Chapter 9 You Know We’re on Each Other’s Team
You Know We’re on Each Other’s Team
HARMONY
A wall of glass splits the vocal booth in two—the most distance I could get between me and Riff. He’s not here yet, so I try to get comfortable on my side while I wait.
Apparently Riff was trying to get the producer to let us come into the studio separately, to record our parts on different days and not have to see each other, but …
no dice. Luckily they don’t want us in the exact same booth (at least not yet) because they need the vocals isolated to balance the tracks.
If we don’t get the “chemistry” just right though, Stef tells me, they might make us try again with nothing but a single condenser mic between us.
I adjust my headphones and take a deep breath.
Is it normal to feel stage fright when I’m not onstage? When there’s no real audience besides managers and sound engineers? God … it’s starting to remind me of when I did Lucky Stars and I had to take propranolol an hour before performing.
As much as I hate to admit it, Charles had a point the other night about going in blind to things. With no warning, I didn’t have much time to freak out about performing “Lip Sync” with Riff; I just had to get up and do it, spur of the moment, and deal with what it meant later.
“I just act—I don’t think.”
Now that I’ve had several days to stress out about the recording, about turning my own words about kissing Riff into a thing that will live forever that people can buy and/or stream continuously, it’s putting me on edge.
I can’t believe I agreed to this. Only the thought of getting my masters back keeps me grounded.
They’re the one thing from that part of my past I might actually be able to recover.
I’ll never look that good or have that kind of energy again, but damn it, I can get on the path to legally owning my early work.
A few minutes later, Riff strides in wearing a tight blue Henley tee (his arms tan from the perpetual California sun like he’s been out baling hay), distressed jeans, and a white Stetson.
We make eye contact through the glass and I scowl as I hit the talkback. “You’re not seriously wearing a cowboy hat for this, are you?”
Riff grabs it by the top and adjusts it, then presses his own talkback button.
“If I angle it just right, it covers part of my face. I figured that would be a good thing; I wouldn’t want to be too much of a distraction to you while you’re trying to work.
” He winks the same way he does in the “Grind My Gears” video.
So much for him apparently telling Charles he wanted to “rebrand” himself. I still don’t understand what that meant—because Riff really doesn’t seem to be averse to this image.
I give him my most saccharine smile. “I’ll put this in country terms so you can be sure to understand: The day I let your smug face distract me from doing my job … will be the day pigs fly.”
He scoffs. “I’m in a recording booth getting ready to sing a romantic ballad with you, of all people. I think the pigs have already flown … darlin’.”
His drawl on the last word catches me off guard, raising the hair on my forearms.
“Anyway,” he adds flatly, in his normal accent, “the hat’s for the cameras. Braden said I had to look my part.”
“Cameras?”
Stefanie presses the talkback in the control room. “Right. About that …” She looks over her shoulder as a couple of camerapeople start setting up.
My chest tightens. We’re being filmed, too?
I would shriek about the lack of warning, but I already know the argument for it. “Better to go in blind.”
“She didn’t tell you?” Riff asks. I want to say his tone is mocking, but it actually sounds almost … appalled. “The label wants behind-the-scenes video. You know, ‘progression of the relationship’ bullshit.”
I keep quiet but flare my nostrils. Our contracts have clauses built into them that say we agree to be filmed in the studio from time to time for documentaries and whatnot. Never did I think it would result in this type of spectacle.
Suddenly my blueberry breakfast scones are threatening to come back up my throat.
Riff gives me an almost-sympathetic look, or maybe it’s solidarity, but I don’t want either from someone so excited to ham things up; I’m surprised he’s not wearing spurs.
I sit up straight, shoulders back, and take another deep breath.
Riff removes his hat and puts on his headphones. At the very least, he doesn’t seem to know the origin of “Lip Sync.” He probably thinks the label’s songwriters wrote it. But there’s a good chance he’ll find out it was me eventually.
All the more reason to get through this so we can move on to the next duet. New music helps people forget about old songs, even if they were once popular.
“Alright, love birds.” Kehlani the producer’s voice comes straight into our ears. “Let’s get started. Nice and easy. You guys ready?”
We both stare at her, and neither of us responds.
Kehlani sighs. “Right. Okay. In three … two … one …”
She touches the sound board and plays the instrumental intro for us.
I breathe slowly through my nose while I wait.
The pedal steel guitar. The slow drums.
Cautiously, I come in. “‘I know the music and the words … it’s nothing that I haven’t heard’ …”
I’ve barely completed the next two lines when Kehlani cuts everything and tells me, “Harmony, I’m sorry but I’m going to need it with a little more feeling.”
More feeling? The whole reason I didn’t officially submit this song to my team was because these are feelings I specifically didn’t want Riff or the public to know about.
If I make a fuss about it, though, someone is going to suspect something, so I have to be neutral.
I nod.
Leaning closer to my pop filter, I go again, this time louder, and adding some vocal fry. Kehlani lets me get all the way to the chorus, where Riff joins.
Partway through, she stops us again to tell us that the camera crew has a request. “Can you two look at each other while you sing?”
I look at Riff sideways. He looks at me with a flat, sarcastic smile.
Take three, I look over at him multiple times during the first verse, and the whole time during the chorus, which is awkward AF, and I’m technically looking at his earlobe but I doubt the cameras can tell.
Honestly I can’t look at him directly right now because our pure, clean vocals blending together in my headphones (without the background noise of a real audience and the echo of bad outdoor acoustics) is too much for me.
I thought our harmony did something to me at Coastal Hearts, but here it’s at full potency.
That was a too-much-wine buzz; this is like a shot of vodka.
His voice resonates, tingling all my senses, and suddenly I’m singing with a yearning I can’t control. I want to think I hear the same ache coming from him too—the same desperation—but I’m either imagining it, or he’s doing what he does so well: acting.
“‘Now we’re so close and before I can blink,’” our voices weave, “‘it’s a whole different kind of lip sync. I just act—I don’t think, your lips on mine like the missing link.’”
Kehlani grins from the control room while the camera crew makes adjustments.
How close are they zooming in? What emotions are they catching on my face?
I can’t bring myself to smile when Riff sings his solo verses, but he’s doing a great job of singing right at me with confidence. On “I feel your energy deep in my bones,” his voice gets gravelly in the best way.
We do the chorus again and I try to lean into it, try not to think about how I’m coming off.
I’ll have to pass it off as part of the show we’re putting on. Surely that’s all anyone who doesn’t know better will think it is. Right?
We run different parts several more times, take after take after take, until Kehlani is satisfied. By the end, my voice is raw. Working with another artist always takes longer, and I suspect everyone is dragging it out for the cameras, too.
The only benefit to this torture is that, at this point, the lyrics to my song have lost all meaning.
Like when you say the same word so many times, it melts into its individual sounds and could be gibberish for all you care.
I rub my eyes and finish my bottle of water that I’ve been sipping on for two hours.
But while the words themselves have lost meaning, their energy lingers.
Riff rakes his hands through his dark blond hair and I catch myself watching for a beat too long, remembering what it felt like to do that to him. He glances up and I immediately turn away.
I have to get out of here.