Not Your Average Teen Pop Star (DarkDreamer9110 x MsBloom)

[MsBloom]

"Not to mention Aretha Franklin," Ellie added in her usual music geek manner while shooting a look at Cassie.
Hopefully she hadn't ruined everything now that they had a full band. In her mind though Ellie was already envisioning the twins walking out with Ember between them, maybe a big Fuck You comment or two for goodbye.

Looking at the trio, the twins with their arms around Ember to protect and comfort her Ellie began strumming her guitar and softly sang aforementioned singer's perhaps biggest hit: Respect.
(oo) All I'm askin'
(oo) Is for a little respect
R E S P E C T
"And you've got ours, even if perhaps my girlfriend was a bit clumsy in trying to boost your confidence."
She paused and then just sat there looking at the trio waiting for their reaction.
"With your voice you would crush that song by the way, like totally give Aretha a run for her money. But only if you want to of course. I do hope that day comes though. And also, whatever you might have been told Ember, you're not fat. Stocky perhaps, butch definitely, but there are plenty of guys and girls out there who like that."

Léon looked up at Ellie and glanced at Cassie before focusing back on Ellie.
"Look. I get what your girlfriend wa trying to do but ... as André told you before we started recording Ember doesn't do lead, and now you know why. It took us weeks to pick up the pieces after that disaster of a talent show at our school. It was ... almost like that scene from Carrie where she has her first period in school and the other girls throw tampons at her, or at the prom where they drop pigs blood on her. Well; without the ensuing fiery vengeance of course. Instead Ember just sank to the floor in tears. Instead Ember just froze and we had to get up there to lead her off the stage."
"Fuuuuuck Meee," Ellie said and putting her guitar down stood up.
"I mean I know high school girls can be cruel as fuck but that's a whole new level," she added as she approached the hugging trio, sensing that Ember was about to start crying.
"I am sure Cassie meant nothing like that with her little stunt."
Ellie smiled and held out her arms.
"Mind if I give you a hug too?"

 

[DarkDreamer9110]

Cassie listened as Léon explained some of what Ember had been through, nodding her head. "Again, I am so fucking sorry for what I did. I honestly didn't consider that it would be triggering. I know that doesn't make it okay, but I promise I will never do it again." She said.

André nodded. "Ember's always been there for us, standing up for us, protecting us." It began. "After that talent show, we had to protect her, be there for her. Because you know mean girls. They didn't stop making fun of her for weeks. You fucked up here, but you fucked up from a place of good intentions. I'm sure you know what it's like when an ally accidentally does a transphobia or something."

Cassie nodded. "I do." She said. "I'd tell them that it's okay, they just need to do better in the future. And I will do better."

Ember smiled at Ellie, nodding at the question about the hug and opening her arms for it before looking at Cassie and motioning her over as well to pull her into an embrace

"It's okay, Cassie. I understand why you did it. And I forgive you. It was just a shock. André's right, what it said about comparing what you did to when an ally accidentally does something harmful.

Cassie nodded. "It had a point. I still fucked up."

Dusty looked around at the group. "We all good? Band not gonna break up today?"

Cassie chuckled. "Not today. Funhouse Sweethearts forever." She said with a grin.

 

[MsBloom]

When Cassie said their pep motto: Funhouse Sweethearts Forever, Ellie mumbled along and then look up over Ember's and Léon's head at Dusty and motioned him over a well.
"It's kind of our thing," she explained and made sure everyone was head to head in a circle.
"Funhouse Sweethearts Forever."
Everyone followed, even Ember and there was a brief silence to follow.

"Anyhow," Ellie broke the silence a few seconds later.
"I still think we go with take five and simply mute Ember's voice in the verses. Cassie can always add the last verse later. However ..."
She took a deep breath and a step back from the circle.
"I don't want anyone to feel like they don't have a say when it comes to the creative process so if anyone has a different idea don't be afraid to speak up."
She now looked at them one by one and Léon gave a nod when she looked at him.
"I agree," he said.
"I really like the way the piano changed the texture of the song but I'd like to record my bass again. And I also think we should drop the rhythm guitar during the solo. The piano I feel more than fill that purpose."
Ellie nodded.
"How about we do all of that in one take, new bass, guitar solo and Cassie's last verse and chorus. Can you queue it up for us."
She looked over at Andi who gave a thumbs up and over the intercom asked for a few minutes.
"You want a bit more reverb on your vocals?" she asked Cassie.

A few minutes later, during which both Léon and Ellie both adjusted the tuning on their instruments, with everything queued up they did the first overdub. with the other three having joined Andi in the recording booth.

