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Scarface
Rising British rock band from Louise Wener's 2002 novel, Goodnight Steve McQueen. Wener was a singer/songwriter in the real Britpop band Sleeper in the 1990s.
Loser protagonist/guitarist Danny McQueen, desperate for musical success, tracks down old high-school pal Ike Kavanagh who's now this band's lead singer. McQueen manages a pay-to-play deal, paying $1,000 to open for Scarface on tour.
"Scarface. You remember. You said you used to go to school with their lead singer."
"Yeah, complete prat. His band are awful, never make it in a million years."
"Well, according co this they already have. Says here that they signed a huge deal in America at the end of lase year."
"No ... they can't have. Are you serious?"
"Yeah, they've been touring the States for the last nine months. NME reckons they've sold close to a million records."
"How can they ... I mean, how did it happen? Why hasn't there been any news about them over here?"
"Well," says Matty, reading out excerpts from their centrepage spread, "it says here that they're coming over in a couple of months to do a British tour. Their record company wants to break them in the UK before they start work on their next album in LA. Wow. I can't believe you know their lead singer, man. That's amazing."
I need to see for myself. l reach over, grab the paper off Matty and start scanning the article for information. I rake in a hundred facts a second: their chart positions; their front covers; their designer disheveled cloches; the stupid, squinty, mockmoody grins on their faces that say they still can't quite believe their own good fortune. Scarface. Bastards. Talentless, witless, sub-Kurt Cobain copyist bastards. How could this have happened? How could Ike Kavanagh have turned into a millionaire big-cheese rock star without me knowing it? How could he be recording his next album in Los Angeles and going out to dinner with Mick and Keith while I'm still working for Kostas in a specialist video shop in Crouch End? I can 't take it in. I can't seem to breathe.
And then I notice it: a small but perfectly formed sentence lurking at the bottom of the page. Right next to the picture of their shiny silver tour bus; curled up underneath the venue listings for their "major UK tour."
SUPPORT ACTS STILL TO BE ANNOUNCED.
Support acts still to be announced. I have an idea. I lift up the article and beckon Vince and Matty across the table.
"Now that," says Vince, screwing up my "to do" list and flicking it into the ashtray, "is what I call a plan."
