Jase pursed his lips. His gut reaction was to argue, to deflect, to get the hell out of the recording studio that was starting to feel a lot more like a church confessional than an oversized cottage on the edge of a lake.
“I want to shout at you right now,” he admitted honestly. “Can we just go make breakfast?”
Cerys smiled at him, a pretty one with a dimple on her cheek. “You let the wave pass through you.”
“That wave analogy might get old fast.”
“Faster you figure out how to stand in them, the sooner we can let it go.”
Jase rolled his eyes. “Carry on.”
“Dad loves your voice. So do I. But you’re here recording for a long time, singing more than you probably do in a normal month. That’ll continue when you go on stadium tours. There are habits, really good habits, that you need to put in place. They’ll all be helpful.”
“We’re touring now though, and I’m fine.”
“Yes, but as I understand it, you’ve been very much focusing on weekend gigs. Maybe one or two in a row, which is fine, but it gives you the whole week to rest your voice. Or a cluster of, say four or five gigs, over seven days with a break before and after. Do you rehearse as a band every day?”
Jase thought about all the rehearsals he’d missed. “No.”
“So this, being here every day, is a different kind of strain. And even when you’re not singing, you’re talking about the creative process.”
She knew he didn’t write any of the songs, that they were all Matt’s. Somehow, he suddenly felt embarrassed that he didn’t write his own songs to sing. That he had to sing the words his brother wrote.
“The lessons will also help build stamina.”
Jase looked down at her oversized hoodie covering what looked like a onesie. “Babe, there is nothing wrong with my stamina.”
Cerys shook her head. “And as most women would point out, there is a difference between stamina and skill.”
Jase pretended to stab a dagger through his heart. “You wound me, Cerys. Are you suggesting I lack in the stamina and skills department?”
Cerys blushed. “Stop it. I know what you’re doing here.”
“Stand in the wave, Cerys. Stand in the wave.”
She laughed. “I feel like we’re on this tangent because you didn’t stand in a wave. We’ll work on increasing vocal stamina. We’ll work on your breathing. We’re going to work through loosening up muscles connected to singing and strengthen those that need it.”
“Loosen up the jaw and what not, got it.”
“It’s a lot more than your face, mouth, and jaw. It’s your throat. And your diaphragm, which means your intercostal and abdominal muscles.”
Jase lifted his T-shirt, revealing his abs. “Not sure they need strengthening.”
Cerys’s lips narrowed and she looked towards the drum kit, but not before she blushed. “They look exceedingly strengthened, but that does not get you out of weighted abdominal work to strengthen your diaphragm.”
“Fuck,” he muttered.
“You should also consider quitting smoking.”
Jase glared at her. “No.”
“It’s all very rock ’n’ roll and all that. But you’re an investment to the record label. All of this costs money.” She waved her hand around the recording studio. “You haven’t earned them a penny yet, and it will take a while for you to do that. So, they want to know their investment has longevity.”
Jase looked to the drum kit and wondered what it would feel like to kick the whole thing over.
Be the wave, Jase. Be the fucking wave.
“So, I’m just a fucking asset now to be optimised.”
“That’s one way to see it. Or you can reframe it. Protect the one part of you that enables you to be the world’s greatest lead singer and to have a decades-long career recording with your band. Your voice.”
“I feel like this is all remedial lessons for the guy who doesn’t understand his craft.”
“Do you know who else has had a vocal coach? Celine Dion, with her five-octave range that takes her from whispers at her lower register to those soaring high notes she’s famous for. You remember how Lady Gaga did that Sound of Music medley for the Oscars?”
Jase rolled his eyes. “Do I look like I watch the Oscars or give a shit about a musical medley?”
“Fair point, but she worked with a vocal coach for six months to nail that. And there are vocal coaches who are unknown but make the singers who they are.”
Okay. Fine. It wasn’t what he’d feared. “Your dad thinks I have a decent voice?”
Cerys’s eyes went so wide he thought they were literally going to pop out of her head. “I wish you could hear yourself the way the rest of the world hears you, Jase. You have an incredible voice. The purity of your notes when you hold them, the vibrato when you want to. You have so much vocal control. Is that why you hold back?”
“Hold back from what?”
“All of it. I’ve seen you in the studio. You have some great thoughts, but you don’t commit to them.”
Wave.
Wave.
Wave.
“What do you mean, I don’t commit?”
“Okay. Let me give you examples.”
“Jesus Christ, Cerys. Can we go back to you in bed and me on the deck?”
Cerys let go of his fingers. “I’m sorry. Am I pushing too hard?”
Jase ran his hand over his face and pushed his hair back. “Yeah, sunshine. You are. Let’s go make some breakfast while you share with me the litany of examples you probably have stored up in there.”
He tapped her forehead gently. He took her hand again and led her to the kitchen, where he lifted her onto the large marble counter. His hands fit comfortably on her waist. “Sit there while I make eggs.” He grabbed a pan, then some eggs and the fresh bread they’d bought from the store to make scrambled eggs on toast.
Cerys slipped down off the counter.
“I told you to sit up there.”
She put her hand on her hip and cocked it. “I’m going to make fresh coffee.”
“Fine.” He could do with a jolt.
“You let the band steamroll you.”
“We’re a democracy. I always lose the vote.”
Cerys shook her head as she scooped coffee into the filter. “But that’s because you aren’t certain of the validity of your own opinion, and quite frankly, you’re a dick when you express them. I overheard part of your argument on Friday before I left. The comment you had about the drums on ‘Tell Me This’ . . . It was spot on the money. They did come in too fast; the song hadn’t built enough. Why did you back off?”
“Because Luke is the drummer. He knows best what works.”
Cerys huffed. “You were right about the percussion and layering. It’s too busy and too pop for your sound.”
“I know. But your dad keeps edging us towards the song that went viral. When we recorded that song, we all felt a bit iffy about it. We don’t play it all that often. It’s perhaps the lightest rock we’ve recorded.”
“So, again. You backed off. Fear is the death of creativity, Jase.”