The next day came quickly. As the grandfather clock struck one in the afternoon, Sonic walked into a room of his house that he dedicated for the band and their practice. The room was previously used as a storage, but Sonic now had something to turn the room into. Upon walking into the room, he saw Tails already there adjusting the settings to his keyboard, gently playing the keys and adjusting the sound levels for each.
"How's the keyboard working for you, Tails?" Sonic asked his little brother.
The teen fox looked up and smiled. "Oh, hey Sonic!" he greeted. "It's alright. It's been forever since I've played this keyboard. It's got to be at least 8 years old." He started playing simple three note songs to test the sound one more time. "Still sounds as good as ever."
"I forgot you even had that keyboard, Tails." Sonic admitted. He eyed the label on the back of the instrument. "A Yamaha?"
"Yeah, I love this brand. The only brand I have ever bought when it comes to music." Tails replied. Standing up from his seat, Tails let out a bored sigh.
"Where are the others? We've been waiting for them for the past hour." he asked, walking over to the other side of the room where a large drum set was set up. Running his hand over a polished cymbal, the fox eyed the musical piece. It was large, but basic. It had the snare drum, two crash cymbals, middle and floor toms, and of course the bass drum and hi-hat cymbals.
"Do you think Knuckles will like this drum set?" he asked.
Sonic shrugged and sat down on the sofa in the corner of the room. "He should. I don't see why he wouldn't."
"Where did you even get this? Since when do you play drums?"
"I don't. One of Chris's friends used to play drums, but then he gave up music for sports. He gave Chris the drum set, in which he gave to me when he heard about this band idea." the hedgehog explained.
Tails nodded in understanding. His ear started to twitch when he heard footsteps approaching the room.
When they looked up, Knuckles and Silver appeared in the doorway.
"Hey guys!" Sonic greeted. "Come on in. We're just setting some stuff up."
As the two walked in, Sonic noticed the large bass guitar case strapped on Silver's back. When the time traveler set it down and unzipped it, he brought out a beautiful electric blue, black, and white Fender branded bass guitar.
"That little riff you played at Amy's birthday party was pretty wicked, Silver." Tails mentioned upon seeing his friend's guitar.
"Oh, well thanks!" Silver smiled his appreciation. "Just thought I'd show proof that I could play. This band idea sounds awesome, Sonic."
Before Sonic could say anything, the deep and hollow sound of an upbeat drum solo echoed through the room, startling the three. Knuckles started playing the drums with ease and without any hesitation; keeping the rhythmic beat of a typical hard rock song. He ended it with a sharp hit of the cymbals and a loud hit of the snare drum, bouncing the stick up into the air when it struck the drum and then catching it again.
The echidna eyed his friends when he set the drum sticks down, and all he received was surprised looks.
"What?"
"You are definitely in this band." Sonic laughed, still in shock. "Dude, I had no idea you could play."
Knuckles chuckled to himself as he stood up to join them. "I practice drum skills with different hollow rocks on the island. It gives me something else to do while watching the master emerald." he replied back.
Before they could carry on a conversation, Shadow walked in the room with a guitar also on his back. Eyeing everyone in the room, he dipped his head in greeting and set the guitar against an amp. "I take it I'm late?" he muttered.
"No, we're just getting started." Sonic said.
As the dark hedgehog sat down on the sofa, he carefully brought out his guitar and stood it up to adjust the tuning for the strings. Sonic was in awe as he glanced at his rival's guitar. It was black with a silver burst design on it.
"What kind of guitar is that, Shads?" the blue blur wondered.
"First of all, quit calling me that…" Shadow muttered darkly. He reached for the amp next to him to turn it on. "And this is a Gibson Custom Les Paul Silverburst."
"That looks like a really expensive guitar." Silver mentioned. "…and rare. Is it new?"
"I've had it for a couple of years. It was decent priced." Shadow shrugged. Plugging the guitar in, he started off playing different bar chords to adjust the tuning. "I put new strings on it this morning. It hasn't been played for awhile," Shadow explained. "They still have yet to be tuned."
"Well, while you're tuning, I want to ask a couple questions." Knuckles said, leaning forward onto the drums and eyeing Sonic. "Why did you want to put together a band again?"
"There's a competition going on in about two months called the World Wide Music Fest." Sonic started explaining. "People from all around the world are going to be there. Auditions are coming up and I figured if we could put something together, maybe we might have a chance to compete. Sounds fun, right?"
The hedgehog got a few nodding heads in response. "Sounds really fun!" Silver said. "It will be like playing in a concert for thousands of people!"
"Try millions of people, Silver." Sonic corrected.
"What kind of music will we be playing?" Tails asked.
"What kind of band are we?" Shadow asked right after.
"Well, I figured we would be a band revolving around mainly Rock music. Hard Rock, Rock n' Roll, Southern Rock, you name it!" Sonic answered.
"What's our band name? That's an important thing to consider…" Knuckles brought up. Silence befell upon the group.
"Well, why don't you guys each think of a name that could be suitable for us, and we'll agree on one tomorrow? For now, I think we should focus on seeing how well we can play as a group."
"Sounds good."
"And therefore, you guys will need these." Sonic smiled as he grabbed some papers off of the table near the door. He handed a paper to each member of the band. "I hope you guys can read music!"
"What is this?" Knuckles questioned, eyeing the paper confusingly.
