Sam I Am

Kevin

I can’t believe our time is almost over here in London. Last week I couldn’t wait to be done but now that it almost is, I’m kind of sad. It’s been fun spending so much time with these guys. I didn’t realize how much I missed them, but truth is I am so happy I made the decision to come back.

As if reading my mind, Nick came and plopped down beside me on the couch. I shook my head at the kid….okay not kid anymore. That’s something I have to get used to. I overheard him the other night on the phone to his girlfriend and the conversation he was having was so adult and unlike Nick, I hadn’t even realized how blatantly obvious I was being while eavesdropping on him until he stopped and smiled at me, “You mind?” He asked in a playful way which had broken me out of my trance and made me feel completely stupid. I had apologized and walked away but part of me still wanted to listen in. I loved witnessing this new grown up Nick, but I’d be lying if I didn’t admit to missing that goofy kid version from time to time.

The fact that there was a ton of places to sit in the living room and he still came and sat right next to me, I mean RIGHT next to me; let me know that goofy Nick was making an appearance.

“Morning Sam!”

“Sam?” I asked not quite sure what the hell was going on.

He nodded and sipped his green, slimey drink. I have learned not to ask anymore. “You know like the eagle from the Muppets. You remind me of him.”

“Of course I do.”

“Yup you are definitely, Sam.”

I laughed, not really sure what to say. “Okay then…”

“I mean Brian should be Sam because he’s going bald…” he continued to babble.

“I HEARD that!!” a detached voice from the dining room yelled out.

Nick giggled, “Sorry!”  

“No you’re not!”

“This is true!”

Once again I sat there shaking my head trying not to seem as amused as I was. We had been picking on poor Nickolas all week long. He seemed more vulnerable now that he had aged a bit. Back when he was younger, there was always this underlying fear of him flying off the handle when we would gang up on him, followed by brutal retaliations. But this new mellow and older version wasn’t quite so quick to hold a grudge or pull a prank.

We decided our youngest member needed a new nickname and had been trying out different ones all week long. Some stuck for a day or so but then quickly got old. We then decided on the obvious one that he hated more than anything else on the planet so during a session in the middle of the week, Howie yelled, “Hey Nicholas with an H!” to get the blonde’s attention, and it stuck like glue!

“So why are you Samming me then?”

“It’s the brows, Kev!”

“Of course it is.”

“And besides…Why should I be the only one to have a nickname? I mean look at the Spice Girls! We all need some new monikers.”

“Moniker?”

He nodded, very proud of himself. “Impressive huh?”

“Yeah, a bit…so who’s going to be moniker and who’s going to be Phoebe?”

He shook his head “Oh BOO! That was horrible, Kevin!”

“I thought it was pretty funny.”

“You know who else would have thought that was funny?”

“Let me guess…hrmmm….Sam?” I asked with one brow raised.

He pointed to his nose and dinged a few times.

“If we did the whole Spice Girls thing, we’d need to come up with a one word description followed by Backstreet or Boy.”

“I didn’t realize there was a rule book on this stuff, Sam.” He put his glass of slime on the coffee table and let out a huge burp.

“There’s rules for everything young Nicholas with an H!”

He rolled his eyes at me.

“I think you should start spelling your name like that. You know to represent the more grown up you.”

“Like how that John Mellen Cougar Camp guy changed his.”

I let out a laugh, “It’s John Cougar Mellencamp and yes.”

“Or Debbie Gibson turning into Debra…” He of course emphasized the ‘bra’ part of her name.

“I tweeted your name with an H the other day and the fans went ballistic. I’m pretty sure a few of them had a stroke.”

He laughed at that.

“I can’t believe you don’t know how to spell Nick’s name, Kevin!” He said in his high pitched voice he used when imitating our fans. “How can you get that wrong, Oh my God what a travesty!”

“Basically.”

“See? The world isn’t ready for Nick with an H just yet.”

“Speaking of being ready…Are you ready for today, Nicholas with an H?”

He shrugged.

We made the bold decision to allow some fans to listen to a few of the finished songs. Talk about an intense meeting. We kept going back and forth about whether or not that would be a good idea, afraid that the songs would leak out via phone and all over the internet. Sometimes a little innocent leakage was a good thing, but not in this case. We wanted this album to be incredibly special, something that fans would anticipate and be excited about. We saw what ‘leaks’ could do to effect record sales and it wasn’t pretty.

I remember playing a group of fans, “My Beautiful Woman,” In the parking lot at the end of a charity golfing event Brian had hosted. I thought I was being so nice and the fans seemed so excited about it. They were smiling and even singing along.  At first I couldn’t believe how quickly they caught on to it until one of them said, “I listened to that song my entire drive here!” Turns out they had already heard most of the songs from the album, much to my dismay.

I was furious, not gonna lie. I hated the fact that most of our album plus many potential ‘B’ sides had made it on the internet. I hated the fans reactions to most of the songs. I hated how they acted like they knew more about our music than we did. At that point in my life though, I hated the fans and music in general.

So of course, I had mixed feelings about the entire thing. On the one hand, I was curious to see what people other than us thought of what we were doing, but on the other hand, I wanted it to be kept under wraps for just awhile longer. There was a fear of these people hating what they heard. What if that happened? Would we actually take their opinions into consideration and scrap all the hard work only to start from scratch?

