Mercyful Fate's blog: "Painshock's Blog"

As you can tell from the subject of this blog, this is about friendship. It's about true friendship, and about how a true friendship can be blown to dust in a matter of few hours. I'll tell you my story now.

Friday 24th april me and my band Painshock were playing a gig at a band competition at Emergenza Music Festival. We did incredibly well, winning the semi-final clearing our way into the finals by audience votes. After the gig we all retreived to our tour bus to celebrate our victorious performance, along side with other people we didn't even know that joined us. One of the unknown people asked me if he could take a beer from an open six-pack that was lying on the table. I had no clue who those beers belonged to, and I gave him the permission to take one. Apparently, our bassist's wife, who was sleeping at the back of the bus, heard me giving him the permission, so she came over to me, and that's when all hell broke loose.

She basically made me look ridiculous in front of everyone, telling me how i was a nobody, a low-life living on wellfare and so on, like it's all my fault. She treated me like a dog. A dog that had done something really really bad, like tear up the livingroom sofa, or taken a dump in her morning slippers. I kindly told her to stop and calm down. Her father was driving the tour bus for us that night. He heard her yelling at me, and he couldn't stand it, so he got up from his seat and grabbed her and eventually hit her. That was way out of line.

Before these cruelties occurred, I did see him grab her, but I had been so used to seeing her and her husband fighting that I didn't want to be there and watch it happen. But it never occurred to me that he would actually go and punch her in the face, never did I even think about that. So, before it happened, I went out from the harm's way to have a cigarette, and tried to concentrate on other things.

A while later, I got back on the bus again, things had calmed down. She had ran away somewhere, I don't know where. After a while her husband came in, grabbed his wife's father, strangled him and threatened to kill him. It was then when I realised what really had happened. She came to the bus door and then I also saw her face, which was bloody all over. I tried to talk to our bassist of what had happened, because even I wasn't entirelly sure, and I was going to tell him what I thought had happened. He refused to listen to me, and as a thank you for my loyalty to him as his friend, he attacked me and threw me on the bus floor. After that I decided to give him the boot from the band, because I don't think anyone wants to play in a band where it's members are a threat against your own physical health. After a while things started calming down again, our bassist and his wife left along side with the wife's sister, and me, my brother and a couple of others got left in the bus.

A guy, who had slept in the back of the bus through the whole time started waking up, he listened to me and my brother talk a bit of this and that. Suddenly he asks me what it is that I'm complaining about, to which I replied I have no problems whatsoever, and that he should keep his nose out of things he doesn't know about. In a little while he came to sit in the front where we were as well, we kept on talking with my brother as we did before, and he asks me again what my problem was. I told him what I had told him earlier. I have no problems, unless he wants to give me one. All of a sudden he attacked me, grabbed my throat and squeezed. My brother got up from his seat, started pulling the guy off me, and I managed to deal a punch or two at his face. Our driver threw them out of the bus.

The next day, on april 25th, nothing much happened. All I got was an SMS message from our bassist that if I was to kick him out of the band, I should pay my debts to him within the next 24 hours. Like I owed him something, like I ever asked anything from him. I told him that I was going to take my words back and that I'm not kicking him out.

The day after that, april 26th I first got an SMS from my bassist's wife's sister, with who I have a relationship history as well. She told me how pitiful and pathetic I was for attacking the guy I was talking about earlier. She said something about it being because of her. I told her the truth, how things had really turned out, but she wouldn't listen. Instead she told me to leave me alone. Lesson number 1 of 'true friendship'.

I asked via SMS from our bassist's wife what had happened, and why are people so mad at me. She said I'm not entitled to ask her anything. She said I had betrayed her and her trust by not coming to stop her father when he attacked her. I told her I didn't have a clue of what was going on, and she wouldn't believe me. She started insisting me that I'd have to make a public apology to her, and especially to our bassist who I had presumably kicked out of the band from 'wrong reasons'. Yeah, in this case the wrong reason was the fact that he attacked me. So, basically, what she was trying to say to me is that anyone can hit me and should get away with it like a dog from it's leash. So, as humble as I am, I made that public apology on our band's website. It's for everyone to decide for their own if I was the one here who should have been apologising or not. Anyway, my apology was not accepted. Lesson number 2 of 'true friendship'.

The next day, april 27th, it all continued. She went to report her father for assaulting her, and she mentioned my name to the police as well, in order to get me in trouble for things I didn't do. She asked me if i was going to lie to the police if I ever get invited for interrogation, or would I stick to the truth and rise against her father. I told her I never supported the actions he took against her, and that I was going to tell the truth, and nothing but. For this, I got a thank you, which surprised me a little.

A few hours later I started getting all the hate SMS's again, and serious badmouthing on our website as well. I removed all the comments from there which contained nothing but bad mouthing, cursing... Stuff that was personal, and not things that belong to the band let alone our fans. They had told me before to leave them alone, but still they kept on harrassing me. I told them to leave me alone, as I thought it was the least they could do as they had asked me the same thing. I haven't heard a thing from them since. They said they don't want anything to do with me or with my band anymore. Lesson number 3 of 'true friendship'.

Notice, that our bassist still at this point never said anything, except the short SMS he sent me on saturday the 25th. I gave him an option: If he wanted to continue in the band, it was up to him and he should say so. If he wanted to quit, it was also up to him and he should say so. To this day I haven't heard anything from him about anything. I take it he doesn't want to keep on doing it. To tell the truth, I don't quite feel comfortable with playing in a band with people who actually hate me, and will probably beat me up when opportunities arise, or when they are drunk. Uh-huh, no thanks. But still, I gave him a chance even though he did me wrong. I understand, his wife got beat up by her father, but is it a reason to let the frustration and the anger out on me? So this bad situation continues, as I have apologised to him, taken my words back, and what has he done? Total silence. Lesson number 4 of 'true friendship'.

So, what have we learned from true friendship? I'm sure true friendship exists, and I know it does, I've seen it and I've felt it. But the smallest things can break things apart. One day you may be the sheep, but it doesn't take a lot to see that the whole time you were just a wolf in sheep clothing. I personally ache because of this thing, after all, he, our bassist has been my friend for over 15 years. maybe things will turn out normal once again, and we can be friends again. But, like I said, it's all up to him.