Threatening red-eyed paiper-mache rats sit stonily in the corner as the primate on stage ceases his whirlings and announces, ''We're Bratface, catch us again in two weeks same time, same place. Peace.'' Those within earshot a considerable volume of air is compressed by the electronic appendage to the speaker's vocal chords share the rats' expressions, stone-faced from the mass-produced beer they are drinking, red-eyed from the air in the smoke. Little notice is given to the glorious silence, and the seven or eight conversations continue while a few women near the stage begin to applaud, ''Yea Marky! Looking good baby...''. I, too, begin to applaud, as I was raised in this manner. Those seated at the small slab of composite board, covered with a beer-ash slurry and mounted on top of a cast of Chinese steel, looked at me in disdain: ''You actually liked that shit?'' I place a forearm on the table, providing enough slope to the unsteady surface to allow my shirtsleeve to become quickly saturated, and return a ''No.''

My questioner was an old friend, John Strelow, whom I was visiting for the weekend. So far, Bratface had denied our attempts to talk, but this was it: I felt as though I could actually hear John and it appeared as though he was about to say something!

''Well, if you didn't like them you're definitely gonna like us. We're ten times better.''

He rose from the table, bumping it slightly and sending more effluent onto my knee. The gentleman on my left, John's roommate, Chris Larkin, followed.

''We have to set up,'' John explained. I sat stunned. There had been no mention of a performance from my friend, let alone a band named the ''Sins of John Glenn'' from what I could make of the chalkboard next to the stage through all these big, airborne, organic combustion by-products. Strelow had always played guitar in college, but never anywhere but in his apartment. This was quite a surprise. Or a practical joke. Strelow and Larkin would return from the restroom, laughing out loud at my gullibility and here they came, Strelow carrying two guitars, Larkin rolling an amplifier. Bratface's prime vocal offender paused and greeted Larkin while the rest of his troop continued tearing duct tape with their opposing digits. The two men stood ankle high in a lush underbrush of audio cables, which no doubt must have been the targets of the rats' gazes, for their nesting value. I stood erect, on two legs, and approached Strelow. He smiled through his ''We'll be on in fifteen, brother.''

I went for air. I found it hard to believe this same sweet, cold Boston air I was moving with my diaphragm to drive the smoke from my airways could blacken the lungs of the cadavers I had seen at the Harvard School of Medicine. Maybe those cadavers had all been to the Rathskeller here on Commonwealth Avenue. The small bar seemed to have the capacity to kill. I watched as two hominids my age, huddled from the brutal January chill, presented their state-issued identifications and a Lincoln (FOUR BANDS FIVE BUCKS, the door read) to the doorman, Jim. With smiles on their faces, the men shed their coats. One went to the bar and purchased 60 fluid ounces of a known toxin, while the other initiated a slow, oxygen-consuming reaction seven centimeters from his mouth. Soon, both were gulping and inhaling molecules their body would see fit to filter. I showed Jim my stamp to avoid repayment and asked him how many other hands he'd inked that night.

''About 60, which is an average night. Never more than a hundred.''

''Never More Than a Hundred'' might be a more fitting name than the unoriginal Rathskeller. This was the third Rathskeller I had witnessed (or at least, remembered) in my short two years of state-approved alcoholic beverage consumption. It was unlike the others in that it was spread over two levels. The street level, where Jim sat, was like many others, mostly wood tables, wood flooring, wood walls, and a wooden bar. The stairs down, also wood, brought one into the ''Cellar'' where the swarming rat models with red light-emitting-diodes for eyes sat motionless, holding their breaths, waiting for better air. On the walls were murals of rats larger than life, swirling about each other, intertwined in a seamless mass of rodent. All the rats depicted by the management of the establishment were those of the taxon Rattus norvegicus, those nasty disease-vector-public-health-enemy-number-ones from Europe and not the native American pack rat. The choice was appropriate.

The hoax has grown quite elaborate. Strelow is testing microphones for the soundman. The soundman, who is a model for us all in terms of optimal communication per physical effort, is sitting in back, opposite the rats and the stage. He is wearing (1) a vacant template on his face and (2) and (3) green, luminescent earplugs, that, through the nitrogen-oxygen-tar emulsion, resemble glowworms burrowing into the substrate. I make a mental note: when in Boston, do as the soundman does. Larkin is tuning his guitar, a classic blue Fender Telecaster* with a white plectrum-guard. And, damn, is he loud. His amplifier is some old-looking piece of hardware built in a factory with a picture of Eisenhower in the foreman's office, and he is going from 0 to 120 decibels in the flick of a wrist. Although the people in the audience have undoubtedly changed since the last show, a difference is hard to discern. All are dressed similarly, wearing various mixtures of flannel and denim. Black leather is also a common choice, for belts, shoes, and jackets. All are under 30 years of age. They all turn towards Larkin, bathed in green light photons bouncing off of the particles in this air. His mouth shapes a series of diphthongs into the microphone, ''Um. HELLO. As most of you know we are the Sons of John Glenn. Thanks for comin'. Circle In A Square.'' (I looked back at the chalkboard. It still read ''Sins'', I swear.) With that, the demons pent up in the instruments of the band leap forth. Some women are clapping and standing and dancing towards the tsunami of sound crashing all at me. I resurface from a moment of sensory blackout, take a deep breath, and see Strelow shit-eating-grinning at me, strumming easily on his guitar, which slung around him damn near his knees.

