je_ficgames #2
First pinch-hit. :D Many thanks itsudemo to silver_lined, beta and flail neutraliser, especially for this one because it needed a lot of whipping into mediocrity. ♥
*
Title: "Pass the salt." (originally here)
Details: Moriuchi, KKK, TegoMass (9-nin NewS); G.
Summary: Summer Time's a lovely song, isn't it? Moriuchi sure as hell doesn't think so, but that's okay. :))) He'll just have to deal.
Warnings: Coarse language? ;* The S-word! Doom.
Prompt: NewS's SUMMER TIME ( translation), for Team What-If. "WHAT IF NOBODY EVER LEFT NEWS? :DD Could Moriuchi stick it out without being miserable and grumpy forever? Should Shige just throw in the towel and be the first to call it quits? ♥♥"
It's a regular day at the jimusho, and NewS congregates around a table in their dressing room.
Or four of them do anyway.
The Pi is off on some drama shooting as usual, and Ryo and Uchi are on their way over from Osaka, probably doing their best to join the Mile High club via shinkansen though nobody wants to call to check. And Massu is out buying nikuman from downstairs, but he'll be back soon if they haven't sold out, and with him his keeper -- the stunning little thing called Tegoshi. (Literally stunning, mind. The harmlessness of his selfishness leaves many a grown man blinking in awe.) But of course, if the nikuman have sold out, Massu will be a while waiting for a fresh batch to be cooked before he returns.
That leaves the alley cats, KKK, who aren't really seated at the table so much as sprawled under and around it, plus one Moriuchi Takahiro who thinks he might just do his head in against the plastic-coated plywood and call himself redeemed.
The weapon of his demise is a CD player, and the cardinal offence is the tune it spawned.
It's an audio monstrosity with the nerve to call itself Summer Time, according to the demo CD envelope; Moriuchi wants to ring the whole rig up on charges of fraud and attempted deception. As he stares unseeing, the looping extro fades off into the distance of his mind, its mocking strains of ...this iza summer time~ ...this iza summer time~ echoing around his head like green faeries.
In fact, Moriuchi finds himself so overwhelmingly underwhelmed by the song's power (...utter lack thereof) that he thinks he may have strained a heart muscle trying not to die. Stuttering trumpets. Simplistic melody and uninspired beat, dum, dum, dum, dum, all processed and synthesized to high heaven and so squeaky clean that it hurts his ears -- not to mention the hyaku-en paperback novel lyrics and how much it is all just not summer in the slightest.
'Sweet emotion'? Bullshit.
That's not summer.
Summer, Moriuchi's conviction will say, is all about salt.
Heat and dirt and sweat. On the chance you get a full day free: dawn-to-dusk jam sessions in the garage with friends who don't care if they've got bad hair and worse B.O. because you'll all reek feral and look like hell by the time you hit that in-the-zone high -- and then after, slipping down to the pub for drinks 'til the sun's legacy is gone and the streets stop hissing when you spit on them.
Summer is forgetting, for a while, that most of your life is not actually about you or even the slightest bit yours. It's blistering freedom and screaming wings of liberty from the top of Tokyo Tower, not this... plinky little ditty about wishing for some one-time maybe lady over melted ice-cream at the beach, what the hell. That's not summer, that's shoujo manga.
Moriuchi scoots his chair back, leaning down under the table. Koyama looks up; their eyes meet. Kusano and Shige-chan look up, too.
"Did you guys hear that?" Moriuchi asks, deadpan. And then: "No, I'm serious," when all he gets are three blank looks in reply. (Stupid K's and their dumb brain sharing affliction.)
"Hear... what?" Shige-chan asks slowly. And really, Moriuchi would rather think an imaginary cat got into Aoyama's Law school.
He gestures to the underside of the table, approximately where the CD player sits up top. "That."
"Man, Taka!" Kusano sighs, melodramatically relieved. "Here you had me thinking there was a werebeast prowling around or something."
Shige-chan pokes the freckled one in the side. "We established last time that that was just Masuda's stomach." Kusano squirms but can't do much, caught as he is in Koyama's casual headlock. Moriuchi sighs. By all sound reasoning, Kusano is one of the stronger members of NewS and should be able to break free of that regular torture.
But then again, not many people can bring themselves to hit Koyama Keiichiro...
"Isn't it a great track?" their eldest beams, smile broad and single-lidded eyes nowhere to be found on his face because they disappear like that sometimes. "It's so happy and hopeful!"
...by the same token, Moriuchi laments, it's kind of hard to hate the guy, too.
"Uh," Moriuchi says, "...yeah." And sits back up properly -- well, sort of properly. Mostly he's flopped forward, chin resting on the table -- gracefully backing out of his own bitchfest before even getting started.
NewS songs always sound the same, like that Eurovision shit the cable music channel likes to pimp up every year -- sometimes it's funny in a kind of painful way, but mostly it's just overproduced and under-considered and just... a load of crap, really. And the public gobbles it up like it's gold and it gets way too much airtime and hits Oricon number one for the day and the week and... Moriuchi really ought to be used to it by now. It's the usual course of business, as much as it pisses him off.