 

[DarkDreamer9110]

André smiled at Ellie's explanation of the ritual, exchanging glances with Ember and Léon as Ellie gathered them all together and led them through it. "Cool." It said to Ellie. "Every band has their things, those little good luck rituals. Thanks for including us."

Cassie smiled. "You're part of the band now. Of course you're included." She said, then nodded at Ellie's suggestions. "Yeah. Sounds good to me." She agreed. "We can definitely try that."

As Ellie and Léon started tuning their instruments for the overdub, Cassie walked over to Ember, drawing a momentary side eye from André before the keyboardist smiled and nodded, seemingly satisfied that Cassie wasn't about to do another dick move. Cassie smiled as she approached Ember. "Hey, Ember, I wanted.to apologize again for earlier, and to ask a favor."

Ember nodded. "I accept your apology. I get what you were doing. We're okay. So, what's the favor?"

"I want to use your vocal track as a guide when I record the final verse and chorus. I promise we'll delete it, you can even be the one who deletes it. But I would like to use it just so I have something to go off of." Cassie said.

Ember's eyes widened for a moment. "Oh. I, uh, yeah, I guess you can." She said.

Cassie smiled. "Thanks." She said, heading back over to talk to Andi for a moment to let her know she wanted to use Ember's vocals as a guide. And with that they were ready

Of course, most of the recording would be Léon alone, since there were only a few pieces the two girls needed to contribute. As they went through it, Cassie noticed Ember and André in the back of the booth, the two leaning against each other and smiling at her.

When it got to where she was supposed to do her vocals, she'd already figured out how she was going to do them.

After they finished it up, Cassie smiled. "Yeah, Léon, I definitely think the changes you made to the bass there were good calls. And Ellie, you were great on that solo."

 

[MsBloom]

Léon's bass line was slightly different from the original one. It had a bit more punch and he had added just a hint of fuzz to it. In their headphones they could of course hear the other instruments as well and had any one looked they'd catch Ellie tapping her foot silently in the air and bobbing her head along with Dusty's drums. Cassie might recognise that she was planning the solo in her head while counting the measures.

As the solo neared she activated her multi-FX processor, put her left foot on the built in Wah Wah pedal and with her lips moving in a silent count in she then began to play and, almost as if they had actually planned it, Léon added a bit more fuzz to his bass which together with André's piano quite perfectly replaced Ellie's guitar. This would of course make it much easier to recreate the song live.

Four bars later Ellie let the last note of the solo hang for a moment until the rhythm guitar came back in and it was time for Cassie to add what she had skipped during the first recording. It was obvious, at least to Ellie, that she had found inspiration in the way Ember had sung them. They were slightly different from the way Cassie usually sang and as she listened to the final verse and chorus a big smile spread across Ellie's face. Yea this was a good match. This was what she had subconsciously imagined Funhouse Sweethearts evolving into as a full band where she and Cassie were not the only ones to influence the music.

As the three of them joined Andi and the rest of the band in the booth and they listened back Ellie nodded.
"I don't know about you guys," she said as the song ended.
"But I think this is fucking awesome. Like ... I've tried to imagine what we might sound like with a full band but I never imagined this. It was always still mostly my own vision of the song but like ... you guys totally transformed it with your bits. I can't wait to see what you will do with the other songs we've planned on recording."
"Out of curiousity," Léon said and chuckled.
"Would it be alright with you three if we could hear what it sounded like before. I mean with the bass and keys you guys did. I get why you left it out when you presented the song to us but like I said ... just curious."
Ellie nodded and leaning across the mixing table queued up the complete original version which in that moment she realised was significantly shorter, a full 35 seconds shorter than the version with André and Léon.

"Interesting," Léon said after having heard the version with just Ellie, Cassie and Dusty.
"Not bad at all of course but quite a difference."
Ellie nodded and then, having heard Cassie's conversation with Ember about using her vocals as a guide for recording the final verse and chorus, nodded at Ember to join her at the mixing table.
"Those two tracks are you singing. Just right click on them and choose delete and they're gone. We can always add new backing vocals later."

Ember nodded, looked at Cassie and then followed Ellie's instructions.
"I was thinking though. When it's just us, the band and maybe Andi as well, would it be alright with you to actually sing along the way you did on this. I don't know what you did but you somehow managed to change how Cassie approached her vocals and it came out fucking amazing. Anything you don't want to keep you now know how to delete."