This music and those whirling females evoked a 1994-version of a Bobby Fuller Four show, with my Aunt Donna in attendance. The song was simple and somewhat catchy, the lyrics were indecipherable. Within 120 seconds it was over. The drummer vehemently ripped into the next. This piece was unquestionably vanguard in terms of rock music, possessing an industrial-strength beat coupled with a fat bass line. Larkin was screaming, and I mean wailing, off the tips of his toes about shopping malls and car companies. He took a solo on his guitar. The soundman defied the impossible and turned him up another notch. Snakes, silly string, and sonic spaghetti madly spewed from his guitar as men had poisoned the pit with a violent, now frenetic, dance and driven the women aside. The boy was speaking in tongues with that instrument and I eyed the exit just in case the rats decided to dance, too. Suddenly the train of noise slammed into a brick wall and stopped in media res. The clever ending was rewarded by chants of ''More!'' from the 40 to 50 gathered in front of the stage. As the show progressed, the energy level of the audience did not wane. It became clear that these dancing freaks were fans. At some point, after some unnoticeable cue, men and women began yelling ''Dead dogs!'' between songs, and it wasn't until the last number that my confusion was cleared. ''Dead Dogs'' was announced as the finale. To my shock, Strelow stepped up to the front microphone. I never, never heard the boy sing in all our college days and that was because he couldn't. And he didn't. He sort of chanted Lou-Reed-style a ridiculous ditty about a dog on a highway: ''he's layin' in a ditch on the side of the road/realizin' compared to trucks, dogs are slow.'' He didn't even have to sing at all, because the crowd completely drowned him out, each and every last word.

The show was over and I went up and gave Strelow a pat on the back and some grief about his stunt, keeping me in the dark and all. Larkin was being polite with three friendly girls as he approached me and asked if I liked the show better than the previous one. I affirmed that I did. As the girls left our company, he confided, ''People are stupid. We played terrible tonight, but no one notices. I wish I was a bear. I would just eat stupid people.'' I laughed. At 170 cm and about 60 kilos wet, he wouldn't do so well as a bear. I offered the drummer my opposable digits and my fascination for tools to help with the disassembly of his kit as I asked Larkin, ''How much you gettin' for this gig?''

''Prob'ly eight, never more than ten.''

''Dollars?''

''Yep.''

The parallel of his reply to that of the doorman belied a mathematical connection between the source of income, the paying stamped-hands, and the income itself. Soon we left ''Never More Than Ten'', er, the Rathskeller.



Strelow and Larkin's apartment is a small, walk-down basement on St. Mary's Street. I am, as usual, horribly disoriented, but from what these guys tell me it is on the border between Boston and Brookline, and not far from Boston University. Stops for the B-train are right out front. The steps down are in utter disrepair, but the true trick to entry is in negotiating the pool of standing water at the bottom. A school of cigarette butts is feeding on the surface, near the clogged drain. Now inside, the apartment is truly in its lowest organizational energy state. Home sweet entropy. Cops looking for coke would be real proud of this pad. I marvel at this museum of experimental sculpture: a plate of air-dried catsup has become a receptacle for half-smoked cigarettes standing upright, supporting a lonely, dirty, was-that-a sock. Compact discs are scattered everywhere, naked and unprotected, shining like chrome in this junkyard. The focus of the room is not the tiny 13'' black-and-white Montgomery Ward beneath the bent clothes hanger, but a stereo system comprised of (1) an amplifier-tuner with a cracked display, (2) a cheap CD-player, for some reason propped upwards at 45* on a work boot, and (3) a pair of non-matching speakers, one about 25 cm tall, the other a monster 50 cm.

I say aloud, ''Well, I guess musicians aren't necessarily audiophiles.''

Larkin returns, ''I am not a musician. Don't ever even call me that again. I play guitar and I sing and I write, but don't call me a musician.''

There is nothing but seriousness in his tone.

I push aside what must have been a hot dog and sit on one of the two, trashed sofas. Strelow calls from the kitchen, ''Anybody else for an Oily?''