There's a few muffled whispers and nudges from yon below. Moriuchi can feel them in the floorboards before Kusano suddenly sits up -- too suddenly, smacking his head on the underside of the table -- and jars Moriuchi's perch. Moriuchi kicks him and apologises the next second ("Oops, my foot slipped."), but Kusano howls anyway: "Koyamamaaa~ Taka-chan's being mean to me~!"
Moriuchi isn't happy. "Don't call me that!" he grumps.
Kusano pops his head up from the side of the table, grinning devilishly-- "You're not the boss of me." --and Moriuchi wonders not for the first time just who the youngest in NewS is really supposed to be, because Kusano and Tegoshi do a damn good job of trying to steal his title five times every other day.
Koyama drags Shige-chan up from under the table, and pulls on Kusano's ear -- causing him to yelp again: "Hey, what was that for!"
"Go see what's taking TegoMass so long," Koyama Strongly Suggests.
And Shige-chan totally knows that tone. "You want us out of the room," he says.
Koyama gives their resident genius three hundred-yen coins and pats him on the shoulder. "Get Kusacchi something to shut him up if he protests."
"Stop talking about me like I'm not here!" Kusano protests.
"I think I'll get him an everlasting gobstopper," Shige-chan deadpans, and tows Kusano the hell away. Thank god.
Even so, Moriuchi's not looking forward to the conversation Koyama's bound to strike up with him. Preemptively, he dons his best grouchy face that says, 'I'm not happy like you, man. Leave me alone'.
But Koyama doesn't buy it even for a second, fact aside that he just gave Shige-chan the last of his pocket change. He's smiling like spaghetti in the silence that follows, and takes one of the eight empty chairs cluttered around their cheap little table. There's silence and silence, then heartbeat and more silence before eventually: "You don't like the song, Taka," Koyama says, too lightly.
'Wow, you're a regular mind reader aren't you?' Moriuchi doesn't tell him with utter, biting sarcasm, though it's said clear enough as he turns away and pillows his cheek on crossed arms. For a long moment, the air above his head veritably shimmers with petulance -- but Moriuchi's twenty years old now. A proper adult. "...it's always the same," he feels obliged to mutter after a bit.
Looking up at the sound of something sliding across the table, he isn't surprised to see that Koyama's pushed over a pen and lined notepad.
This is often also the usual course of business. They all have their kryptonite; KKK might find drinking bars dry and declaring their mutual love for the world cathartic, but that's not really Moriuchi's scene and Koyama's aware of that. Actually, most of NewS are aware of that -- but Koyama's one of the few who knows what to do about it. (Ryo tries, sometimes, though will invariably recommend some combination of beer and Uchi -- at which point Moriuchi will say that he's quite enough uchi for himself though, thanks, and leave Ryo and his dodgy advice alone.)
"Write it down," Koyama tells him, still smiling. "Whatever you think they should change -- Ryo-chan always says your ideas are very good. Let our producers know so they can fix it."
"Fix it my ass," Moriuchi mutters, though he picks up the pen anyway. "You mean maul it twice as bad."
Like that one time he recommended more guitar for a fuller sound, and they added a freaking ukulele. Or that other time he told them cymbals would be more dramatic, and they put in tambourines instead so Kis-My-Ft2 could run around shaking them during con season. Damn incestuous jimusho...
Nevertheless, Moriuchi hits 'Back' on the CD player. And as the track begins to play again, he listens. Listens and writes.
With the thin black pen over the next four minutes forty, he fills two pages with bulletpoints of chicken scratches that look like barbed wire, drawn with a cutting commonsense strung straight from where he feels it.
And quietly, Koyama watches. Not saying anything for once -- not even that the new song's already kind of growing on him even if it probably is. Just sitting there.
Watching Moriuchi pour his heart out.
• 2:05 less trumpet? tone down treble overall - too much for headphones/laptop speakers esp. if tegomass sect
• layer rap w/ bg harmony.
Moriuchi is, for better or worse, the 'Real Muso Type' in NewS's cast of dating sim characters. It's a title he earned pretty quick, but almost regrets getting these days. Within NewS itself, the others by and large don't even bother pretending they can string together two shreds of musical inclination. Except for Ryo, but YEAAAH! ☆＃％◎※ Yeah, no. There's really only one person in the jimusho that Moriuchi can vaguely respect for musical reasons, though even then the man's blueberry afros and talking pyramids lend a dubious edge to that belief, while senpai like TOKIO spend more time being weird or naked (or both) than being awesome. And Moriuchi wants nothing to do with admiring that.
• 4:30 fade to 0 by now? too many loops.
• try add bg/voc echo in rondo with loop?
Done for the round, Moriuchi sets the pen down with a token scowl. "I still don't think it'll sound any good," he says. But feels a little better as he reaches over to turn the CD player off. (If this song really is their next single, they're going to be singing too much of it in the very near future, making twice through totally enough for one day.)
"Alright," Koyama smiles in his weird mother hen mode. "It's still tough for you, isn't it?" he says sympathetically. "Fitting in here?"
Moriuchi crosses his arms, a challenge in his raised brow: "Harder for you though right, Kei? Since you're the one keeping all us headcases under damage control."
"Ahh~" Koyama rocks back in his chair, wiping an imaginary tear from his eye. "Taka says so much nicer things than mean old Shige!"
