Show Me

The problem with your fantasies

They won’t happen on their own

I won’t know to do that to you

Not until I’m shown

So show me show me show me show me show me show me…

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The lyrics were written on a piece of loose-leaf, torn from a notebook. The paper itself was protected behind glass, sealed in a small wooden frame, hung up behind the bar at The Plateau. Old theatres tend to collect keepsakes and mementos, but with The Plateau, it felt more like vestigial parts no one had reason to remove. When asked about the lyric’s origins, the current bartender couldn’t say. The frame was hung before they arrived. Even if they wanted to move them, the frame was bolted to the wall. Those lyrics were important enough to immortalize in this way so for them, they were part of the fabric of the venue. 

×

The Show

The crowd was insane. An audience unhinged. 

This was the first time anyone in North America was getting to see Our Hoards of Saviors live and the show was off to a great start. Local bands opened and did not disappoint, playing like so much depended on it. The Plateau was chosen because of its infamous history. It was known in the punk community as the site of some of the most memorable musical performances, but audiences and performers agreed, it wasn’t an easy space to be in. Its more sinister reputation was deserved. A crowd like this one felt like it would stomp through the disintegrated wood flooring, but no one cared. It was a wild show and would live on in the minds of those in attendance for a long time, all before Hoards played a single chord.

When the band came out the noise in the venue shook its foundations. Distortion and feedback radiated from the walls. Three young, tattooed, denim and chains clad punks who purposefully, performatively looked like what parents feared. When they were ready to play, a single static spark could have set the air on fire on account of the worked-up clouds of particulate and alcoholic vapour. 

The lead singer and guitarist, Alfie Plank, stepped up to the mic, looked back at his band with a grin and shouted that their first one was a new song that he wrote the lyrics to moments ago. To prove it, he took a piece of paper from his pocket, crumpled it, and tossed it into the crowd. Bodies converged dangerously around it, like starved carnivorous fish being offered a finger. 

With a quick count of four, they were off. 

The music was fast and loud, distorted beyond recognition, the drums like well sequenced firecrackers. The noise forced all bodies in the room into frenzied movement, a vortex-like mosh pit. Water and beer flew through the air in uninterrupted parabolic arcs. Alfie’s singing cut through all of the chaos. His voice was passionate, angry, and sensual, matching the lyric’s simple message of desperately wanting to please. 

If the song had ended where one would have expected, this would have gone down as the most incredible introduction in the venue’s storied history.

But Alfie couldn’t let the song end.

As the song progressed, those capable of paying attention noticed that his trademark cocky grin had faded. He was still playing the song but through muscle memory alone, gazing out at the crowd with a look, equal parts shock, and amazement. 

He shouted the final lyrics of the song for so long, the crowd went through several cycles of thinking it was, cheeky troublemaking, fuck off punk attitude, exaggeration, worrisome and finally, art. He was still yelling, sweating, and in tears when the crowd fell silent. He had to be taken off stage by his band mates. 

Everyone in the venue could hear the echoes of show me show me show me ringing in their ears as they filed out of The Plateau. At the very least, it was the most memorable one song performance they had ever seen. What would turn out to be Our Hoards of Saviors’ last.

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Alfie

Alfie walked out on stage to a view which he was only now starting to grow accustomed: fans, wild with adoration, looking for a damn good time. Hoards was pleased to oblige. He took a hard look at this creep show venue their manager had chosen because stories circulated that the place was haunted. It fucking looked it. It would do just fine. 

Alfie had a new song and some lyrics inspired by an ex he was ready to trot out and first up was as good a time as any to try.

“This is a new song. Finished writing the lyrics backstage. Who wants ‘em? ONE TWO THREE FOUR!”

Nothing felt better.

The crowd went nuts. The moshing was violent, and Alfie had this silly feeling of being proud of the chaos. Looking down at the people pushed up against the waist high stage, he could see fans screaming, eager to be able to sing along to this new song, couples making out aggressively and the rest, kids, eyes closed, passively, almost peacefully being swayed by the tectonic ebb and flow of the pit. He was that kid. It wasn’t that long ago. Getting kicked in the face by strung out bass players, making out with whoever he met at the stage, sometimes without ever exchanging words, taking in every wave of sound knowing his ears would ring for days. This is what he was able to give to his fans now. There was nowhere else he would rather be.

Except.

Alfie got to the last part of the lyrics feeling a bit uneasy about some of the people in the crowd. It was stupid, he’d performed for skin heads who had no problem starting violence at the slightest provocation, but this place had his eyes darting at nonsensical shadows that moved too quickly. Peoples’ faces blurred unnaturally in the marauding follow spot. 

He already knew he would repeat the last words, “show me,” as many times as needed to go beyond audience expectation and the band knew to follow his cue but as he started singing the words, everything changed. When he looked down at the same people at the edge of the stage, the screaming fans were now smashing their faces at his feet, flattening their features to the point where they were bloodied and unrecognizable. The kissing couples, usually one of his favourite things to see at his shows, were now devouring each other, biting down hard on cheeks and lips, tearing flesh, not bothering to chew, just continuing to make out with long tendrils of each others faces hanging from their open mouths. And the rest, the ones who looked so peaceful, were now staring at him with wide open, awful eyes, screaming and amplifying the distortion coming from the band’s speakers right back at him. In the noise, he could hear what sounded like hundreds of stories being told at once. 

Then he noticed, there were too many hands on the edge of the stage. 

There weren’t that many people standing there. 

The sight of all those disembodied hands is what broke Alfie. The only thing that prevented him from losing it entirely at that moment, in front of what was originally an adoring crowd, was the repetition of those words: show me. 

Maybe he had asked for this. 

The Plateau had simply responded to his insistent request.