"Yes," Nerdly said happily. "I think that's exactly what she's doing."
"No," Pauline corrected. "I never said the band would not go out on this tour. I'm just saying that you do not have the ability to compel them to undertake this tour under the current contract. If you want them to do this, a separate, foreign travel tour contract will need to be negotiated and signed beforehand."
Doolittle rolled his eyes upward. "Pauline," he said. "I understand you're trying to impress us all with your legal knowledge. I also understand that you lawyers all like to put things into writing. But is there any reason why the standard touring terms for North American tours can't just be carried over to this foreign touring contract? After all, our terms with the band in that regard are quite generous from an industry standard standpoint."
Pauline shook her head. "I don't have much experience setting up an overseas tour, Doolittle, but I'm not an idiot. North American tours are done primarily on the ground, are they not? The equipment is trucked from place to place in tractor-trailers and the personnel, including the band, are bussed. And even with the fairly low budget that Intemperance requires — since they don't use all the laser lights, pyrotechnics, and other glitter — they barely make a profit."
"The purpose of a tour is not to make profit," Doolittle said. "That's something that I've tried to make you understand all this time and you still don't get it. A tour is to promote album sales. That's where the profitability comes in."
"I understand that very well," Pauline said. "And album sales, while they do benefit the band, benefit National Records a lot more."
"We're a business," Crow said. "We're here to make profit."
"I understand that as well," Pauline said. "Where we're running into problems with this foreign tour concept, however, is that it will be much more expensive to carry out, won't it? We'll have to fly all of the band members and the roadies to each geographic location. You'll have to move all of the equipment by ship. You'll have to fly the people to England, ship all of the equipment there on a freighter, and then rent the busses and trucks to transport everything around once you're there. When the England portion of the tour is over, you'll have to fly all the people to the European mainland again, ship all the equipment again, and then rent a new set of trucks and busses to move it around there. And then, when it's time to move on to Japan, you'll have to do it all over again. All of that takes a lot of money. And then there is foreign taxes, visas for every member of the tour, customs charges, hotel rentals in places where the currency exchange is not in American favor. There's no way in hell a tour like this could do anything but operate in the red. And quite a bit in the red. Am I correct?"
"Well... I don't have exact figures in front of me, of course," Doolittle said. "But yes, it is a little more expensive to run a foreign tour then a domestic one, for all the reasons you mentioned. Once again, however, the purpose of the tour is not to make money. The profit comes from the increased album sales."
"And once again," Pauline said patiently, "I understand that. It is you who do not understand where I'm coming from, or at least you're pretending not to."
Doolittle sighed. "Suppose you tell me where you're coming from," he said.
"Under the current contract, the band pays for half of the tour costs for North American tours," Pauline said.
"Yes, we remember negotiating that point ad nauseam when we put together the contract," Doolittle said. "As I told you before, it's more than fair considering that most first time contract bands have to pay one hundred percent of the tour costs."
"Uh huh," Pauline said. "Don't even get me started on that one. My point, however, is that fifty percent of the tour costs for a foreign tour is considerably more money then fifty percent of the cost for a domestic tour. In return for putting up more money, the band will not be receiving any greater percentage of the increased album sales the tour will generate. In short, the advantage goes mainly to the record company in this deal."
"I suppose you could look at it that way," Doolittle said carefully, plainly not liking where this was going. "And how would you suggest we rectify the situation?"
"Easy," Pauline said. "You pay for the tour since it is you who will be benefiting the most from it."
Crow's eyes widened almost comically. "You want us to pay for one hundred percent of the tour costs?" he asked. "Are you high? You must be if you think we're going to take that proposal under any sort of consideration."
Pauline simply shrugged. "I haven't discussed this in length with my clients as of yet," she said. "After all, you did just spring this on us. I am quite sure, however, that they will demand considerable concessions if you want them to go out on this tour. Remember who is in the position of strength here, Doolittle. You cannot compel them to go out on tour for you in this situation. There is no reason for them to do your bidding if it's going to end up costing them short-term money. If you want them to do it, you'll have to make it worth their while."
"That's blackmail," Doolittle hissed angrily.
Pauline simply shrugged again. "When the circumstances are in your favor, you call it good negotiating. When it's in our favor, you call it blackmail. Refer to it however you want. None of us really give a damn. But think it over. We're going to end this meeting for tonight and get back together again on... oh, say Wednesday. By that time, we should have Charlie and Coop back with us and fully briefed in. In the meantime, I'll talk with the band and see just what it is they want out of this tour."
"You'll get no concessions from us," Crow said.
"Then my guess is you'll get no tour from us," Pauline told him. She pushed her chair back and stood up. She looked at Jake, Matt, and Nerdly, all of whom were looking at her in stunned respect. "Are you ready, guys?"
"Yeah," Jake said. "I think I am."
"Fuckin' A," said Matt. "Let's get out of here."
At five o'clock that evening Nerdly, Jake, and Matt emerged from one of the side doors of the National Records Building into the VIP parking lot. Matt and Jake each had backpacks stuffed with several days' worth of clothing, shaving gear, and other overnight accessories. They would be spending the night in Ventura and then flying to Bodega Bay — a small oceanfront town north of San Francisco — in Jake's plane the next morning.
Nerdly was empty handed as he was not going with them. Jake had invited him along back when the trip was in the planning stages, back before they'd even started fighting with each other over the overdub issue. Nerdly had politely declined, stating he didn't like torturing innocent fish (the main purpose of the trip was to do some deep sea fishing) and even if he did, he wasn't about to climb into a small, single-engine plane with a new pilot at the controls. As he left now, escorting Sharon out to his Geo Metro so they could make their dinner date (they were going out as "just friends"), he didn't even say goodbye.
"You think he's gonna get over this one?" Matt asked.
"I don't know," Jake said. "I've never seen him like this before."
"He'd better fuckin' mellow out before we hit the road," Matt said. "It's bad enough having to deal with freak-boy and all of his pathological fears about germs and viruses and tapeworms. I don't need to deal with a homicidal nerd on top of that."
A white Mercedes convertible pulled into the VIP parking lot from the guard booth. It circled around through the parked cars and headed for the yellow zone where Jake and Matt were standing. The top was down on the car and an attractive woman was behind the wheel. She had a head of blonde hair that was not natural but dyed so perfectly a casual observer wouldn't be able to tell. She wore a spaghetti strap top that did little to hide the cleavage of her considerable, obviously enhanced breasts. Her face was deceptively innocent looking. She waved as she saw the two musicians standing there, waiting for her.