Moriuchi snerks. "Not hard." Shige-chan and Kusano can be bastards sometimes -- especially when they double-team about it. (And they do.) Which probably has something to do with a residual rage at the world for mixing the two of them up for ages after they all debuted, right up until Kusano got his perm. Serve them right for both being dark and spiky back then. That look's Moriuchi's domain. The others can have their shameless, star-spangled spandex and prance about in it too for all he cares. In fact, they can take his share too.
"How's the band?" Koyama asks next. Moriuchi gives him a sidelong look. Band? Koyama's obviously not talking about NewS anymore, even before he botches it: "One Lock Okay, or--"
Unforgivable.
"It's ONE OK ROCK! Like one o'clock, get it right!"
Koyama laughs. "Sorry, sorry~ that was my bad."
"It sure was," Moriuchi grouches. But he can't be unhappy for long; his lips resort to that funny duck-pout he likes for no real reason. "...nah, they're alright. We're good."
"I'm glad to hear it," Koyama says, cordial, and Moriuchi searches in vain for the slightest trace of sarcasm -- but he really should know Koyama better by now. Actually he does know Koyama better by now, which is the depressing bit. "Not still thinking of running off with them to go it solo?" the other teases, in a very fail attempt at being sly and cute.
Fail, because Koyama's long and lanky. A state that will never be cute no matter what the guy himself thinks or says. "No," Moriuchi stares at him. "Besides, it's too late."
"It's never too late to aim for the stars," Koyama smiles. And it's that other type of smile this time -- the one that makes his eyes twinkle instead of disappear. "I should know, really! Since I only joined Johnny's at seventeen..." He shivers suddenly then, rubbing his arms as if the Ghost of Trauma Past suddenly paid him a visit just for the mention, before getting a grip and soldiering on. His voice drops to a conspiratorial whisper as he leans in: "You know... if you wanted to elope, I think you could lead them to success."
Moriuchi feels his gut twist and scowls. Well, sure. He's pretty sure he could too -- ONE OK ROCK's sound is solid, and they're close knit -- but that's not his issue. Leaning back, he focuses on dismantling the black click-pen in front of him. "Stop trying to get rid of me," he tells Koyama evenly. "If Ryo and Uchi can run two gigs at once, then so can I." Even if being in two Johnny's groups is totally different from being in one Johnny's group and one ad-hoc other thing.
"I'm not trying to get rid of you," Koyama smiles. "But if you're really not happy here after so long, you know... I heard Ryo-chan and Yamapi talking the other day. They think you're really good. We all do! I don't think a single member here would begrudge you the chance to--"
"No, it's too late," Moriuchi cuts him off. And makes that duck-pout again.
Because I'm Moriuchi of NewS now, he doesn't say;
Because that fame shouldn't have anything to do with this one;
Because the Johnny's stigma is nothing I'd want to bring to a rock band;
Because... I stuck it out for a season too long; and--
"Because you all like me already, and I'd feel like a shithead for leaving now."
Where would NewS get its muso cred then?
For half a second, Koyama's actually surprised enough to be speechless -- but then he starts laughing and laughing and sighing and giggling behind his hands and won't freaking stop. Moriuchi scowls. "I'm serious!" he goes on. "If I was gonna leave, I should've done it back before Kibou, when everyone still hated each other."
It would've been easier -- almost okay -- when they all hadn't gotten along. Pi'd been pissy good and long about the 4TOPS split, and KKK were without their ITY. Ryo and Uchi had been Osakan, Massu'd been the only one who could really dance worth a dime and who the hell was Tegoshi Yuya anyway for fuck's sake? But now...
"Taka says the nicest things!" Koyama laughs, grinning as if his face is going to split like a melon at the beach.
Everyone's too goddamn nice.
The door slams open.
"Did somebody call my name?" Tegoshi sing-songs, incoming with Massu, nikuman, Kusanoman and Shige-chan in tow.
"No," Moriuchi informs him, quite nicely.
Tegoshi's sharp gaze cuts across the room though, and meets Moriuchi's flat one. And then Tegoshi smiles and clears his throat. "Kei-chan. Let's play harmony~"
Immediately Koyama sits up straight, because Tegoshi has the older ones whipped like that. "Laaa~" he begins, drawing the note along with his thin voice wavering until Shige's husky tones pad it out and Kusano's strength brings the three together.
Massu swallows his mouthful of snack and takes the nasal midrange: "Laa~"
"Match me, Taka," Tegoshi grins, competitive.
Moriuchi's eyes narrow over a smile, and he stands. "You're on."
"La~ La~ La~"
Their six voices rise, cementing one chord before moving on to the next, higher and higher, step by step until the room rings with the sharpness of it.
Shige-chan's the first to drop out, unable to go another note.
"Shige sucks," Kusano laughs, jumping ship from Koyama's baseline to join Tegoshi and Moriuchi at the top.
He gets two steps up with them--
"At least I don't hang upside down on monkey bars to try stretch my vocal cords," Shige-chan mutters.
--before dropping out to argue. "Hey, trade secrets! Don't give them away!"
Moriuchi snickers before Koyama's voice cracks over his highest note the next second, dissolving him into coughs like a cassowary with throat cancer and grabbing Kusano's attention instead. "Kei-chan, you need to stop with the smokes if they're going to affect your voice like that!"
