LOCATION. New York City - Marquee Skydeck002. The DJ
INTERACTIONS . N/A
The music was all-encompassing, loud and brash and in-your-face, vibrant and high-tempo. Energy was high and rhythms pulsed through every action and movement; people danced, drank, ate. Waiters flowed through the proceedings like water snaking through the gaps between stones, seeing routes no one else could, performing their own dance unto themselves. Those who were uninterested in amuse-bouchées and prosecco instead crowded the bar, shouting orders and pointing at cocktail menus, the beleaguered bar staff behind the counters working diligently to sling spirits and mixers and bottles of beer to their demanding audience, the activity there a constant buzz, drinkers like worker bees buzzing in and out of the hive in reverse, arriving dry and parched, leaving with nectar. Ephraim stood in a quiet corner, eyes closed, head swaying back and forth as he silently judged the music, each new mix and track choice tallied and marked and filed. Lots of classics, lots of crowd-pleasers; tracks people would recognize and cheer at and pull friends to the dancefloor because 'oh my god this is my song! Let's go!' - perfectly serviceable, but all Ephraim could think was 'where's the edge?'. He had no sense of the DJ's personality - no idea what kind of music they liked to play, only what they thought the audience wanted to hear. That was the first mistake. The audience never knew what they wanted to hear, and whatever notions they clung to were inevitably incorrect.
He pushed off the wall, finishing his drink and making his way to the venue entrance; guests continued to filter in, somehow endless yet the club felt to have reached a capacity plateau, an upper-limit on 'packed' that it quietly maintained without seeming to get any more or less busy, as if the dancefloor itself just expanded another couple square-inches for every new pair of legs through the door. Ephraim pushed against the flow, fighting the current to leave; and then he was out, breathing cool air and seizing an elevator all to himself as another batch of party-goers got out and left the lift behind them empty. He jumped in and hit the button for the ground floor lobby, a moment of peaceful meditation as he descended and watched the lights blink on and off through the levels; eventually, he reached the bottom, and stepped out quickly, inviting in another group of dressed-up men and women eager to make their way upstairs to the celebrations.
At the lobby coat-check Ephraim retrieved the rucksack he'd checked at the beginning of the night and thanked the clerk before slipping him a generous tip. Without a word shared between them, Ephraim was beckoned by the young attendant to slink into the staff-only corridor behind the cloakroom; it ran around the outside of the lobby and held an express employee elevator shaft for quick movement up and down the skyscraper, leading to similar restricted-access areas the length of the tower, and it was in this elevator that Ephraim's elegant-yet-subtle shirt and dress pants were swapped for patchwork denim, distressed cotton, rough leather. On the ground floor, Ephraim stepped into the lift with a rucksack, and back up at the Skydeck, Bobby Rifo stepped out, Ephraim's face replaced with the mask. The rucksack hung, invisible in plain sight, amongst scores of identical bags hung across staff lockers.
When Rifo emerged from the server's double-doors he'd already caused a stir in the staff who were quick to snap photos and try for selfies and whisper excitedly to each other; as he made his way to the dancefloor the response from the guests was more mixed - many recognised him and clamoured accordingly, whooping and cheering as Bobby waded steadily toward the DJ booth, but many others didn't, all levels of society represented here; the industry magnates and modern Manhattan aristocracy tended not to keep up with the EDM scene, or music much in general. Still, as more saw that mask cutting through the crowd the people began to part before him, his intention very clear: here's Bobby Rifo, gracing the celebrations ready to play a surprise set, and absolutely nobody in the building was about to stop him. Some wondered if he'd gate-crashed, having used the staff door; others knew that no, this was exactly his style, a rock'n'roll entrance to make waves and build hype before even touching a deck, and Bill Tremayne clearly had his finger on the pulse more than most gave him credit for. Whatever anyone thought about Bobby Rifo's appearance, everyone knew one thing: they wanted to hear what he wanted to play.
When the performance was over, Rifo basked in the afterglow as he once more crossed the dancefloor, pushing through the praise and clamouring hands of his erstwhile audience toward the bar. He met no resistance there; not even a charge, just the requested cocktail in a lowball glass and a couple of beers slid emphatically toward him with reverence in the bartender's eyes and a wave of the hand when Bobby pulled the wallet from his jacket pocket. No one could tell through the mask, but he'd smirked, having expected to get comped, and then in another show he'd left a twenty-dollar bill on the bar-top anyway. It was less than what he'd have been charged for the drinks - but just the show of it was enough, and no one was doing the maths anyway. The necks of the beer bottles fit snug between his fingers, and he gently rocked the cocktail side to side in the other hand as he turned from the bar, pausing for a selfie with a bold fan, and then pushed his way across the venue and out onto the Skydeck proper, enjoying the relief of the cool night air on his face through the mask.
He found a corner quieter than the rest, although still far from abandoned, and pulled a side-table close to set his drinks on and site an ashtray nearby before rolling his mask up past his mouth, resting it just beneath his nose as he rolled a cigarette and fished a lighter from his pocket. The gentle orange of the flame flickered in the breeze, eclipsed by the million lights of Manhattan stretching out before him across the city, New Year's celebrations underway across New York. Somewhere vaguely nearby was Times Square, and the crush of people could be seen from here even around the corners of the streets below; everywhere he looked, tiny pedestrians flocked like ants along the lines of the streets and alleyways, coming and going, never-ceasing. Rifo took a long pull of his drink - a Boulevardier, made strong - and polished it off in one, setting the glass back down and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, taking a drag from the cigarette as his hand fished for a beer. People murmured in his vicinity, and he knew his brief respite lived on borrowed time; he couldn't decide if tonight should be an early exit for Rifo, or if it should be one of Bobby's famed blotto nights, a raucous evening of booze and debauchery that suited Rifo's image. He'd not had one in a while; the hangovers were rarely worth the PR. But standing there looking out over the city, cigarette smoke burning in his lungs and the bittersweet combination of the cocktail lingering in his throat, there was an essence to the air; the feeling that a good solid drinking session was the best way of surviving the night. And it was New Year's Eve, after all.
