36 EVIE
E VIE
I’m not sure why I’ve never told you about the time I spent in England.
I know you’re aware that I’ve been there.
I think I said something about a college trip or some such because it was easier than telling you the truth about it, which I couldn’t do.
But I never told you about the rest of it.
Or about the plans I’d had to move there.
I was afraid it would raise too many questions, I suppose.
And also, it was difficult for me to think of it.
Just the thought of London would bring up images of us walking on rainy, dark wintertime streets, holding hands in the drizzling rain that reflected the streetlights.
Touches of snow that would melt on the cobblestones below, both of us in dark hats and dark boots and dark coats and light hearts.
In London, we piled into the cramped flat in Camden Town where Tommy and Carter were roommates, with empty fireplaces and candles on the mantels, lyrics and art posters taped on the white walls.
We’d sit around big tables at Indian restaurants, and then we’d endure my sorry attempts at cooking kitchari .
We went to pubs near the Lock where the guys were welcomed back with open arms like old family, having once played on tiny black stages to small crowds for little more than beer money before hitting it big.
At night, we’d go to Alex’s favorite clubs, the tightly knit group of us creating an energy that people seemed drawn to watch.
Those were wild nights, I won’t lie, all blending together forming the most fun of my life.
Of course, they would all have much nicer places to live in one day than that old flat on Harmood Street, but I think they held on to it for a while, if only for sentimental reasons.
I like that they did that. Later, Carter’s place in particular was stunning, with works of art throughout.
Though Tommy’s country house near the Devon coast was pretty incredible as well.
But I’m getting ahead of myself.
We also were in the north back then. The label had rented them a residential recording studio that was situated in the picturesque hills outside of York, converted out of a seventeenth-century estate and barn, near to the Dales.
With some of the most impressive recording gear in the UK, six bedrooms, and a full mixing and editing suite on-site, it had all the comforts of home without any distractions.
A welcome escape from the world for the impressive list of musicians who had recorded there.
Carter spent long days writing and recording and long nights in the studio.
But we had quiet moments as well, sometimes watching the rare snowfall outside the windows onto the pastures beyond.
I worried, as I so often did, that my presence was a distraction and that perhaps I should leave them to it. I said as much one day.
He set aside the book he had been reading in bed and looked over at me. “You’re serious right now, aren’t you?”
“I just don’t want to hold you guys up.”
He paused, a smile playing on his lips. “Hold us up?” He rolled onto his side, propping his head on his fist. “Ev, I’m writing better now than ever before. And it has a lot to do with you.”
I looked up at him. “Really?”
He touched his fingers to his lips, a gesture he often did when he was forming a thought and choosing his words with care.
Every time he did it, it made me want to reach over and kiss him.
“When I write now, it’s like you’re always sitting close by, even when you’re not around.
I picture you listening. I write every note and lyric as if you’re the only person who’s going to hear it, and it doesn’t matter if anyone else in the world likes it as long as you do. ”
“But, Carter, you wrote some amazing things before we even met.”
“Thanks, and ... I guess. But still, it’s true.
It’s like you’re this source of life and creative energy that was missing in my writing before, as if it has blood flowing through it now.
Whether it’s directly about us or not, every song feels like it’s for you.
But what’s even more amazing is that before I met you, I used to go crazy because I couldn’t shut the music off when I wanted to.
Once I met you, I found this sense of peace.
The whole world, even the music, could disappear for a while when you were around.
And then when I’m ready to write, I can turn it back on and it’s better than ever.
It’s the best of both worlds. Balanced. So if it were up to me, you’d never leave my side.
” He reached over and kissed me. “But then again, you already knew that part.”
It was the most beautiful compliment I’d ever received.
“Thank you,” I whispered, kissing him back.
“Okay. So now that that’s settled, speaking of the tour, what’s the plan for the next month or so?”
“I’ll get the last bit of footage we need while you’re in the studio, and then I have to head back to New York at the end of the month for a few weeks to start editing and finish packing my apartment.”
“Do you think you could squeeze in a couple of days to come to LA?”
“Why? What do you have in mind?”
“We have this thing we have to do. And ... I’m going to need a date.”
“Yeah? What kind of thing?”
“The Grammys.”
I remember my eyes going wide. It was their first nomination of what would become many over the years, and they had gotten word of it while I’d been asleep the night before. “Moonstar” had been nominated for Best Song, and they had been invited to perform.
“So you’ll come, then?”
I smiled. “I wouldn’t miss it.”
He looked at me, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. “Ev, look—I know that things are all getting kind of crazy—the album, the new tour, all of this—and they’re only about to get crazier. I know that your life is affected too.”
