The Exes
Written by Pagan Kennedy (Simon & Schuster $22)
by Suzanne Kammlott
If you’ve ever admired your dark sunglassed self in a rear view mirror; or prattled endlessly on a bar stool about some creative projects, or even wondered if you could collaborate with someone you’ve crawled beneath the sheets with, then The Exes will explain all. Pagan Kennedy’s second novel shines a sharp, yet sympathetic spotlight on a band of underground musicians who, having once shared intimate connections, now seek to share the stage. There’s an Odd Couple(s) feel to the work: Can four, grown underachievers conquer the alt/indie scene, without driving each other crazy?
Read on. The novel is neatly cut up into namesake chapters, deliciously bite-sized; teasing each personality and unique temperament out from the other, as they work as a whole to form The Exes, a garage band with an unseeming, gangly premise. As the most flamboyant of the quartet, Lily, explains, “Hey, y’all, we’re the only band in the world made up entirely of people who used to go out with one another. That’s right, we used to be boyfriend and girlfriend, and now instead of avoiding each other – like most you chicken shits out there do – we spend all our time together. At night when we should be cuddling up with our current sweetie honey-pies, we’re up late jamming with our exes. And that’s so we can bring you songs about love and how to get over it.”
Less a gimmicky elixir d’amour, and more of an tasty off-beat cocktail, The Exes is a funky mix of stressed-out, high-strung, ambitious, suspicious, but more often simply hilarious personas. Hank, the hands-on, managerial type, whose raison d’être is to recapture the raw intensity that “Green Fuzz” cast on him as a suburban teenager, trapped in a wood-paneled Hell. He longs to be a genius in obscurity, but realizes that he lacks the maniac insight his ex, Lily has. Lilly, the wild child of The Exes, with her dreadlocks, dangling Dr. Seuss-esque ski cap, and art school student aura has it all mapped out: Xeroxed flyers, posing for album covers, schmoozing with record label swells. Her Dexedrine-like hysterics turn into viable concepts under Hank’s calm instruction. Add Pakistiani, bassist, Shazia, self-contained to the point of being non-committal; her psyche is divided between being a “good Muslim girl” and the innately talented, sexy independent bisexual rocker she really is. Shaz, once bitten by a local scene Svengali, is a shadow of doubt on the band’s bright bounding progress from No Name to Big Time. She brings as a conquest to the motley troupe, drummer Walt, a lanky soul, a passionate postal worker, owner of the coveted van, whose passion for gene splicing, percussion, and pathological repression finds him glued together only by Zoloft, 4-track mixers, and swirling electron hallucinations. He wants to talk like a regular guy, but ends up “sounding like Noam Chomsky.” Divided, these four individuals are lonesome, poignant notes plucked in a vacuum, but together, they fuse into an awesome symphony of licks, riffs, chops, love, lies, soul-grappling antics, and endless amusement.
Kennedy, with diner-cam-like vision, charts their course from a musty subterranean practice space to second billings in obscure clubs, forays into the heartland; from road trips to head trips, a string of city maps, cigarettes, bleach blonde groupies, impatience, and perseverance, yet The Exes press on in search of the allusive all-American garage band dream. Kennedy’s deft, irreverent prose paints these four chipped characters so well – you’ll swear, you know these people, you might even be one of them. As The Exes progresses, heartbeats and emotional chords collide, but the tune that comes out on top is a fresh, fun, and quirky read. If you’ve ever longed to be a rock ‘n’ roll God in Heaven’s tour bus, consider reading The Exes, and perhaps, consider your own ex.