I ask, ''What's an Oily?''

''Olympia. Brewski. Suds. Cheapest case at the liquor store. Ten-ninety-nine. We used to buy Lionshead, but they stopped getting it.''

Larkin, with a mock dreamy look, tones, ''I really miss that Wilkes-Barre beer. Actually though, I like the stuff. Like it, shit, love it. I can't drink Bud anymore, it's just too mass-produced for my flavor.''

I nod in agreement, as I, too, am cheap in beer tastes. Strelow goes to shower and I change the subject. Talking about beer is truly a waste of time.

''How many times you guys play a week?''

''Ah, we average about 2 or 3 shows a month. There are only 5 bars that'll let us play, since we do mostly originals. We've played the Causeway in the North End and Teeth of the Bears and the Middle East in Cambridge. And we played at the Local 186 in Brookline, but they've never had us back. I think I insulted the manager 'cause I said she was too cheap with the free beer.''

''Free beer?''

''Yeah. Every place, except that one, lets you drink all you want from the tap.''

''Must be nice, just working and playing bars occasionally for fun, hanging out.''

''Fun? I'm not doing this for fun,'' he retorted in his don't-call-me-a-musician tone. ''I wanna contract. I wanna make it big. That's my dream.''

''You want to do this for a living?''

''Definitely. And I will. Right now, if I could just make $200 bucks a week [playing shows], I would quit my day job at the record store. I've been recording demos.''

''Where, like, in a studio?''

''No, no. Right here in my room. I've got a four-track.''

He leads me to his room and we are laughing because Strelow is yodeling or singing some German folk song that I've heard his dad belt out after a few. My laughter stops as I enter the bedroom. Angels are singing as I inspect this masterpiece of order. Near to the door is a neatly-made double bed complete with a matching comforter and pillowcases.

''Are you living with a woman?'' I inquire.

''No.''

The back wall looks like a recording studio. I finger a microphone stand protected by a peculiar hoop with panty hose stretched across it.

''That takes the pop out of p's when you're recording.''

Three guitars, one acoustic and two electric, and an electric bass are all neatly propped in stands next to one another. Stacks of tapes, all neatly labeled, line the shelves. I ask to hear his latest endeavor. He gladly obliges and slips a tape into his box. A beautiful, slow acoustic song plays. The sound is lean, only a guitar, a voice, some tambourine-type percussion, and occasional backing vocals. The lyrics are rather riveting. Names, shaved in the backs of heads, written dreamily in notebook margins, tattooed, sprayed on bridges, are the focus of the song. I find myself liking it and I also notice how different it is from the live show. I ask about that.

''I don't think anybody can play the same thing all the time. We all feel differently every day. My music reflects that. I just record whenever I feel like it.''

I ask to borrow some tapes. He gives me three Sons of John Glenn recordings and a tape of his own, simply titled Autumn '93.



Chris Larkin grew up in the suburbs of Hartford, Connecticut. Neither of his parents were particularly musical. The first time Chris handled a guitar was in the state school system: ''I first picked up a guitar...you know, one of those cheap classical ones with the nylon strings you play in music class...when I was eleven, I think, and I just felt like I had when I learned how to read, like I had discovered something new.'' His revelation soon became an obsession and has served as lifestyle template ever since. In high school, he ''spent a lot of time with headphones on'' listening to Eric Clapton, Stevie Ray Vaughn, and the Replacements. After four years of college and an English degree ''to satisfy my parents and pay them back for raising me,'' Larkin decided to pursue his dream, a recording contract, in Boston.

''I grew up in New England and I've always liked it here.''

His accent reflects this. He is of smallish stature and slight build. An impressive nest of black, curly hair rests on his crown. His eyes are blue, his lips are red.

I telephone his father, George, and ask if wants to talk about his son's career path. He doesn't seem overly willing but he does offer this:

''I just hope he comes to his senses. When he matures, he will be fine. He's a bright kid...In my house, when you're 22 you're on your own...''

Larkin replies, ''I love my parents and they love me, but they could never understand. They see life as a family thing. They've never known anything else. My mom is always asking when I'll get married. It's all so cliché, but it's the way it is.''

I listened to the tapes I had received earlier. They were complete, competent albums in my mind, even though they were not affiliated with any distributor or recording company. The first Sons album was titled Let's Go Outside, and consisted of ten short rockabilly-type tunes, including Circle In A Square. The cover art was hilarious, four men dressed in radiation suits. The later two albums, Audio Cod and Remember Grenada, were much darker and harsh in tone.

Larkin commented on this, ''Let's Go Outside was recorded as I came to Boston [in early 1991] with a different lineup that what we have now. I don't even like that music too much anymore, it's too simple-minded. I think as I struggled with money and jobs I grew more cynical over the last two recordings.''

