The Sound And Fury From Seaddle

by Nic-Fit

Let It Slide

Chapter 3 : Let It Slide

In which a gig is attended

~

Three months is a long time if you think about it. Its a whole quarter of a year, a lot can change in that time. A lot had changed, for Octavia anyway.

Over the course of the last few months her taste in music had completely changed. She was way more 'Manticore Jr.' now, rather than 'Tchaitrotsky'. Thats not to say she didn't still enjoy her old stuff, it just wasn't particularly exciting anymore. Plus, her new collection outnumbered her old collection now anyway, so chances are if she even just picked something at random it would be one of her newer discoveries. This new taste she had acquired had begun to show itself, Octavia found herself wearing her faithful bow tie less and less, and band shirts a lot more. Band shirts. She blamed Vinyl for that development.

Speaking of which, Vinyl had very kindly offered Octavia a job at the record shop, and she couldn't accept the offer fast enough. It was perfect; her work had been slow and sporadic lately anyway, she would get to talk to ponies about music as part of the job, and she got to work with a friend in a place she enjoyed spending time at. Basically, Octavia was getting paid to do something she would probably have done anyway, if not from the other side of the counter.

~

It was a slow day at the record shop, which gave Octavia a chance to browse through the crates for something new. Again. It happens quite a lot. The Alternative and Punk section of the shop had sort of become an impromptu base of operations for her, every foray starting there, then expanding into the other sections. It would always go in an order, she'd look around until she found something interesting, then she'd take it to the store's record player and listen, and if she enjoyed it she'd buy it. A significant amount of her earnings were used in this process.

After five or ten minutes or so, she'd found something that looked interesting. 'In The Balloon Over The Sea' by 'Neutral Milk Stable'. The cover was an old timey painting of ponies at the seaside, but one of them had a drum instead of a head. Drum? Potato slice? Tambourine? Anyway, it looked interesting. She made her way over to the record player and put it down on the turntable. The first song was all acoustic, but had some weird sounding instruments she couldn't name. The singer had an odd voice, and he was singing about carrots and suicide. It was strange, but it wasn't bad. Then it went and got droney and oddly spiritual for a bit, and then changed again, this time a high energy distorted state of affairs. She wasn't sure what was going on, but it was enjoyable none the less, she would probably buy this one.

So she sat there contently listening, humming along to the melodies, working out the lyrics, picking apart chord progr-

"TAVI!"

Octavia jumped and spun around, finding an exasperated looking Vinyl had poked her head out of the office door. She pointed a hoof out to the shop front, and to the line that had formed at the counter. None of the ponies in line looked very pleased.

She turned back to Vinyl, sheepish grin on full display.

"Sorry..."

~

The queue was defeated about 10 minutes later, during which Octavia had learned: A. To pay more attention to her surroundings, and B. She never wanted to make eye contact with anypony she had annoyed again. Ever. It was pretty busy in the store after that, so she had stuff to do right up to closing time. She didn't mind, at least these customers weren't angry with her, and she could have a chat about music if any of them were feeling particularly talkative. She even managed to get some information about 'Neutral Milk Stable' from one of them. Apparently they are exactly as weird as they sound like they should be.

Soon enough it was time to start closing up. Yes, it was a few minutes early, but the shop was devoid of customers. Until one walked in anyway. A minty green unicorn was stood at the counter, smiling expectantly. Curiously, she had nothing to buy.

"Sorry, we're just closing up. Can I help at all?"

"Oh yes actually, I just came by to talk to Vinyl, but if you're busy packing up it can wait."

"No, its fine, I'll go get her."

Vinyl was usually in the small office behind the counter. Really, the reason Octavia worked there was to let Vinyl work in the office rather than the till. She always told Octavia how boring it was, but it meant Vinyl could do all the admin stuff here, rather than finishing up at work and then getting home to starting more work.

The office was much messier than usual, normally all the paperwork is at least on the desk. Or shelf. Or really what ever empty, flat surface presented itself. There was a large pile of papers in the center of the tiny room, with sheets littering everywhere else. There was, however, no sign of Vinyl anywhere.

"Uh...Vinyl?"

There was a light rustling as the pile of paperwork in the middle of the floor stirred. "...Ugh, leave me alone mom, I don't have to get up yet..."

OoooKaaaay...

Octavia silently approach the pile/pony with a sly grin. Reaching the target, she leaned in closer...

