M-M-M-My Audition

When I first moved to Southern California from Pennsylvania in 1978 to become a working musician, I didn't really know anyone here, so I registered with Musician's Contact Service. MCS was a company where, for a fee, players looking for bands could hook up with bands looking for players. One of the first auditions I got through MCS was in the late summer of '78. They didn't tell me the name of the act or anything about them, but I packed my gear into the back of the old Pinto station wagon and drove to a rehearsal studio in Hollywood for an audition. I looked like a typical musician in 1978--longish hair, a goatee, and bell-bottom corduroy jeans. I walked into the rehearsal studio, and there were these four guys all dressed in tight, straight black jeans, black boots, white shirts, and skinny black ties, with hair that was shorter than the hair I was used to seeing on musicians. The guitar players both had cool old Vox AC30 amplifiers and nice guitars. There was one guy who seemed to speak for the rest of them, so I introduced myself and told him I'd bring my gear in. He told me I didn't have to and pointed to an old Wurlitzer electric piano in the corner. I sat down and thought we'd all decide on a tune or two to jam on. But the spokesman-type guy came over to me and asked me if I knew any Beatles tunes, since I had written on my MCS profile that The Beatles, Chuck Berry, and Gershwin were some of my influences. Well, I was in luck, because I knew the piano parts to a bunch of Beatles songs lick for lick. So I played "Martha My Dear" and the piano solo in "Lovely Rita Meter Maid" and the Billy Preston piano solo in "Get Back" and the harpsichord solo in "In My Life" and a couple of others. The main guy seemed pretty impressed, and the other guys just kind of milled around. Finally, the main guy said they really liked me and asked me if I would be willing to shave my goatee because they weren't into facial hair. I originally grew my goatee because Wilt Chamberlain had a goatee and I thought it would improve my basketball game, but I said sure, I'd shave my goatee, no problem. So the main dude said okay, fine, we'll give you a call and let you know what we decide. Nobody else said anything, and nobody else played a note besides me. They never told me who they were. I had a phone number that MCS gave me for these guys, and I called a couple of days later, and the guy said they hadn't really decided if they were going to add a keyboard player, but I was the front-runner if they were. Didn't hear from them again.

About a month later, I was walking by the record store in the mall, and there was a big display in the front of the store with a new album, and on the front of the album was a picture of those guys, all dressed exactly the same as they were dressed the day of my audition.

The Knack. My Sharona.

I guess they decided not to add a keyboard player.