack of Mistys, gave it a few good hard taps on her left palm, removed one and put it in the holder.
Next, she reached under the driver’s seat, smiling and winking all the while. She pulled out her custom black-and-pink 20 gauge, and began waving it in the air, slinking closer to Alex.
“Hey, Yankee-boy, where you gonna run to?” Scarlett teased as the big man backed up. “You’re not afraid of lil’ old me and my shotgun, are ya?”
“Of course not, Scarlett,” Alex said, suddenly sobered up. “You don’t want me to sing with your band? Fine, that’s cool.”
“No, sir, I don’t,” Scarlett replied, cool as a cucumber. “I’m gonna shoot you in the back, ‘cause you’re gonna start runnin’ like a big old baby-man!” She cocked the weapon.
Indeed, Alex turned tail, along with a half-dozen other people. Scarlett raised the gun to her shoulder, took aim and fired. BOOM!
Alex and his fellow yellow-bellies covered their ears, ducked and screamed simultaneously. Ray and his fellow bandmates howled with laughter. Scarlett let out a rebel yell to curl your toenails.
Crawling out of the mud and piss and beer and Bop, Alex checked himself, saw that he was all there, that nobody around him was bleeding and that he’d been made a fool by a jealous, conniving, delusional harpy.
“Rebel Woman!” Alex yelled at Scarlett. “You are a goddamn crazy bitch!”
“Aw, Alex, don’t be like that,” she purred. “Now be a gentleman, and come over here and light my cigarette.”