He was proven right about being interrupted when a brunette figure in a black dress sidled up next to him; Bobby was no stranger to flings and lovers, but Ephraim wasn't sure he was in the mood. Either way, with two drinks down and a third getting started, he'd just gotten comfortable as the cold of the night settled in around him, and he was loathe to give it up quite so easily. He passed his cigarette wordlessly, but the girl declined with a flat palm and short shake of her head. He didn't look at her, but he noticed her careful body language, the deliberate movements to come close but not too close, a way of standing to accentuate distractions instead of facilitate conversation. Ephraim also noticed she did not possess a drink, and that got his guard up.
"Nice night for it. Happy New Year's Eve."
"And to you." He replied, not looking at her as he worked on the second beer.
"Impressive set."
"Yes, I thought so. Got things moving in the right direction."
Josie turned to look back through the glass panel wall to the dancefloor, where things certainly had turned up a notch; the picks now were less 'safe' and kept the tempo Bobby had set, keeping people entranced in a well-crafted rhythm rather than relying on familiarity to move feet.
"Bobby Rifo's Secret New Year's Eve Set. Mr. Tremayne can certainly make things happen in this city."
"I played because I wanted to, not because I was asked." Ephraim said, his hackles rising slightly at the inference it'd been someone else's idea.
"Certainly." Josie answered, letting the matter lie.
There was a lull. Rifo clearly wasn't biting, and it seemed Josie had already gotten his goat inadvertently, so she decided to drop pretence and bite the bullet. She didn't envision the conversation going very far, but she wasn't about to waste an opportunity.
"Josie Tatl, Tatl-Tales." She said, introducing herself properly, at the same time fishing the recorder out of her clutch. She was many things, but dishonest was not one of them; in her line of work, she'd often found being forthcoming provided better results than trying the underhanded tactics employed by many of her competitors. Honey, vinegar, flies - something along those lines, she reasoned. If it got results, who was she to question the method?
"Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?" She gestured with her head at the recorder held in her palm, thumb hovering above the Record button.
Ephraim didn't give any indication of consent one way or the other, but he did pull the last drag from his cigarette and flick the stub over the railing, watching the last embers tumble into the night air. Before he turned, he finished his beer too and, for a moment, seemed poised to toss that over the edge as well; instead, he set it down on the table next to the other empties and pulled his mask back down over his chin, and then breathed the smoke out into it, wreathing his head in dissipating plume. It was quite the effect, though like many other posturings she'd witnessed from men trying to be impressive or mysterious, Josie remained unaffected.
He finally looked her head-on, his gaze lingering over her features for a short while, trying to think where he recognised her face from, before slotting the pieces together. Some independent blog/vlog thing. Couple viral video articles on YouTube. An enterprising young journalist to be sure, but still a journalist, and therefore not to be trusted nor trifled with.
"Oh. I know you. Tatl's a bit on-the-nose." He said, a response Josie didn't quite know what to do with.
"Excuse me?"
"Well, I don't go around calling myself Bobby Playmusic, do I?"
Josie cocked an eyebrow, aware she was being mocked, but unmoved. It was nothing she hadn't heard before, on the playground at school or in her chosen career path. She'd even named her platform accordingly - leaning into the skid, so to speak. Did Rifo really think some recess-level mockery was enough to deter her away?
"What do you call yourself under there, Mr. Rifo?" She challenged back, putting a pointed emphasis on 'Mr. Rifo'. Ephraim found himself suddenly and sharply bored of this still-brief interaction. As much as Josie had dealt with riffs on her name, he'd dealt with prying fingers trying to peel back Rifo and the mask, and he strongly suspected each of them were as fed up with their individual trials as the other.
"Buzz off. Security'll throw you out if you're a pain in the ass, and you're being one." He turned away, standing up from his lean against the railing entirely and making for the bar, thinking - accurately - that he could lose her in the crowd, and she could pester someone else. She followed him anyway, persistant. You had to be in this industry. Ephraim heard the 'click' of the Record button as she lingered at his heels, irritatingly close.
"Mr. Rifo, care to comment on rumours your vocal anti-AI stance is a conscious U-turn to cover for your work up to this point not being as authentically 'Bobby' as you might like your audience to believe? 'The DJ doth protest too much', perhaps?"
Bobby stopped and pivoted.
"I'd rather kill myself."
"Than comment?"
"Than use AI, or ghost writers, or try stealing other people's work, or anything else they're saying just because they're jealous I can do it and they can't." He'd leant into the recorder mic, making sure his voice was clear and lucid. "There's your quote."
He leant back up, pressing the Stop button on the device for Josie before saying "Now fuck off," and then, deftly, hitting the bottom of it and sending it flying up into the air out of her grip. She fumbled for it, juggling it a couple times before securing the catch and holding it tightly to her chest; when she looked up, Bobby Rifo was already gone, the back of his black mask difficult to spot amongst the crowd in the low-light.
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