Part 65
Suddenly, Daniel came crashing onto the set - the other pioneers had made him take a Valium earlier so he wouldn't be so nervous, but Daniel, being the fragile child he is, was completely out of it...he tossed one of the many TRL TVs through a window and it hit the crowd. Then Daniel himself jumped from the window and into the crowd, expecting to be caught by his loving and devoted fans. Except the crowd wasn't made of his loving and devoted fans, and again, Daniel Johns landed flat on his face. Back to silverchair stuff
"Well ladies and gentlemen, I suppose it's time to bring out our guests, silverchair!" Ada said. "Well, two of them anyway."
Meanwhile, outside, Daniel struggled to his feet. He heard an all-too-familiar sound that he had never liked and never would:
"Oh my gosh! It's Daniel!" squealed a girl of about seventeen who was wearing too much makeup. She tried desperately to climb over the barrier that had been set up outside (MTV was prepared for a small riot, just in case), but she was no match for the security guards. "Well, can I have your autograph at least?" she half-wailed.
"Maybe later," he replied, hitching a ride back up to the studio with the window washer (how convenient!).
By that point Ben and Chris were talking about recording. "Most people don't know about this, but we have a studio tradition," Ben explained. "We bring in a table tennis table for when we have breaks in recording. It's heaps fun."
"It sounds like fun," Kelnino said. With an evil grin, she said, "So who's the reigning champ?"
"Uh..." Ben stammered, while Chris jokingly pointed to him, barely able to keep from snickering. "Hey - Danny's back!"
They went over to the (broken) window, and helped pull in their bandmate. "So Johnsy, how's the crowd today?" Ben grinned.
"The usual," he replied in a way only Daniel Johns could.
"So Daniel," dreamer smirked. "Ben and Chris here are telling us all about the recording sessions. Got any good stories for us?"
"Does a fish swim?" he grinned. "Well, there was that one time - there was a time back in my day when me and the guys were heaps drunk and we had an orgy...haha, no I'm making it up!" Daniel replied, still slightly crocked.
"Good one. Got any *real* stories?" Kelnino couldn't resist prying just a little.
"Tons. Once, we were in the studio with nothing to do, and you wouldn't believe what we found."
"Dare I ask?" dreamer arched her eyebrow.
"Well...see...we found this closet that was full of these old theatrical costumes - it's anybody's guess as to how they got there - and we decided to play a little game of dress-up. The costumes were of medieval style. You know like Manson wear..."
"You're thinking of MacBeth, idiot, not Manson, you fruitcake and banana sandwich!"
Daniel replied, "Yeah, well, anyway..."
"Yeah well, anyway..." KelNino began. "While this video is playing I'm going to have somebody explain what the hell is happening, cuz I've been away for some time now and I'm quite confused...Here's Soundgarden with Jesus Christ Pose at #7!"
"KelNino, Jesus Christ Pose was at #9..." dreamer muttered.
"Wow! This is TRL history! The first video to be on the countdown twice...on the same day! Here it is, folks! Jesus Christ Pose by Soundgarden!"
"KelNino, you're on crack," Junta said.
"Junta, you and I *both* know she does this stuff sober," dreamer chuckled. Suddenly the screen cut to something else, and a production assistant handed her a slip of paper. "Whoops, kiddies, looks like there was a mix-up in the control room...today your number 7 pick is In Bloom by Nirvana...oooh, the dresses version! We love this one! I've only seen it once before."
While the rarely-seen video was being played, Kelnino figured out what was going on (there was a computer in the greenroom, so there was plently of time to check the pioneers' online log). Then, the pioneers finished getting the story out of Daniel:
"So there were these medieval costumes in this closet," he grinned, "And wigs and stuff too. So you can guess what we did with them! It was hilarious! Chris even said he'd forgotten how great long hair was. He didn't look so bad as a girl." Everyone in the studio laughed, and Chris turned several shades of red. However, even he had to concede that it had been fun.
"Hey, wait a sec!" KelNino stomped her foot and interrupted the flow of the Never Ending Story. "I want Soundgarden at #7, dammit!"
"KelNino, we can't-"
"But I want it! Gimme, gimme, gimme!" KelNino flew into a rage.
"Kelnino, come on-"
"I want Jesus Christ Pose, NOWNOWNOW!" KelNino stomped repeatedly.
"All right, all right. Give her Jesus Christ Pose again..." dreamer rolled her eyes and gave in. "Is there want thing you want at #6, KelNino?" she added sarcastically.
"Hmmm...maybe something from the Chosen Rejects?"
"They broke up, dimwit!" Rockstar snapped.
"Oh." KelNino scratched her head, then suddenly stopped. A blank facial expression apeared on her face and....she broke into song:
"I see your pretty face...
Smashed against the bathroom flooooor.
What a disgrace!
Who do I feel sorry for..."
"Oh no, not again - " dreamer muttered before she was interrupted by the screams and roars of Korn fans. Like so many times before, a stage rose up beneath KelNino, but she was no longer KelNino. In her place stood a very gritty-looking John Davis and the rest of Korn. Korn fans crammed around the small stage as Davis jammed. "Well," dreamer covered an ear and yelled into the mic, "You saw it here on TRL! KelNino has turned into Jon Davis!"
