The Aquisitioner of Sound

We sat back to listen.  

He put the CD on the sound system – state of the art, sounds emerged from every corner of the room.  

“Jake Liscombe, Trumpet Sounds,” he said , reading the  CD cover. 

“You don’t have to pronounce the ‘e’ in Liscombe,” I said.  

He nodded.  

“Help yourself to wine,” he said. “I have to do some work, if you don’t mind.” 

I poured myself a glass of the red. 

“Good choice,” he said. “I first tasted that wine on a business to trip to Nice. I liked it so much I bought the vineyard. That bottle’s from an exclusive range, you’re one of only a few people in the world who have every tasted it.” 

“Nice,” I said. And it WAS nice, I just don’t have the vocabulary to say more. 

The first track ended. Two minutes 25 seconds. 

I savored the wine while he typed on his laptop.   

The second track ended. Two minutes 33 seconds.  

“Jake Liscombe,” he said again, pronunciation correct this time. 

I nodded. 

“English?” 

“Sort of I said. The Isle of Man.” 

Tappity tap on the keyboard.  I sat and enjoyed the wine, mostly I just smelt it, I didn’t want to get drunk, this was a job interview, and the aroma alone was enough to send you to a different realm. It smelt divine, almost too good to drink.   

The third track ended. One minute 41.  

“Much of a blues scene on the Isle of Man?” he said. 

“Not at all as far as I can gather. The music scene, such as it is, is quite eclectic, mostly British influenced, with a live scene focused on the tourist trade and traditional folk . A disproportionate number of recording studios and record companies located there for tax purposes, however, which encourages something of a ‘have-a-go' attitude to recording.” 

He nodded.  

Track four ended. Two minutes 53.  

Tappity tap. Tappity tap. 

Two minutes 11. 

“He doesn’t go for much in the way of accompaniment, does he?” 

“No,” I agreed. “It’s mostly just him and his trumpet.” 

“And the same trumpet for all the tracks so far.” 

“You can tell that?” I said. 

He nodded. “I have an ear for that sort of thing. You knew that?” 

“I had to look it up, but yes, I knew.” 

Track six ended. Two minutes  24 seconds. 

“I have to work. Sorry. I’m about to make a billion dollars.” 

Tappity tap. Tappity tap. Two minutes 53 seconds. 

Tappity tap. Tappity tap. Three minutes 2 seconds. 

Tappity tap. Tappity tap. Two minutes 18 seconds. 

Tappity tap. Tappity tap. One minute 43 seconds. 

Tappity tap. Tappity tap. Three minutes 37 seconds. 

Tappity tap. Tappity tap. Two minutes 24 seconds. 

Tappity tap. Tappity tap. Two minutes 18 seconds. 

Tappity tap. Tappity tap. Two minutes 34 seconds. 

He rose from the keyboard, joined me on the sofa and poured himself a glass of wine. 

“Single trumpet, two-minute tracks, no covers, no ensembles, no singer. It’s like a one-man-punk-trumpet scene.” 

“That pretty much sums him up,” I said. 

“Big is he, in the UK?” 

I suppressed a laugh. 

“Hardly,” I said. “There’s a specialist alt-blues podcast I listen to, they’ve been raving about him.” 

Another track finished. Two minutes 49 

“You’re ballsy,” he said. “A one-man trumpet revolution that nobody’s heard of.  Why did you think I’d like him?” 

“Because he’s good. I thought you'd like him.” 

He nodded. 

“Well, do you?” I said. “Like him?” 

“Oh yes, he’s sublime. You’ve got the job.  Stacey will make the arrangements. Three hours a week, on average, but times will change. My schedule!” 

“I’m amazed you’ve got time to listen to music.” 

“I make time. Which is why I need you. I’m not going to fuck around listening to Dire Straits’ greatest hits, I need to hear what’s happening, now, everywhere in the world. Hip hop, synth pop, folk, even the Isle of Man solo blues scene.” 

So that’s what I do for a living, or did, when I was working. An acquisitioner of sound is how I describe it. I work for cash-rich, time-poor clients with an interest in music, research what’s happening on the music scene and select the latest tunes for them to listen to. I’m a personalised DJ, without the news, adverts, or annoying jingles.  