"You need to quit too before they affect your voice like that in the future," Shige-chan tells Kusano primly.
"Uh-huh," Kusano snickers, "because you're one fit to give me vocal advice, Shige. It hasn't hurt Jin or Kame-kun any."
"You're two-faced and weird," Shige-chan tells Kusano, "and want to sleep with KAT-TUN." Like it's a crime.
"Half of Japan wants to sleep with KAT-TUN!"
"They all have bad taste."
Tegoshi ignores the pair, gesturing for Masuda to take over their baseline and keep the game going. Massu needs no further prompting, and Moriuchi falls a couple of easy semitones into the midrange: "La~ Laa~"
And one higher. "La~ La~ La~"
And one higher. "La~ La~ La~"
And one higher.
Loud. Strong. Pitch-perfect even to Moriuchi's ears, and he meets Tegoshi's eyes with a grin. Massu drops out, sensing the game is over; Tegoshi and Moriuchi hold for two beats more, before dropping their notes as well. The air rings satisfyingly. "We win~" Tegoshi grins.
"...finally," Shige-chan mutters. Clearly just jealous.
Calmly, Masuda goes back to eating his nikuman. And picks a few crumbs off of the table to place particularly into the bin.
"I could've gone higher," Kusano says, watching Tegoshi flounce over to a mirror to see that his hair survived the ordeal; if he hears the challenge, Tegoshi ignores it for now. "But thank god Taka was there. If it were just TegoMass, I think the pitch would've perforated my ear drums."
Moriuchi snerks. His rougher tones temper a lot of NewS' vocals -- because he has the range for it, unlike certain other members with husky voices.
"Ahh-huh," Shige-chan says, decidedly sulky. "Now you know what it's like when he isn't there, and it's just you and them. I'll record it next time and set it as your phone alarm."
"I'll kill you," Kusano deadpans.
"Not if it kills you first," Shige-chan deadpans right back. "By perforating your brain."
"The mirrors are still intact," Tegoshi observes, with a superior air. He probably aims to shatter glass with his voice one day. (He probably thinks he's capable of it, too.)
"That's because Shige-chan hasn't checked his hair yet," Kusano grins.
Koyama hits him. "Mean!"
Shige-chan says nothing but sighs into the table, used to his lot in life.
"..." Moriuchi purses his lips for a moment, making the duck-pout. His groupmates are all ridiculous and stupid, but what goes around comes around, right? Right.
Calculatedly casual, Moriuchi slides Koyama's notepad and pen over to the next person who needs it. "The demo. Write down your thoughts," he instructs. And then adds, derisive to Shige-chan's blank look: "Don't make that face. I know you do have thoughts."
"...hey!"
"Kato, that pen has no ink in it," Massu points out calmly. Kusano cackles.
Flustered, Shige-chan puts the empty barrel back down and protests. "Why should I bother anyway? I'm not the musical one here!"
Moriuchi crosses his arms, impervious. "But you are here. And that's what counts." Koyama pretty much said so earlier, and Tegoshi's selfishness reminded Moriuchi again in not half so many words -- so now he'll pass on the favour. Moriuchi isn't NewS, and he isn't ONE OK ROCK either -- but he's a part of both, and that's the important bit because neither group is really complete without him, for better or worse. "It's only all of us together that makes our sound. Including the lame producers and stuff, like your crappy range. That's what NewS is."
A life on its own is just a span of time after all, and over soon enough. But it's how you mix with everyone around that really makes a mark.
Shige-chan blinks at Moriuchi for a moment as if the other's grown a second head. Usually, the group's philosophising is left to Pi or Ryo (if it's on air or J-web; or Shige himself if it's neither) -- but without further protest, he skims Moriuchi's two pages of scrawl while fixing the pen. And then slowly, thoughtfully, he appends a few things to the bullet points.
• layer rap w/ bg harmony.
-Kato: can take the baseline with Koyama please.
Kusano moves over to drape across Shige-chan's shoulder, telling him to add this or that--
• 4:30 fade to 0 by now? too many loops.
-How about a different voice each time? Variation! Spice of life.
And Moriuchi is satisfied then that his good deed for the day is done, and is sort of almost... happy.
Until Kusano reaches over to turn the CD player back on and run their new track again for TegoMass to hear, at which point Moriuchi goes for his mp3 player and sound-blocking headphones and migrates over to the couch. Good deed or no, that new song really is the devil.
Just before he turns away though, he pauses at the sight of Koyama's single-lidded eyes shining, and the happy, hopeful grin on his long face like 'Taka says the nicest things~'
"I want the bridge with Massu or Uchi!" Tegoshi calls as Summer Time starts up again.
"There is no bridge," Shige-chan tells him.
Kusano smirks. "Well, there's a bridge but it's all rap this time. Which means it's totally ours~"
"Huh. That's not very good is it," Tegoshi says. "When do I get to showcase my voice?"
"You get to do that all the time anyway!"
"..." Moriuchi takes a breath, wanting for a moment to call them all stupid, but then just shakes his head and slips his headphones on instead, closing his eyes. He'll leave them alone.
After all, stupid is part of what NewS is too.