 

[DarkDreamer9110]

It was clear that Léon, André, and even Ember had all added their own flavors to the song, from things as simple as Ember's indirect influence on Cassie's singing, to how André and Léon had reshaped the song entirely by altering their tracks. And that felt right. Funhouse Sweethearts was meant, at its core, to be about a whole group working together to make something amazing. And now they were. It was a watershed moment, to know that Funhouse Sweethearts was now no longer just her and Ellie, but was now ready to move into the next phase, where they would hopefully hit it big.

She nodded in agreement with Ellie. "Yeah. I really appreciate how you two were able to add a whole new flare to it. That's the big thing to me and Ellie, we wanted bandmates who could synergize really well with us, and so honestly I gotta say, Andi proved herself as an agent putting us in the same room. We're cooking with gas here."

When Ellie made the proposition to Ember about continuing to sing along in the privacy of the studio, the other girl shrugged. "Yeah, that's doable." She agreed, glancing at Cassie, who smiled.

"Yeah. In fact, I'd like to actually do another take, though. Just me and Ember recording, with the last cut as our backing." She said, smiling. "And then ..." She glanced at Ellie, nodding knowingly, "And then I'm thinking we can see about letting you three work with us on NYATG." She said, pronouncing it "Nigh-Uh-Tag,"

That led to confused looks from those in the room unfamiliar with the abbreviation of the title of Cassie and Ellie's long in-progress passion project. "What are you talking about?" André asked.

 

[MsBloom]

"Not Your Average Teen Girl," Ellie interjected.
"It's this monster of a song we've been working on for a while about being a teenage trans girl. Perhaps a bit less straightforward than most of our other songs so far. One might even describe it as progressive. Still to a large extent a work in progress even though it is at the same time structurally finished. We just need to put all the pieces together."
She stopped and nodded at Cassie before continuing to explain that there was a follow up to it.
"... that we so far call Out of the Closet and Onto the Battlefield. I am fairly certain you heard about the debacle when Cassie officially came out to the entire school. That was what inspired it. Both are quite lengthy as is and there still a lot of work to do. However that's a job for our next rehearsals. For now I think we should use the time to work on songs that are already finished, as finished as they can be before you guys add your stuff to them."

Ellie put down her guitar which she had been fiddling around on while talking and subconsciously played some lines and riffs from NYATG.
"I'll be in the booth with the rest," she told Cassie and gave her a quick kiss before joining the others.
She almost immediately huddled with Andi over something or other on the mixing board.
"Ready when you are," she then told Cassie and Ember over the intercom bout half a minute later and gave them the thumbs up.

 

[DarkDreamer9110]

André smiled at Ellie's explanation. "Passion projects, then. Those are some of the best."

Cassie nodded. "Yeah. We started working on NYATG when we were, what, twelve?"

She looked at Ember as they started getting ready. "Before we do anything, I had an idea. When we're done with this take, would you mind it if we listened to it both ways? With just my vocals, then with just yours?"

Ember paused, her expression one of deep thought. Finally, she nodded. "Just to see what it could sound like if I were singing lead?"

Cassie nodded. "Just that. We wouldn't use that version in anything that anyone who isn't the band or Andi will hear."

When they were ready, Cassie nodded at Ellie's thumbs-up. "Let's get rolling." She responded.

As the first bar played into the headphones, Cassie smiled. She couldn't wait to hear Ember sing again. There was something about Ember's voice that intrigued her. And the girl was fairly attractive.

Momentarily distracted, she nearly missed her cue to start singing, only noticing when she realized Ember was counting herself in.

She managed to stay in sync with Ember, though. As they sang together, Cassie found herself frequently glancing over at the other girl, who was getting more and more physically active while she sang, clearly enjoying herself and letting the music flow. It was infectious, and Cassie found herself moving along, soon enough, dancing in place by the first chorus, and then moving a bit more. She caught Ember's eye, and the two started dancing towards each other as they sang, the energy between them intensifying as the distance closed.

By the third verse, they were very clearly singing to each other, their voices playing off each other in a synergy that only grew. By the final words, the two were barely a couple of feet apart (their mics thankfully equipped with sound deflectors), and the room was almost glowing with the electricity between them.

As the final notes faded, though, the mood dissolved, both girls backing away and blushing at each other awkwardly. Cassie broke the silence first. "So, I think we should see how all three versions come out. Me singing, you singing, both of us singing." She said to Ember as they headed towards the booth.

Ember nodded. "Definitely." She said as they entered the booth.

It was pretty obvious that none of the others had missed the chemistry that had gone on, given their expressions. Cassie decided to ignore that elephant for now, and get on with the reason they were here. "Can we hear it with both of us singing, then Ember muted, and then me muted?" She asked Andi, then turned to face Ellie, who she had avoided looking at since the song ended.