Soul Music

'Days right,' said the other one.

'We are The Band,' said Asphalt.

'Which one?' said the first troll. 'I got a list here.'

'Days right.'

'We're The Band With Rocks In,' said Glod.

'Hah, you ain't them. I've seen them. Dere's a -guy with this glow round him, and when he plays der guitar it goes—'

Whauauauaummmmm-eeeee-gngngn.

'Dat's right—'

The chord curled around the cart.

Buddy was standing up, guitar at the ready.

'Oh, wow,' said the first troll. 'This are amazing!' He fumbled in his loincloth and produced a dog-eared piece of paper. 'You couldn't write your name down, could you? My boy Clay, he won't believe I met—'

'Yes, yes,' said Buddy wearily. 'Pass it up.'

'Only it not for me, it for my boy Clay—' said the troll, jumping from one foot to the other in excitement.

'How d'you spell it?'

'It don't matter, he can't read anyway.'

'Listen,' said Glod, as the cart trundled into the backstage area, 'someone's already playing. I said we—'

Dibbler hurried up.

'What kept you?' he said. 'You'll be on soon! Right after… Boyz From The Wood. How did it go? Asphalt, come here.'

He pulled the small troll into the shadows at the back of the stage.

'You brought me some money?' he said.

'About three thousand—'

'Not so loud!'

'I'm only whispering it, Mr Dibbler.'

Dibbler looked around carefully. There was no such thing as a whisper in Ankh-Morpork when the sum involved had the word 'thousand' in it somewhere; people could hear you think that kind of money in Ankh-Morpork.

'You be sure and keep an eye on it, right? There's going to be more before this day's out. I'll give Chrysoprase his seven hundred dollars and the rest is all prof—' He caught Asphalt's little beady eye and remembered himself. 'Of course, there's depreciation… overheads… advertising… market research… buns… mustard… basically, I'll be lucky if I break even. I'm practically cutting me own throat in this deal.'

'Yes, Mr Dibbler.'

Asphalt peered around the edge of the stage.

'Who's that playing now, Mr Dibbler?'

''And you'.'

'Sorry, Mr Dibbler?'

'Only they write it &U,' said Dibbler. He relaxed a little and pulled out a cigar. 'Don't ask me why. The right kind of name for musicians ought to be something like Blondie and his Merry Troubadours. Are they any good?'

'Don't you know, Mr Dibbler?'

'It's not what I call music,' said Dibbler. 'When I was a lad we had proper music with real words… 'Summer is icumen in, lewdly sing cuckoo', that sort of thing.'

Asphalt looked at &U again.

'Well, it's got a beat and you can dance to it,' he said, 'but they're not very good. I mean, people are just watching them. They don't just watch when The Band are playing, Mr Dibbler.'

'You're right,' said Dibbler. He looked at the front of the stage. In between the candles was a row of music traps.

'You'd better go and tell them to get ready. I think this lot are running out of ideas.'

'Um. Buddy?'

He looked up from his guitar. Some of the othermusicians were tuning theirs, but he'd found he never had to. He couldn't, anyway. The pegs didn't move.

'What is it?'

'Um,' said Glod. He waved vaguely at Cliff, who grinned sheepishly and produced the sack from behind his back.

'This is… well, we thought… that is, all of us,' said Glod, 'that… well, we saw it, you see, and I know you said it couldn't be repaired but there's people in this city that can do just about anything so we asked around, and we knew how much it meant to you, and there's this man in the Street of Cunning Artificers and he said he thought he could do it and it cost Cliff another tooth but here you are anyway because you're right, we're on top of the music business right enough and it's because of you and we know how much this meant to you so it's a sort of thank-you present, well, go on then, give it to him.'

Cliff, who'd lowered his arm again as the sentence began to extend, pushed the sack towards the puzzled Buddy.

Asphalt poked his head through the sacking.

'We guys better get on the stage,' he said. 'Come on!'

Buddy put down the guitar. He opened the sack, and began to pull at the linen wrappings inside.

'It's been tuned and everything,' said Cliff helpfully.

The harp gleamed in the sun as the last wrapping came off.

'They can do amazing things with glue and stuff,' said Glod. ' I mean, I know you said there wasn't anyone left in Llamedos that could repair it. But this is Ankh-Morpork. We can fix nearly everything.'

'Please!' said Asphalt, as his head reappeared. 'Mr Dibbler says you've got to come, they've started to throw things!'

'I don't know much about strings,' said Glod, 'but I had a go. Sounds… kind of nice.'

'I… er… don't know what to say,' said Buddy.

The chanting was like a hammer.

'I… won this,' said Buddy, in a small, distant world of his own. 'With a song. Sioni Bod Da, it was. I worked on it allll winter. Allll about… home, you know. And going away, see? And trees and things. The judges were… very plleased. They said that in fifty years I might realllly understand music.'

He pulled the harp towards him.

Dibbler pushed his way through the rabble of musicians backstage until he found Asphalt.

'Well?' he said. 'Where are they?'

'They're just sitting around talking, Mr Dibbler.'

'Listen,' said Dibbler. 'You hear the crowd? It's Music With Rocks In they want! If they don't get it… they'd just better get it, all right? Letting the anticipation build up is all very well but… I want them on stage right now!'

Buddy stared at his fingers. Then he looked up, whitefaced, at the other bands milling around.

'You… with the guitar…' he said hoarsely.

'Me, sir?'

'Give it to me!'

Every nascent group in Ankh-Morpork was in awe of The Band With Rocks In. The guitarist handed his instrument over with the expression of one passing over a holy item to be blessed.

Buddy stared at it. It was one of Mr Wheedown's best.

He struck a chord.

The sound sounded like lead would sound if you could make guitar strings out of it.

'OK, boys, what's the problem?' said Dibbler, hurrying towards them. 'There's six thousand ears out there