That's just the way it is when they're all together, and if things were any different then they wouldn't be the same.
*
Title: "Pass the salt." (originally here)
Details: Moriuchi, KKK, TegoMass (9-nin NewS); G.
Summary: Summer Time's a lovely song, isn't it? Moriuchi sure as hell doesn't think so, but that's okay. :))) He'll just have to deal.
Warnings: Coarse language? ;* The S-word! Doom.
Prompt: NewS's SUMMER TIME ( translation), for Team What-If. "WHAT IF NOBODY EVER LEFT NEWS? :DD Could Moriuchi stick it out without being miserable and grumpy forever? Should Shige just throw in the towel and be the first to call it quits? ♥♥"
It's a regular day at the jimusho, and NewS congregates around a table in their dressing room.
Or four of them do anyway.
The Pi is off on some drama shooting as usual, and Ryo and Uchi are on their way over from Osaka, probably doing their best to join the Mile High club via shinkansen though nobody wants to call to check. And Massu is out buying nikuman from downstairs, but he'll be back soon if they haven't sold out, and with him his keeper -- the stunning little thing called Tegoshi. (Literally stunning, mind. The harmlessness of his selfishness leaves many a grown man blinking in awe.) But of course, if the nikuman have sold out, Massu will be a while waiting for a fresh batch to be cooked before he returns.
That leaves the alley cats, KKK, who aren't really seated at the table so much as sprawled under and around it, plus one Moriuchi Takahiro who thinks he might just do his head in against the plastic-coated plywood and call himself redeemed.
The weapon of his demise is a CD player, and the cardinal offence is the tune it spawned.
It's an audio monstrosity with the nerve to call itself Summer Time, according to the demo CD envelope; Moriuchi wants to ring the whole rig up on charges of fraud and attempted deception. As he stares unseeing, the looping extro fades off into the distance of his mind, its mocking strains of ...this iza summer time~ ...this iza summer time~ echoing around his head like green faeries.
In fact, Moriuchi finds himself so overwhelmingly underwhelmed by the song's power (...utter lack thereof) that he thinks he may have strained a heart muscle trying not to die. Stuttering trumpets. Simplistic melody and uninspired beat, dum, dum, dum, dum, all processed and synthesized to high heaven and so squeaky clean that it hurts his ears -- not to mention the hyaku-en paperback novel lyrics and how much it is all just not summer in the slightest.
'Sweet emotion'? Bullshit.
That's not summer.
Summer, Moriuchi's conviction will say, is all about salt.
Heat and dirt and sweat. On the chance you get a full day free: dawn-to-dusk jam sessions in the garage with friends who don't care if they've got bad hair and worse B.O. because you'll all reek feral and look like hell by the time you hit that in-the-zone high -- and then after, slipping down to the pub for drinks 'til the sun's legacy is gone and the streets stop hissing when you spit on them.
Summer is forgetting, for a while, that most of your life is not actually about you or even the slightest bit yours. It's blistering freedom and screaming wings of liberty from the top of Tokyo Tower, not this... plinky little ditty about wishing for some one-time maybe lady over melted ice-cream at the beach, what the hell. That's not summer, that's shoujo manga.
Moriuchi scoots his chair back, leaning down under the table. Koyama looks up; their eyes meet. Kusano and Shige-chan look up, too.
"Did you guys hear that?" Moriuchi asks, deadpan. And then: "No, I'm serious," when all he gets are three blank looks in reply. (Stupid K's and their dumb brain sharing affliction.)
"Hear... what?" Shige-chan asks slowly. And really, Moriuchi would rather think an imaginary cat got into Aoyama's Law school.
He gestures to the underside of the table, approximately where the CD player sits up top. "That."
"Man, Taka!" Kusano sighs, melodramatically relieved. "Here you had me thinking there was a werebeast prowling around or something."
Shige-chan pokes the freckled one in the side. "We established last time that that was just Masuda's stomach." Kusano squirms but can't do much, caught as he is in Koyama's casual headlock. Moriuchi sighs. By all sound reasoning, Kusano is one of the stronger members of NewS and should be able to break free of that regular torture.
But then again, not many people can bring themselves to hit Koyama Keiichiro...
"Isn't it a great track?" their eldest beams, smile broad and single-lidded eyes nowhere to be found on his face because they disappear like that sometimes. "It's so happy and hopeful!"
...by the same token, Moriuchi laments, it's kind of hard to hate the guy, too.
"Uh," Moriuchi says, "...yeah." And sits back up properly -- well, sort of properly. Mostly he's flopped forward, chin resting on the table -- gracefully backing out of his own bitchfest before even getting started.
NewS songs always sound the same, like that Eurovision shit the cable music channel likes to pimp up every year -- sometimes it's funny in a kind of painful way, but mostly it's just overproduced and under-considered and just... a load of crap, really. And the public gobbles it up like it's gold and it gets way too much airtime and hits Oricon number one for the day and the week and... Moriuchi really ought to be used to it by now. It's the usual course of business, as much as it pisses him off.