“It’s fine. Really. I’m happy.” And I was. But I’d begun to realize that it was true what I’d heard—my life was becoming completely defined by his, and I’d been feeling a quiet uneasiness.
Once, when we were out on tour, the wife of the lead singer of The Evolution had come to visit.
Monet Garett wasn’t someone you easily forgot, and I always remembered the kind way she’d spoken to me.
“Be careful,” she told me. “It’s wonderful now, believe me, I know.
But later, when you’re at home with kids and the man you love is off in the world, you may just wish you’d made different choices.
No matter how much it breaks your heart to think it.
” Watching her and her husband, Sam, they were completely enamored with one another.
Still, the conversation had stuck with me.
“I promise you. We’re always going to come first, okay?” he told me.
“Promise?”
“First. You and me.”
Like I said, we had a bit of trouble keeping our word sometimes. But we did the best we could.
The day before I was scheduled to fly back to New York, I joined them in the studio, where they were recording the first songs for the new album, which was still untitled at the time but would become Sigma Five . I loved watching them work, whether they were writing or recording.
Carter would often play them the first draft of the song on the piano.
Gradually, the others would join in, arranging their own parts, tweaking lyrics or notes, until the end result was a distinctly Mayluna sound that could be achieved only by a group of musicians working perfectly together to create magic.
It was otherworldly, as if some greater source energy was shining down on them and through them, and they were merely the instruments and scribes.
Sometimes I filmed. Other times I sat curled up on a black leather couch in the dimly lit room with the producer and engineer, the scent of whiskey and the occasional cigarette filling the air.
When the label suggested a photographer be brought in, I recommended Derek.
I trusted him and knew that he would be the perfect fit.
It began his lifelong friendship with the band.
We were all there one day, and it was nearly midnight when it came time for Carter to start laying down the lead vocal track to a new song that I hadn’t yet heard in completed form.
He’d been somewhat secretive about it—working on it while I was away or asleep.
Before he started recording that day, he went outside on his own for a bit.
I remember it was a clear night, with a few rare stars peeking through the crisp winter sky.
When he came back in, he took me by the hand to follow him.
“Come on, I want you here in the booth for this, next to me,” he said.
Tommy, who was usually the joker of the group, grew serious as Alex started the intro.
It had a haunting quality and an ever-building crescendo that captivated me instantly.
A few measures in, I recognized it as the song that Carter had been fiddling with our first night at the beach house.
That strange melody that felt so inexplicably familiar to me from another time.
It sounded like the feelings of falling in love—intense, passionate, sweetly lulling, and dark and safe—all at the same time.
When Carter sang the lyrics he’d written to accompany it, a stillness came over me as I listened.
An ancient road down we’ll go
You and I
The moon that to the water led
A dance along the razor’s edge
With tangled hands in secret lands
You and I
The music sounded like us. With the microphone in hand, Carter watched me, reflecting the darkly sultry feel of the song, eyes locked on mine.
He leaned down, singing just inches from my face, and my eyes warmed with tears.
He repeated the final words with the perfect simplicity of just Alex’s guitar behind him.
There was at once
an appearance of light
Above the cloud with its shadow
beyond the pale of night
You and I
As you know, that song, titled “An Appearance of Light,” would become their breakthrough hit the following year—the one that propelled them into stardom.
It soared up the charts, reaching number one in multiple countries, helped by heavy radio rotation and a near-constant buzz.
It earned widespread critical acclaim, including another Grammy Award for Best Rock Song and a Brit Award for Best British Single.
The Sigma Five album was nominated for Best Album, while yet another song on the album was nominated for Best Performance.
The lyrics “Tangled hands in secret lands, you and I” became the anthem of hip lovers and defined a particular time of life for a lot of people of that generation.
Over the years, it was featured in TV shows and films and has been covered by dozens of other artists.
It often tops the lists of best songs of all time.
But then, on that night, it was just a moody alternative-rock song. A pure love song. And as it concluded, Carter leaned down and kissed me in a way that I’d never been kissed. No one else in the room existed.
“Ahem, guys?” The producer’s voice sounded over the speaker in the ceiling. “Uh ... guys?”
We ignored him.
We finally ended our embrace when a loud cacophony of sounds erupted around us: guitars screeching, drums banging, and a chorus of amused laughter. Carter stood and looked down at me, and I looked up at him.
Behind us, Derek d’Orsay held a camera. Sent in to do a few promotional shots that day, he captured the two of us in silhouette, my hair hanging long down my back, and the details of my face hidden by Carter’s hand as it lay gently on my cheek.
A photo, captured in the grainy light of a candlelit studio, that would become one of the most iconic images in music history.
Knowing the delicate nature of the relationship, Derek never revealed my name. The mystery girl in the studio.
But now you know the story behind it.