And him? Mr Tappity Tap? None other than Anton Miles, the richest man in the world. Tech billionaire and self-declared coolest dude in the known universe. A title for which he needed to know the latest sounds, ideally sounds that nobody else had heard yet. 

He paid. He paid well, so well that I could drop all of my other clients, focus entirely on him, and still pay off my mortgage in a few years.  

If he liked a band I introduced him to, I mean REALLY liked them, then he’d buy them, the rights to the songs, the record companay, and he’d have them perform for him, private parties, gigs just for him. They’d be paid a king’s ransom to follow him around the world. Usually he destroyed them. Artists need soul, and that was the one thing the money couldn’t buy him. He remained soulless, devoid of all humanity, until the day he died.  

My sessions with Anton were a pleasure. As he’d warned, they could occur at any odd hour of the day or night, and might last a few minutes every day for a week, or a long, relaxed session of three hours that stretched to ten or twelve.  

We would sit and drink wine, the finest, from his vineyard, or somewhere equally exclusive, sometimes we’d drink scotch, long-distilled malts. “This is nice,” I’d say, did you buy the distillery?” 

Anton smiled. “I bought the island it’s made on. I own the distillery, the staff, the secret family recipe, and the river that supplies the water it’s made from. Only sixty million – cheaper than a president.” 

I would bring a stack of records with me, all carefully researched and chosen. I’d always start with the new stuff, the breaking bands. 

“What’s going down on the street in the Isle of Man?” he say at the start of every session. 

He wanted to know everything about the act, the usual biography, but also juicy gossip, stuff nobody else knew. Many times I’d phone the band beforehand, posing as a journalist, and ask exactly the questions I knew Anton would like to know.  

Sometimes he’d invite me to one of his parties, exclusive affairs with presidents, PMs, popstars, the great and the good. I would work with him to plan the soundtrack for these events, every single background sound was carefully planned and researched.  

I’d hear him impressing a girl, literally a girl in many cases, with the information about the band I’d supplied him. My quotes would become his quote, he owned me, as he owned everyone and everything else.  

Anton would still tappity tap during our sessions, his work was all-consuming.  Sometimes he’d stop to boast about the trades he was making. “This stock’s about to double in price,” he say. “The president gave me a tip-off, he’s about to announce a new tax incentive that will make this company a fortune.”  

He’d break off from his tappity tap and his trades to ask me about the music. “Where does the band come from, what are their backgrounds, how do they make their sounds? Why do they make their sounds?” 

Usually my sessions with Anton were squashed between business meetings. Sometimes he’d let me stay, orchestrating the background sound, while he met his lawyer, another one who thought he was a cool cat, who liked to challenge me about my choices, dropping the latest names, the newest noises, testing me; but I always held my own. I know nothing about the law, this is true, but everything about music. 

I’d hear the most private conversations, the dodgiest of deals.   

“The town’s upset about your new data centre,” he’d tell Anton. “There’s a petition and campaign group – you know, the usual moans, using all the power, taking the water.” 

“And?” Anton would say, meaning ‘and how have you solved the problem?’. 

“There are only three law firms in the area, so i bought them all for you. They’ve become partners in a new company I set up, Justice for Ohio, they couldn’t take you to court now even if they wanted to, conflict of interest.” 

“Excellent,” Anton would say. “Find some new data centre sites in the same area, might as well make the most of our latest legal expertise.” 

Justice has a different meaning for the super rich. 

I was with him when he sold his company.  “Look at this,” he said. “I’m about to make 1.2 trillion dollars. 

I looked at the screen of his computer. The company bank account, about to transfer $1.2 trillion to his private account.  More money than you could possibly spend if you lived to be a million years old. 

My reaction was instantaneous, innate you could say. I picked the scotch bottle we’d been drinking from, pummeled his head until I could see the brains leaking out, typed in my own bank details and pressed transfer. 

Technically this was murder, and theft, and fraud and goodness knows what else. But it didn’t matter, it wouldn’t apply to me. Murder isn’t murder when you’re the richest man in the world.  

But Anton wasn’t dead yet. I saw him struggling in his chair, gesturing to me. 

“Well?” I said. “You’d have done the same.” 

He shook his head, splashing blood and brains over me. He raised his hand and pointed to the music system. A new album had just started playing. He wanted info about the band. 

My response was the last words Anton heard. He died, as he’d lived, finger on the pulse.