There's a few muffled whispers and nudges from yon below. Moriuchi can feel them in the floorboards before Kusano suddenly sits up -- too suddenly, smacking his head on the underside of the table -- and jars Moriuchi's perch. Moriuchi kicks him and apologises the next second ("Oops, my foot slipped."), but Kusano howls anyway: "Koyamamaaa~ Taka-chan's being mean to me~!"
Moriuchi isn't happy. "Don't call me that!" he grumps.
Kusano pops his head up from the side of the table, grinning devilishly-- "You're not the boss of me." --and Moriuchi wonders not for the first time just who the youngest in NewS is really supposed to be, because Kusano and Tegoshi do a damn good job of trying to steal his title five times every other day.
Koyama drags Shige-chan up from under the table, and pulls on Kusano's ear -- causing him to yelp again: "Hey, what was that for!"
"Go see what's taking TegoMass so long," Koyama Strongly Suggests.
And Shige-chan totally knows that tone. "You want us out of the room," he says.
Koyama gives their resident genius three hundred-yen coins and pats him on the shoulder. "Get Kusacchi something to shut him up if he protests."
"Stop talking about me like I'm not here!" Kusano protests.
"I think I'll get him an everlasting gobstopper," Shige-chan deadpans, and tows Kusano the hell away. Thank god.
Even so, Moriuchi's not looking forward to the conversation Koyama's bound to strike up with him. Preemptively, he dons his best grouchy face that says, 'I'm not happy like you, man. Leave me alone'.
But Koyama doesn't buy it even for a second, fact aside that he just gave Shige-chan the last of his pocket change. He's smiling like spaghetti in the silence that follows, and takes one of the eight empty chairs cluttered around their cheap little table. There's silence and silence, then heartbeat and more silence before eventually: "You don't like the song, Taka," Koyama says, too lightly.
'Wow, you're a regular mind reader aren't you?' Moriuchi doesn't tell him with utter, biting sarcasm, though it's said clear enough as he turns away and pillows his cheek on crossed arms. For a long moment, the air above his head veritably shimmers with petulance -- but Moriuchi's twenty years old now. A proper adult. "...it's always the same," he feels obliged to mutter after a bit.
Looking up at the sound of something sliding across the table, he isn't surprised to see that Koyama's pushed over a pen and lined notepad.
This is often also the usual course of business. They all have their kryptonite; KKK might find drinking bars dry and declaring their mutual love for the world cathartic, but that's not really Moriuchi's scene and Koyama's aware of that. Actually, most of NewS are aware of that -- but Koyama's one of the few who knows what to do about it. (Ryo tries, sometimes, though will invariably recommend some combination of beer and Uchi -- at which point Moriuchi will say that he's quite enough uchi for himself though, thanks, and leave Ryo and his dodgy advice alone.)
"Write it down," Koyama tells him, still smiling. "Whatever you think they should change -- Ryo-chan always says your ideas are very good. Let our producers know so they can fix it."
"Fix it my ass," Moriuchi mutters, though he picks up the pen anyway. "You mean maul it twice as bad."
Like that one time he recommended more guitar for a fuller sound, and they added a freaking ukulele. Or that other time he told them cymbals would be more dramatic, and they put in tambourines instead so Kis-My-Ft2 could run around shaking them during con season. Damn incestuous jimusho...
Nevertheless, Moriuchi hits 'Back' on the CD player. And as the track begins to play again, he listens. Listens and writes.
With the thin black pen over the next four minutes forty, he fills two pages with bulletpoints of chicken scratches that look like barbed wire, drawn with a cutting commonsense strung straight from where he feels it.
And quietly, Koyama watches. Not saying anything for once -- not even that the new song's already kind of growing on him even if it probably is. Just sitting there.
Watching Moriuchi pour his heart out.
• 2:05 less trumpet? tone down treble overall - too much for headphones/laptop speakers esp. if tegomass sect
• layer rap w/ bg harmony.
Moriuchi is, for better or worse, the 'Real Muso Type' in NewS's cast of dating sim characters. It's a title he earned pretty quick, but almost regrets getting these days. Within NewS itself, the others by and large don't even bother pretending they can string together two shreds of musical inclination. Except for Ryo, but YEAAAH! ☆＃％◎※ Yeah, no. There's really only one person in the jimusho that Moriuchi can vaguely respect for musical reasons, though even then the man's blueberry afros and talking pyramids lend a dubious edge to that belief, while senpai like TOKIO spend more time being weird or naked (or both) than being awesome. And Moriuchi wants nothing to do with admiring that.
• 4:30 fade to 0 by now? too many loops.
• try add bg/voc echo in rondo with loop?
Done for the round, Moriuchi sets the pen down with a token scowl. "I still don't think it'll sound any good," he says. But feels a little better as he reaches over to turn the CD player off. (If this song really is their next single, they're going to be singing too much of it in the very near future, making twice through totally enough for one day.)
"Alright," Koyama smiles in his weird mother hen mode. "It's still tough for you, isn't it?" he says sympathetically. "Fitting in here?"
Moriuchi crosses his arms, a challenge in his raised brow: "Harder for you though right, Kei? Since you're the one keeping all us headcases under damage control."
"Ahh~" Koyama rocks back in his chair, wiping an imaginary tear from his eye. "Taka says so much nicer things than mean old Shige!"