Larkin came up with the name, Sons of John Glenn, back in the cruel spring of 1991, ''after the Gulf War, after a girl dumped me bigtime.''

''It was the first band name I ever genuinely liked. I sat in with three bands in school [college]: 2-E-Z, The Essentials, and The Zeroes. Compared to those it's just a good name. People are always asking, like, who's John Glenn? And nobody knows see, people are stupid.''

I am smug in my knowledge that John Glenn was the first American to orbit the planet, and is currently a senator for Ohio. Any deep significance to the Sons of John Glenn?

''It might be construed as a slight generational label, but other than that, nothing. Bands have to have names if they are going to go anywhere. And you have to understand how bands are named. We all sat around for an hour saying ridiculous names like The Insipid Lilies, The Lucky Sperms, and The Fla-nnels when finally someone said Bastard Sons of Elvis and I returned Sons of John Glenn and it stuck.''

What now? What is the band doing about landing a contract?

''It's hard. Everybody has to work. We don't have a good place to practice. But we have come this far. We do have a base of some fans. We have saved up about $150 to buy some studio time so we can make a promotional single. I met a local distributor with national ties, Carl Plaster, and he's gonna sell us around. There's a possibility a high school friend of mine who's with Twin City Imports is gonna pick up the tab. And all this is happening real soon. We might have to move to Minneapolis, prob'ly just me and John.''

''And leave the other two behind?''

''Unless they want to come, it's up to them.''

His look was determined throughout the discourse.



I am trudging with Larkin through a snowfall worse than my memories of the ''Blizzard of '93'' en route to Nuggets, the small, independently owned record store in which he works as a salesperson. The store is, like many other residences Larkin dwells in, below street level. Walking down the steps, I am greeted by the unmistakable smell of electric heaters volatilizing mildew. But groundwater is good, and the displays are untouched, impeccable offerings of treasures to be heard. I stare into Ornette Coleman's young face beneath a smiling poster of John Prine. Maybe this place is accepting applications. But Larkin's long fell out of love with the store, and I can tell by the way he grunts a greeting to his co-worker.

''I get $6.50 and hour which isn't too bad. Plus I get 40 hours a week, always. And then there's a 50% off workers' discount on the first $10 of purchase per week, 20% off anything above that. I think I have about 300 discs now.''

''Do you get any benefits, like health care?''

''None. No health care.''

''What do you pay a year for health care?''

''No health care.''

He begins straightening shelves, and then pops open a box of a new release. About 30 Tori Amos' are looking at me from the floor as Larkin pops each one of her into a plastic display/anti-theft case.

''Back when they had cardboard boxes, this was a lot easier. Now we gotta monkey with these all the time.''

I ask if he has ever confronted a shoplifter.

''Oh yeah. I feel like a fascist, but it is wrong. Both I busted weren't even 18. At the chain store I used to work, we had tagged merchandise and electronic surveillance and employee bonuses for catching shoplifters. Here, we just try to keep an eye out.''

''You used to work at a chain? Was it a record chain?''

''Yeah. Musicland. Hated it. Hated my brainwashed boss. Too many company-sponsored management seminars. Kept saying to me someday I could be manager if I worked hard. Ha-ha. It was just a big bureaucratic monster.''

I am beginning to note Larkin's distaste for all that is big. And yet I keep in mind that he wants in on all this as well.

I notice the store has a eclectic mix of artists displayed in its posters. For instance, I fail to see Eddie Vedder anywhere. I ask Larkin who hangs the promos.

''Oh we all do. The reason you don't see Pearl Jam is because everyone here is tired of them. That's the coolness here. We can put up whatever we want, we can play whatever we want. Not like Musicland, where every second Monday the new posters went up to coincide with the new chart releases and the music was piped in. I couldn't stand it. Listenin' to Ugly Kid Joe for slaves' wages. Ugly Kid Joe just sucks, completely talentless. And whenever I hear bands like that it just turns my stomach. I could make better music than that with a Casio and a talking G.I. Joe doll.''

''I would buy an album of that,'' I counter, my sides aching from laughter. Larkin is not laughing, though. He continues.

''That's exactly the problem. Stupid people buy crap music. So record companies sign crap bands. It's all an image thing. Or it's who you know. But I think good, honest music will make it. I know there's a big day coming.''

How can someone remain so convinced in the face of contrary evidence? Larkin has yet to make ten dollars at a show or even hear his music on a college radio station and yet he's sure ''there's a big day coming''? Who is to say, maybe someday I will walk into my little sister's room and see a 100 cm reproduction of Chris's face staring at me. My guess, though, is that for every Robert Smith and the Cure, there are at least 5000 Chris Larkins and Sons of John Glenn.