...

"Boo!"

The resulting noise produced by the white unicorn was comparable to the sound of a train being violently assaulted. Also to thank from her surprise wake up call, was that now, due to her jumping, she was stuck horn first in the ceiling. The final thing to emerge from this event were the stifled fits of giggling coming from the grey pony at the door.

"Yeah yeah, very funny. A little help, please?"

The laughter continued, if anything getting louder.

"Aww, come on! This is-pffft...This is really starting to-"

Vinyl had realized the ridiculousness of the situation she had found herself in, and was now left struggling to keep in a laugh. Thankfully, she was rescued from her brief skyward adventure by Octavia, who had finally moved from the door. Now back on Terra Firma, she let out the laughs that had built up.

"Vinyl! Vinyl!" Octavia managed between giggles and breaths, "Th-theres somepony here to see you."

"Okay, deep breaths, calm down. You too Tavi."

It didn't work, and Vinyl made her way to the door still chuckling, Octavia following behind after. The green unicorn was still waiting at the counter. Upon seeing Vinyl her smile widened and she cocked her head slightly.

"Having fun?"

Vinyl gasped a little, and then cleared the counter completely, taking out the other pony in a sort of tackle-hug combo.

"OhmygoshOhmygosh! Lyra! I've not seen you in forever!"

"Its great seeing you too, but I was rather enjoying the ability to breathe..."

"Heh, sorry..." The second awkward grin of the day appeared on Vinyl's face as she took a step back. "What brings you here, I thought you moved away?"

"Well, I did but it didn't really work out. I'm was meant to come back next week, but I've got tickets for Sonic Foal here tomorrow, so I decided to come back early."

"Ooh, Sonic Foal! You're so lucky, that show was booked out waaaaay in advance..." Vinyl sighed.

"Woah, slow down. I won them in a contest. Three of them. I stopped by to ask if you wanted to go, but I think I already know the answer."

"Oooh, thank you! I would love to go! Who else is coming?" Vinyl started bouncing on the spot gleefully, Sonic Foal had been on her 'watch live' list for a few years now, their shows were apparently exceedingly good, no nonsense affairs, with frequent improvisation and experimentation.

"See, thats the thing, I dunno. I was gonna go with Bon Bon, but she was all "I don't even like them" and I was all "Come on, it'll be fun!", then she was like "No." So now I have no idea, unless you have a friend who would like to come."

"Hmm..." Vinyl turned to face Octavia, who had gone back to sorting the shelves behind the counter. "PRIVATE TAVI!"

Octavia jumped, hitting her head on the shelf above. "Ow. Yeah?"

Vinyl scowled at her. Octavia sighed, and feigned a salute.

"Better!" Vinyl's expression softened back to a smile. "So Tavi, whadaya say? Want to come see Sonic Foal with us tomorrow? It'll be fuuuun!"

Octavia weighed the choice up. On one hoof she hadn't really listened to much Sonic Foal, but on the other hoof, she had liked what she'd heard, she wasn't doing anything otherwise, it would be free, and she's looking for new music anyway.

"Okay, why not. Sounds good!"

"Well then, I suggest you and Lyra get chatting! I'm going to clear up the office." With that, Vinyl returned behind the counter.

"..."

"Uh...hi..."

"Hey."

Awkward

~

Lyra, Vinyl and Octavia got to the venue pretty early, allowing them to use the bar before it was packed, if nothing else. It was a pretty small place, it looked like it would be maxed out at about 500 ponies, but it was a nice environment. While it was empty, anyway. It would be another 40 minutes before the support act came to the stage, a garage noise rock band by the name of 'Pony Galore', notable for using garbage cans instead of drums. That should be interesting.

Sonic Foal themselves should also be pretty interesting, they have a reputation for modifying their instruments, playing in strange tunings, and using odd methods to play the instruments, yielding different noises.

But there was still at least an hour until Sonic Foal took the stage, and that time has to be occupied somehow. Probably involving drinking.

"Sooo, Vinyl tells me you play the cello?" Lyra inquired.

"Oh yes," She replied taking a swig of her drink. "I've been playing for some years now. Do you play?"

"Not the cello, no, but I've been playing the lyre since forever. Maybe longer. We should jam some time, I'll get Vinyl to bring her drums."

"I didn't know she played the drums!"