I was pretty proud of everything we produced the last three weeks. The songs we chose to play for the fans were things we all agreed on one hundred percent. What’s worse, letting them listen and then not caring what their reactions were or not letting them listen at all? That’s the debate that ensued for a good three hours until we finally decided to be brave and just go for it.

Today was the big day.

“I think it’ll go well.” Nick said after a few minutes of thinking it through.

“You think they’ll like what they hear?”

“You know what Sam, I really do.” He smiled at me then. His real genuine and grown up smile and pat my shoulder as he said it. For some reason it eased my mind a bit.

“I’m not feeling the Sam thing.” I said, breaking up our grown up moment.

“It’s your nickname; you really have no say in the ‘feel’ of it.”

“A nickname usually isn’t a real name. Sam is more like a dog’s name.”

He bit the inside of his cheek and moved his eyes to look up at the ceiling as he thought further about what to call me. I’m sure a plethora of very colorful names came to his mind. In the midst of all the thinking, Howie and Brian entered the room looking at Nick staring at the ceiling and instinctively followed his eyes in that direction.

“What are we looking at?” Howie finally asked after staring at nothing for far too long.

“He’s trying to think of a good nickname for me.”

“What happened, shithead didn’t stick?” Enter AJ.

“I only call him that when he’s not in the room, AJ.”

“Nice.” I shook my head.

“I’m pretty great with giving people nicknames; maybe it should be my job.”

“Yeah AJ, you’re awesome at that.”

“Rok stuck to you for a long time, didn’t it?” He asked Brian as he flailed his arms around. I swear if we tied his hands behind his back he wouldn’t be able to speak. “And Jizzle for me…”

“Well Kevin seems to think we all need one descriptive word for each of us like the Spice Girls.”

“Nick can be gassy!”

We all laughed at the quickness of Howie’s diss. He’s getting better and better at it.

“Nah I like Nicholas with an H for him.” Brian said walking over to Nick and sitting on his lap. “Don’t you like that, Mr. Man or should I say Nicholas with an H?”

“Nicholas with an H isn’t Nick. It would be Nitch…like snitch! It makes no freaking sense to spell Nickolas with an H. Whoever thought of that was stupid.”

“Are you calling Santa stupid?” Howie tried to sound gangsta when he said that.

“No, I’m calling Santa’s momma stupid!”

“What a Ho!” They all looked at me like I made no sense. “You know ho… as in ho ho ho…merry Christmas?”

Still nothing but a confused silence. “I know…I know… Sam would have made that joke, right?”

“I don’t even think Sam would have found that one punny. SEE? I made a joke too!”

“Nitch the snitch, I like that!”

“Your brain is still back there?” Brian asked AJ.

“What? I like that. I think we should call him that from now on.”

“We’re looking for a nickname for Kevin, not Nitch.”

“Oh my God, I am SO gonna quit you guys if you keep up with the stupid Nick with an H thing!”

“You’re gonna quit us?” I asked trying to sound really upset.

“Oh no, don’t quit us Nitch. The fans would not be happy!”

“No they wouldn’t Howard. They would angrily tweet all of you! Oh my God how could you make poor Nick quit! He doesn’t deserve that!” Once again in his high fan voice.

“Guys, we should really get a move on.” Fun time was over as we all looked at the clock and saw we had about an hour before we had to be at the studio. I felt bad pointing it out, but someone had to.

“I can’t believe this is it.” Brian exhaled a deep breath. I could tell he was feeling a little uneasy about the listening party as well.

I looked down at the pants I was wearing. For some reason, my wife felt compelled to buy us all matching pajamas for this living experience. Like these three weeks would be nothing but a huge slumber party. After I told her that guys didn’t do that kind of thing, she still made me bring them anyway.

“Sure you don’t.” She had said in a half joking mostly mocking way.

I had forgotten about them until last night when I felt compelled to hand them out after dinner. They all got a pretty big laugh out of it and then Brian came up with the idea to wear them into the studio for our last day of recording. What better way to go out then in a nice comfy pair of pjs?

Plus the fans that were coming into the stupio would get a kick out of it too, and it might help to ease the tension in the room.

So today was going to be a pajama day.

“I guess we should go put our matching jammies on now then, huh?” AJ asked staring down at mine.

“I suppose so.”

Nick stood up and helped me to my feet. “I think we should huddle for a minute.”

He went and stood in the middle of the room and put his hand out as if doing the hokey pokey. We all knew what he wanted us to do but it was more fun just staring at him standing there in that pose waiting.

“Well?” He said after a few seconds.

We finally joined him and put our hands in the center.

“Here’s to an excellent day in the studio. Our last one in London but only the beginning of our new journey…let’s do this!”

We all then said “Backstreet!” And let our arms go up in the air.

It felt good doing that chant again.

“Okay guys let’s all go get dressed up in our matching outfits now!”

“Way to kill the moment Howie.”

“I’m sorry Nitch!”

“I am gonna quit you!”

They all were babbling as they walked out of the room and I only shook my head and followed.

“I guess Sam it is.” I muttered to myself as I shut the light off.