"It's the music you guys will be playing. I already put together some songs that we can experiment with. Together it should sound pretty awesome!" Sonic explained.
Shadow read the sheet music, his eyes slowly narrowing. Shaking his head, he set the paper down and set his guitar on his lap. "Listen, faker, I write my own music." he brought up immediately.
Sonic looked up from his lyric sheet. "What?" Snickering, he shook his head. "Let me guess: you can't read music? That's okay, Shadow, not a lot of people can-"
"I know how to read music. That's not the point. I just don't need anybody to write my own music for me." Shadow repeated. "I prefer to play what I want to play."
"But we haven't even tried out these songs yet." Sonic stopped him. "Let's try playing some of these songs, and I promise, you'll like what you're about to hear."
The next few hours consisted of plugging in and adjusting the sound levels of Silver and Shadow's guitars and playing simple songs to get an idea on how well the five of them could play together. For the most part, they had an equal skill level and none of them found it difficult to stay with the rhythm of the song they played. After getting comfortable with playing as a group, Sonic told them to try playing the first song he passed out, titled "Is This a Dream?". The song started out with Knuckles and Silver playing a speedy and heavy rhythm; Silver's bass line brought in the riff that Shadow would soon be playing. Shadow then started playing powerful bar chords leaving the room echoing with distortion from the amp. Tails' keyboard wouldn't come in until the chorus.
Then it was Sonic's cue to start singing. The other four members had to admit, if they closed their eyes, Sonic could be mistaken to be an 80's rock singer. He had that raspy sound and occasional high pitched scream that any hair band would need to be successful.
When the song ended on a rather wobbly note, Sonic started laughing. "You know, for a first time, that didn't sound too bad. Definitely need to fix the end note though."
"I didn't think we would be able to play together as a group as well as we did for the first time." Tails admitted.
"Well, you remember we were all in the school band back in high school." Knuckles reminded. "We were taught to read music and be able to play it almost perfectly the first time."
"Also, I want to point out something Silver…" Sonic said, looking at Silver's bass sheet as he talked. "You were playing a little flat. The tuning should be standard."
Silver cleared his throat and nodded. "I know, but as we were playing I tuned it down to flat. I wanted to see if it would sound better than what it would have been in standard."
"Well, you see, the music sheet says standard. That means it has to be played in standard. There was nothing wrong with it being in standard." the band leader replied back rather irritated.
"Just experimenting, Sonic. Jeez…"
"Listen guys…" Sonic stated. "I have 5 different songs here to play with. Each one of these songs are written with perfection. If one instrument tries anything different, the entire song will be ruined."
"Silver was playing flat throughout the entire song," Knuckles brought up. "It sounded okay to me."
Tails and even Shadow had to agree with the red echidna.
"Why are you so mad, Sonic?" Tails wondered.
"I'm not mad! It's just…" the hedgehog paused to sigh and process in his mind what he wanted to say. "The auditions are in fifteen days. And we only have the rest of today, tomorrow, Sunday, and Monday to master these songs before we are to perform at our first gig."
"Wait a sec! We are already booked for a gig?" Tails asked, shocked.
"We have to at least had performed one successful gig in order to be eligible for the auditions." the blue blur explained.
"Strict rules…" Knuckles muttered under his breath, twirling a drumstick in his hand.
"We have plenty of time." Silver said, uncertainty lingering in his voice. "I mean, look how well we just played this song for the first time! Four more can't be too hard?"
"We still have an additional three songs for the gig." Sonic muttered.
"Okay, well, eight songs! We can master 8 songs in just a few days!" Silver was desperate to sound reassuring and hopeful at this point.
"Not when we are mixing up everything when everything is wrote down right in front of us!" the blue hero reminded. "We can't be mixing anything up!"
"You need to relax, Sonic." Knuckles snapped rather harshly. "This isn't just your band, you know!"
Sonic stared at his friend, arms crossed.
"Yeah, you need to realize that when it comes to a band, there isn't just one person who runs the show." Silver explained. "A band is a collaboration. Everyone should have their say in what goes on. Or else it wouldn't be called a band. It would be called 'Guys and guy who controls the other guys'."
Sonic had to chuckle at the silver hedgehog's description. "I guess you're right…"
"And about the sheet music…" Shadow said. Setting his guitar down against the wall, he walked up closer to the other four. "…The song we just played wasn't that bad. But I would like to make some changes on my part."
Sonic sighed again and looked back at the paper in his hand.
"If that's not too much to ask…?"
"Go ahead." Sonic agreed. "But don't go crazy." Shadow only rolled his eyes and walked back to his guitar.
"…And if you want to change the tuning to flat, Silver, go ahead. I'll admit, it didn't sound bad at all." the hedgehog said with a hint of a smile.
Silver nodded in appreciation and started scribbling down the minor changes to his sheet of music.
Sighing, Sonic forced a small smile. "Let's go over this again. And one, two, one, two, three, and..!"
A/N: And chapter two is done! Looks like someone is turning a little bossy! Why is Sonic being so bossy? How much longer do you think the rest of the band can tolerate his bossiness? And just as another note, I do NOT own any brand of instrument, music genre, or band(s) (If mentioned in later chapters). They belong to their respectful owners. I plan on updating again soon so thanks for reading! Reviews would be awesome!