"Oh yeah." Lyra paused to finish her drink. "She only really uses them to record samples for her electronic stuff, but she certainly knows her way around them."

"Huh..."

This left Octavia wondering what else she didn't know about her companions, she'd never really bothered to ask them anything.

"Note to self: get to know them better."

~

Soon enough the open act were on. It was exactly as predicted: noisy, different and fun. The bins in place of drums made for a nice departure from convention, even if musical convention wasn't really what anypony there was expecting. Octavia's biggest surprise, however, was just how loud it was. She used to play in an orchestra, that was loud. But the volume generated by just the 4 ponies on stage was mind boggling.

Soon enough, Pony Galore finished their set and trotted off stage. The crowd huddled closer to the stage in anticipation, the venue staff already bringing out Sonic Foal's equipment.

"Hey Tavi, me and Lyra are going to go up the front, you coming?"

This was a difficult choice for Octavia. This was her first gig, outside of classical performances (which were pretty different), and she wanted the full experience. However, she also knew that being at the front would likely be terrifying for somepony like her, it wasn't in her nature to thrash around a lot.

"Uh...I think I'll pass. Maybe I'll come down later..."

"Suit yourself, but its gonna be fuuuuuuuuuuuun!" Vinyl turned and left, with Lyra following afterwards, disappearing into the crowd.

~

About 5 minutes after they had left for the front, Sonic Foal took to the stage. The noise was almost deafening, and the band hadn't even started playing yet, it was all coming from the crowd. The cheers only seemed to get louder when they did start playing, the show could probably be heard for miles.

Octavia had found herself a nice spot next to the sound booth to watch the show from. The floor around the booth was raised slightly, giving her a good view, and a place to set her drink down. Two thing struck her from her vantage point: the first was the amount of movement the band had going on. Classical shows are very controlled affairs, and with most of the orchestra sat down, there wasn't a whole lot of room for moving around anyway. Sonic Foal were acrobats in comparison, running around, jumping, thrashing about, it made for quite the spectacle.

The second thing that struck her was the amount of moving the crowd was doing, especially at the front. Octavia had expected this from the stories Vinyl had told her about all the bands she'd seen, but it truly was a mesmerizing sight. The crowd rose and fell, it tore itself apart and flowed back together, it was like watching rippling water, or a shrub moving in the wind. She tried to find her friends from her spot, but the movement of crowd prevented it.

After an hour and a half, the show was coming to an end. The crowd showed no signs of slowing down, and were still as hypnotizing as ever. Octavia had decided, she was going to be a part of it before the show drew to a close. She made her way through the crowd, which was no easy feat considering how densely packed the venue was. Nearing the front, she began her search for Vinyl and/or Lyra, which was proving to be more difficult than expected, considering that the movement of the ponies around her put Octavia in a constant state of about-to-fall-over. It made it very difficult to focus.

Even if she couldn't find her friends, being at the front was thrilling. Terrifying, but thrilling none the less. The noise and movement made for an all out assault on the senses, leaving Octavia feeling disoriented, and a little bit sick, but content. Between songs, the moshing died down, but it was still just as loud. She took this brief break to get herself together, facing the front of the venue to get her bearings. As she did, the singer took the microphone.

"Ok guys, this is gonna be our last song for the night. We know you know it. We just wanna say thank you, and goodnight."

The band played the opening chords to the song. The concert goes reacted immediately, shouting and cheering louder than before. The drums kicked in, and that was it, the crowd was in full thrash mode. This left Octavia struggling to balance, She knew she just had to go with it, but she didn't even want to consider the consequences of falling over. Not only was the floor filthy, but there was a pretty large risk of getting trampled.

Then, something unexpected happened.

Vinyl had told Octavia about stage diving once before, when Vinyl had gone to see The U-Stallions. Some pony would jump off stage, and the surrounding unicorns would use their magic to carry them over the crowd and to the back. Octavia had never encountered it, until now. Things seemed to slow down when she noticed it, an orange unicorn had made his way onto the stage, and was in the process of vacating it. Right in her direction. She didn't really realize what was happening until it was too late. Recognizing the situation, she started to brace herself, only to take a hoof to the face as an award for her delayed reactions.

The grey pony swayed for a bit, muttered something under her breath and promptly collapsed on the floor, unconscious. In the middle of the stomping crowd. Away from her friends.

All things considered, it could probably have gone better...

~