Moriuchi snerks. "Not hard." Shige-chan and Kusano can be bastards sometimes -- especially when they double-team about it. (And they do.) Which probably has something to do with a residual rage at the world for mixing the two of them up for ages after they all debuted, right up until Kusano got his perm. Serve them right for both being dark and spiky back then. That look's Moriuchi's domain. The others can have their shameless, star-spangled spandex and prance about in it too for all he cares. In fact, they can take his share too.
"How's the band?" Koyama asks next. Moriuchi gives him a sidelong look. Band? Koyama's obviously not talking about NewS anymore, even before he botches it: "One Lock Okay, or--"
Unforgivable.
"It's ONE OK ROCK! Like one o'clock, get it right!"
Koyama laughs. "Sorry, sorry~ that was my bad."
"It sure was," Moriuchi grouches. But he can't be unhappy for long; his lips resort to that funny duck-pout he likes for no real reason. "...nah, they're alright. We're good."
"I'm glad to hear it," Koyama says, cordial, and Moriuchi searches in vain for the slightest trace of sarcasm -- but he really should know Koyama better by now. Actually he does know Koyama better by now, which is the depressing bit. "Not still thinking of running off with them to go it solo?" the other teases, in a very fail attempt at being sly and cute.
Fail, because Koyama's long and lanky. A state that will never be cute no matter what the guy himself thinks or says. "No," Moriuchi stares at him. "Besides, it's too late."
"It's never too late to aim for the stars," Koyama smiles. And it's that other type of smile this time -- the one that makes his eyes twinkle instead of disappear. "I should know, really! Since I only joined Johnny's at seventeen..." He shivers suddenly then, rubbing his arms as if the Ghost of Trauma Past suddenly paid him a visit just for the mention, before getting a grip and soldiering on. His voice drops to a conspiratorial whisper as he leans in: "You know... if you wanted to elope, I think you could lead them to success."
Moriuchi feels his gut twist and scowls. Well, sure. He's pretty sure he could too -- ONE OK ROCK's sound is solid, and they're close knit -- but that's not his issue. Leaning back, he focuses on dismantling the black click-pen in front of him. "Stop trying to get rid of me," he tells Koyama evenly. "If Ryo and Uchi can run two gigs at once, then so can I." Even if being in two Johnny's groups is totally different from being in one Johnny's group and one ad-hoc other thing.
"I'm not trying to get rid of you," Koyama smiles. "But if you're really not happy here after so long, you know... I heard Ryo-chan and Yamapi talking the other day. They think you're really good. We all do! I don't think a single member here would begrudge you the chance to--"
"No, it's too late," Moriuchi cuts him off. And makes that duck-pout again.
Because I'm Moriuchi of NewS now, he doesn't say;
Because that fame shouldn't have anything to do with this one;
Because the Johnny's stigma is nothing I'd want to bring to a rock band;
Because... I stuck it out for a season too long; and--
"Because you all like me already, and I'd feel like a shithead for leaving now."
Where would NewS get its muso cred then?
For half a second, Koyama's actually surprised enough to be speechless -- but then he starts laughing and laughing and sighing and giggling behind his hands and won't freaking stop. Moriuchi scowls. "I'm serious!" he goes on. "If I was gonna leave, I should've done it back before Kibou, when everyone still hated each other."
It would've been easier -- almost okay -- when they all hadn't gotten along. Pi'd been pissy good and long about the 4TOPS split, and KKK were without their ITY. Ryo and Uchi had been Osakan, Massu'd been the only one who could really dance worth a dime and who the hell was Tegoshi Yuya anyway for fuck's sake? But now...
"Taka says the nicest things!" Koyama laughs, grinning as if his face is going to split like a melon at the beach.
Everyone's too goddamn nice.
The door slams open.
"Did somebody call my name?" Tegoshi sing-songs, incoming with Massu, nikuman, Kusanoman and Shige-chan in tow.
"No," Moriuchi informs him, quite nicely.
Tegoshi's sharp gaze cuts across the room though, and meets Moriuchi's flat one. And then Tegoshi smiles and clears his throat. "Kei-chan. Let's play harmony~"
Immediately Koyama sits up straight, because Tegoshi has the older ones whipped like that. "Laaa~" he begins, drawing the note along with his thin voice wavering until Shige's husky tones pad it out and Kusano's strength brings the three together.
Massu swallows his mouthful of snack and takes the nasal midrange: "Laa~"
"Match me, Taka," Tegoshi grins, competitive.
Moriuchi's eyes narrow over a smile, and he stands. "You're on."
"La~ La~ La~"
Their six voices rise, cementing one chord before moving on to the next, higher and higher, step by step until the room rings with the sharpness of it.
Shige-chan's the first to drop out, unable to go another note.
"Shige sucks," Kusano laughs, jumping ship from Koyama's baseline to join Tegoshi and Moriuchi at the top.
He gets two steps up with them--
"At least I don't hang upside down on monkey bars to try stretch my vocal cords," Shige-chan mutters.
--before dropping out to argue. "Hey, trade secrets! Don't give them away!"
Moriuchi snickers before Koyama's voice cracks over his highest note the next second, dissolving him into coughs like a cassowary with throat cancer and grabbing Kusano's attention instead. "Kei-chan, you need to stop with the smokes if they're going to affect your voice like that!"