"I hate Korn!" Ada yelled.
"Me too, the sellout bastards!" Heath screamed. He threw a shoe filled with vomit at Jon Davis.
"It's not fair! I want to be famous too!" Angie screamed in a jealous fit. Much to her dismay, she didn't turn into a cool rock star like KelNino. She turned into Barney! "I love you, you love me, we're a happy family - "
Suddenly, Jill came up behind Barney with one of Daniel's guitars and *WHAP!* Barney/Angie lay on the floor. Blood oozed across the floor from his balloon-like head and everyone sighed a breath of relief. Even Jon Davis took a break from his singing to salute Jill's valiant deed.
"Hail Jill!" Jon Davis moaned. "For she has killed Barney. For her effort, I will dedicate a song to her...what would you like me to play, Miss Jill?" Jon picked dirt from under his fingernails as he waited for Jill's answer.
"Oh goodie!" Jill jumped up and down with glee. "How about you sing...MMMbop by Hanson, or you can sing Oops, I Did it Again by Britney Spears!"
The studio fell dead silent. Everyone stared at Jill like she was some sort of sideshow freak. Then Kelnino/Jon muttered, "Um, okay. You heard the girl. But let's speed the @&$%#^*! song up!"
And that's exactly what Korn did.
"Those poor Hanson kids would probably die of shock if they saw this," Ben laughed.
As the song continued, something strange happened to Barney's purple foam rubber corpse. It seemed to be mutating!
"Where am I?" Angie mumbled as she emerged from the cocoonlike mess, which quickly dissolved.
"Stand back!" yelled Jill. "She might still be dangerous!"
dreamer took out a small flashlight and checked Angie's pupils. "Nah, she's fine. She just doesn't know how to control her new special power just yet. You'd better practice alone before trying it on live TV again, Angie." She turned back to the camera and smiled. "Well, that was Korn - sort of - doing their twisted take on MMMBop. We'll be right back after the commercial."
As Angie came together about being an Angie again, KelNino (no longer Jon Davis) and dreamer introduced the next video:
"We're back, Kelnino's back to her usual self, and today's number 6 video, as chosen by your votes, is an old one from Hole. Violet, right here on TRL," dreamer glibly explained to the camera.
"You know, I've never seen this video," Daniel said. "Is it any good?"
dreamer raised an eyebrow. "Good? It's a bloody masterpiece."
"I'll say," Ben grinned.
"*You* like it, Ben?" Kelnino asked. "How come?"
As if to answer her question, a shot of Courtney in a sleazy strip club from hell flickered across the screen. Ben was grinning like there was no tomorrow.
"Remind me to kick you with my heels later," dreamer deadpanned.
Just then, the pioneers heard fill-in laughter after her quip. "What was that?" KelNino looked around for the laughing.
"It's fake laughter," dreamer grumbled.
"Fake laughter! We can't have fake laughter on our show! Jesus Christ Almighty!" KelNino marched off into the control room to give the producers a good lecture about *live* TV.
When the Hole video ended, Robin took the mic from dreamer. "And welcome back! That was Violet by Hole! Bloody freakin' genius! But now we have a special treat for all you TRL fans...Home video footage! Yes, kids, today we have a home video re-make of the famous redneck beating scene in the old-school punk movie, 'SLC Punk!'"
"SLC Punk! Awesome, Robin! Who made the video?" Junta asked enthusiastically.
"Me and KelNino!" Robin grinned as his video came onscreen. The pioneers watched intently as Heroin Bob (played by KelNino) and Stevo (played by Robin) took heavy wooden bats and beat the hell out of two old rednecks. Then the clip was over and there was a *real* round of applause and laughter from the audience.
"Speaking of all things punk, number 5 is Basket Case by Green Day!" However, there was no round of applause on this last anouncement.
"What, you don't like Green Day?" Robin said nervously.
"Sell-outs!" shouted someone in the TRL crowd.
"Yeah! Green Day sold out!" another shouted.
dreamer glared hard and rolled her eyes. "You guys suck!"
"Oh, okay then. Uhh...KelNino, who do you think should be at number 5?" Robin stuttered.
"How about our SLC Punks scene?" Kelnino suggested. The crowd cheered again.
"KelNino, that's not a music video..." dreamer pointed out.
"So?" Kelnino answered. "Don't you guys want to see it again?!"
"Hell yeah!" the crowd answered. So Robin and Kelly's redneck-beating scene played again, and there was an even bigger round of applause.
"Okay...okay..." Junta shushed the crowd. "What's at number 4?"
"Let's bloody skip #4." Robin suggested. "No one really cares who's at #4. Bloody Hell, let's go straight to number one and then do something queer and stupid for the remaining time."
"Sounds fun," Ada agreed girlishly. "Okie dokie then! The number one video on today's TRL is a classic from 1991...apparently lots of people knew this was the 10-year anniversary of Nevermind's release, because Nirvana's Smells Like Teen Spirit is #1, as voted by you guys, the viewers!"
The audience cheered wildly. Flannels (where the heck did THOSE come from?! No one had been wearing any earlier...) were tossed into the air. As the video went on, the audience grew increasingly restless. In no time at all, the seats were overturned and a mosh pit started.
"So what do we do now?" Robin asked.