FICTION: I Play the Drums In a Band called Okay, By Toby Litt, Penguin, 269 pp. £12.99It's good to see Toby Litt has adapted the quintessential rock 'n' roll songwriting motif, Don't Bore Us Get to The Chorus, in his new novel.
I HAD a grumbling dread of having to sift through countless introductory chapters before the rock 'n' roll horror stories showed their dirty faces but, luckily, by the second paragraph, it was clear how the novel - and indeed the characters - would develop. Litt does indeed get to the chorus before the boredom factor sets in.
I Play the Drums in a Band Called Okayportrays the ups and downs, the ins and outs, of a successful Canadian rock band named Okay, all cleverly narrated by its long-suffering drummer Clap (not his real name, believe it or not), who is also the focal point of emotion in this otherwise emotionless tale. The novel balances on two interlinking narratives: the relationships or non-relationships between band members, and Clap's institutionalised inability to live a normal life outside the band.
Although the novel paints a relatively accurate picture of the workings of a touring band, it unfortunately relies too heavily on rock 'n' roll clichés rather than rock 'n' roll realisms - but then. let's face it, what reader wants to read about how hard it is to be in a band. They want sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll - excuse the cliché.
Syph - the band's front man and singer - suffers from a severe case of LV Syndrome (Lead Vocalist Syndrome), which leads sufferers to believe they are second only to God in earth's kingdom and that the sun does indeed shine out of their arses. Which of course is true. Clap, our over-zealous narrator, suffers from a debilitating disease known as DD (Drummers' Disease) the symptoms of which include lead vocalist envy and Attention Deficit Disorder. Each member sleeps with a different groupie every night. They take limos to Spar, consume vast amounts of recreational drugs off the private parts of well-endowed women . . . you get the message.
Toby Litt can sure as hell write. A graduate of the ultimate in creative writing courses, East Anglia, and included in Granta's 2003 list of the 20 Best of Young British Novelists, he's the author of novels including Corpsing, deadkidssongs and Hospital, and is also well known as a short-story writer.
It's just that, with I Play the Drums In a Band Called Okay, there's a sense of an over-researched project, too much homework - borne out perhaps by the list of bands Litt thanks in his acknowledgements.
Is this where the clichés come from, when he'd have been on surer ground relying on his own undoubted ability as a story teller? Take Clap's breakdown. Here, Litt's abilities shine, with language and imagery illustrating graphically the drummer's confused and neurotic state during his explosion. But, alas, the banal resurfaces elsewhere, making it almost impossible to relate emotionally to any of the characters in a sustained way.
God knows, you'd like to believe that some of these stock-in-trade adventures in the rock'n'roll world were true. My job would be a hell of a lot more fun if they were - but, sadly, mainly they're not. What may have happened in the 1960s and 1970s you see little of today.
Twenty- and thirty-somethings who've always dreamt of being part of a rock 'n' roll band will probably adore this book and think me a naysayer spoiling the fun. Litt does manage to gracefully illustrate how a rock band would function in the dreams of such dreamers - and he's to be saluted for that. After all, people don't read fiction for a dose of reality.
Although the author wasted no time in bellowing out his chorus, he seemed to forget the verses and bridges that should link it, and his novel lacks dynamics and structure because of that, in the same way one of Okay's songs would if left without such essentials. But then, isn't it always the chorus people remember from songs? Let's hope so for Toby Litt's sake.
Niall Breslin is singer and songwriter with the Irish band The Blizzards, whose debut album, A Public Display of Affection, went double platinum. The band also won a Meteor award for Best Live Performance for their appearance at Oxegen last year