"You need to quit too before they affect your voice like that in the future," Shige-chan tells Kusano primly.
"Uh-huh," Kusano snickers, "because you're one fit to give me vocal advice, Shige. It hasn't hurt Jin or Kame-kun any."
"You're two-faced and weird," Shige-chan tells Kusano, "and want to sleep with KAT-TUN." Like it's a crime.
"Half of Japan wants to sleep with KAT-TUN!"
"They all have bad taste."
Tegoshi ignores the pair, gesturing for Masuda to take over their baseline and keep the game going. Massu needs no further prompting, and Moriuchi falls a couple of easy semitones into the midrange: "La~ Laa~"
And one higher. "La~ La~ La~"
And one higher. "La~ La~ La~"
And one higher.
Loud. Strong. Pitch-perfect even to Moriuchi's ears, and he meets Tegoshi's eyes with a grin. Massu drops out, sensing the game is over; Tegoshi and Moriuchi hold for two beats more, before dropping their notes as well. The air rings satisfyingly. "We win~" Tegoshi grins.
"...finally," Shige-chan mutters. Clearly just jealous.
Calmly, Masuda goes back to eating his nikuman. And picks a few crumbs off of the table to place particularly into the bin.
"I could've gone higher," Kusano says, watching Tegoshi flounce over to a mirror to see that his hair survived the ordeal; if he hears the challenge, Tegoshi ignores it for now. "But thank god Taka was there. If it were just TegoMass, I think the pitch would've perforated my ear drums."
Moriuchi snerks. His rougher tones temper a lot of NewS' vocals -- because he has the range for it, unlike certain other members with husky voices.
"Ahh-huh," Shige-chan says, decidedly sulky. "Now you know what it's like when he isn't there, and it's just you and them. I'll record it next time and set it as your phone alarm."
"I'll kill you," Kusano deadpans.
"Not if it kills you first," Shige-chan deadpans right back. "By perforating your brain."
"The mirrors are still intact," Tegoshi observes, with a superior air. He probably aims to shatter glass with his voice one day. (He probably thinks he's capable of it, too.)
"That's because Shige-chan hasn't checked his hair yet," Kusano grins.
Koyama hits him. "Mean!"
Shige-chan says nothing but sighs into the table, used to his lot in life.
"..." Moriuchi purses his lips for a moment, making the duck-pout. His groupmates are all ridiculous and stupid, but what goes around comes around, right? Right.
Calculatedly casual, Moriuchi slides Koyama's notepad and pen over to the next person who needs it. "The demo. Write down your thoughts," he instructs. And then adds, derisive to Shige-chan's blank look: "Don't make that face. I know you do have thoughts."
"...hey!"
"Kato, that pen has no ink in it," Massu points out calmly. Kusano cackles.
Flustered, Shige-chan puts the empty barrel back down and protests. "Why should I bother anyway? I'm not the musical one here!"
Moriuchi crosses his arms, impervious. "But you are here. And that's what counts." Koyama pretty much said so earlier, and Tegoshi's selfishness reminded Moriuchi again in not half so many words -- so now he'll pass on the favour. Moriuchi isn't NewS, and he isn't ONE OK ROCK either -- but he's a part of both, and that's the important bit because neither group is really complete without him, for better or worse. "It's only all of us together that makes our sound. Including the lame producers and stuff, like your crappy range. That's what NewS is."
A life on its own is just a span of time after all, and over soon enough. But it's how you mix with everyone around that really makes a mark.
Shige-chan blinks at Moriuchi for a moment as if the other's grown a second head. Usually, the group's philosophising is left to Pi or Ryo (if it's on air or J-web; or Shige himself if it's neither) -- but without further protest, he skims Moriuchi's two pages of scrawl while fixing the pen. And then slowly, thoughtfully, he appends a few things to the bullet points.
• layer rap w/ bg harmony.
-Kato: can take the baseline with Koyama please.
Kusano moves over to drape across Shige-chan's shoulder, telling him to add this or that--
• 4:30 fade to 0 by now? too many loops.
-How about a different voice each time? Variation! Spice of life.
And Moriuchi is satisfied then that his good deed for the day is done, and is sort of almost... happy.
Until Kusano reaches over to turn the CD player back on and run their new track again for TegoMass to hear, at which point Moriuchi goes for his mp3 player and sound-blocking headphones and migrates over to the couch. Good deed or no, that new song really is the devil.
Just before he turns away though, he pauses at the sight of Koyama's single-lidded eyes shining, and the happy, hopeful grin on his long face like 'Taka says the nicest things~'
"I want the bridge with Massu or Uchi!" Tegoshi calls as Summer Time starts up again.
"There is no bridge," Shige-chan tells him.
Kusano smirks. "Well, there's a bridge but it's all rap this time. Which means it's totally ours~"
"Huh. That's not very good is it," Tegoshi says. "When do I get to showcase my voice?"
"You get to do that all the time anyway!"
"..." Moriuchi takes a breath, wanting for a moment to call them all stupid, but then just shakes his head and slips his headphones on instead, closing his eyes. He'll leave them alone.
After all, stupid is part of what NewS is too.
That's just the way it is when they're all together, and if things were any different then they wouldn't be the same.