Gamer Superstar - Chapter 63

63 – New strategy
Just like she said, when we arrived at the venue for the second show, I was going to be the last Rank E artist of the night, which was much better for me than being the first artist like at the previous bar, because I could see the difference in the crowd.

Even though there were fewer people here, these people were much more excited now than they usually were when I started the show.

The artist on stage was still only a Rank E artist like me, so he didn’t have as much stage presence as the artist I saw play after me at the Viper Poison bar, which meant the crowd wasn’t as excited as it should have been.

But that was okay, I was confident that I could lift these people up better than anyone else, and since Selena wanted to see something interesting happen at the Rank D artist’s show after me, my idea was to do just that.

“I hope you enjoyed the Soul Sinners show!!! Let’s give them a round of applause!” The host said as he took the stage and cheered the crowd on while the band took down their equipment and waited for me to come up.

“For our next artist, this is a new kid who played his first show yesterday.” The host said, making the audience look confused. The host said, making the audience look confused. “But don’t think he started yesterday and already has the best spot of the night for a Rank E artist because of some connections, this kid just played a gig at the Viper Poison bar and I heard he played really well there!”

Upon hearing this, the audience’s confusion was replaced by surprise.

“Holy shit, Viper Poison takes Rank E artists?” One person in the audience asked his friend in surprise.

“Normally there’s only one spot for Rank E artists, which is for the opener, the first artist of the night, but as far as I know they’re pretty selective when choosing the artist. This person’s friend replied in surprise.

Although the bars were competitors, they weren’t like TV stations that avoided mentioning each other’s names so as not to attract viewers, these bars had different offerings.

While the Viper Poison Bar was a place that focused on rank D rock artists, but gave opportunities to one rank E artist per night and had a main rank C artist every night, the price they charged was also proportional to that.

The bar we were in now was a place that focused on Rank E artists, with two or three Rank D artists playing every night, which made it cheaper than Viper Poison because of the level of artists.

Everyone wanted to set up a bar to host high level artists, but it was a process that couldn’t be skipped. Normally, bars, like artists, had to build up their reputation before they could bring in bigger artists and charge more.

That’s why the owner of this bar didn’t mind mentioning that I was playing at Poison Bar tonight, since they were in different categories, the customers here wouldn’t stop coming here to go to the other bar.

“Welcome our last Rank E artist of the night, a boy who has only been playing for a month and has already achieved what many artists take years to achieve, welcome to the stage, BlackVelvet!” The host said.

As soon as he finished introducing me, I walked on stage with my guitar around my waist and waved to the audience, who whistled in celebration even though they didn’t know who I was, showing that the host was good.

It wasn’t easy to get people excited to hear someone they didn’t know play.

I took the microphone he gave me and smiled, “Good evening everyone, you’re really excited tonight!”

As soon as I said that, a few men in the background whistled and raised their glasses, cheering people up even more.

“Since you’re excited, I’m going to start with one of my favorite songs, for those of you who have recently ended a relationship, who gave everything for the sake of the relationship and in the end it didn’t work out, for those of you who feel frustration in your chest after trying so hard for something you wanted and in the end it didn’t work out, this song is for you, this song is for you to scream out loud and let that feeling out, for you to release what has been held from you and for you to feel lighter after this show, sing with me In The End! ” I made the introduction and began to play the song.

In The End is an upbeat song, but the lyrics are a little sad, so I realized that when I started playing it, people would go through a few processes.

First, they would hear me sing and try to understand the lyrics, which would make a lot of people sad, but then those people who were sad would start singing the chorus of the song with more and more enthusiasm, which would infect other people around them and increase the enthusiasm of the audience in general.

What I wanted to do with this speech was to speed up the process of the audience understanding the song.

Since there might be people who have difficulty understanding the meaning of the lyrics, wouldn’t it help them if I gave them a direction before the song started and made them more involved in the song?

🎼🎶🎤

One thing I don’t know why

It doesn’t even matter how hard you try

Keep that in mind, I designed this rhyme

To explain in due time

All I know is Time is a precious thing

Watch it fly by as the pendulum swings

Watch it count down to the end of the day

The clock ticks away life

🎼🎶🎤

As I sang this beginning of the song, I kept looking around the audience and analyzing their reactions.

From the reaction I saw, people really understood the way the song was going to go faster.

Just the fact that I explained the intention of the song before I sang it really made people pay more attention.

It seems that knowing what the song was going to be about made them more interested in it and more attentive to whether the song I was going to sing would really live up to the expectations I had created.

That rap part of the song wasn’t very danceable, so the most common thing was to see people just bobbing their heads or making rock symbols with their hands up, which was great for that part of the song.

🎼🎶🎤

I tried so hard and got so far…

But in the end it doesn’t even matter…

I had to fall to lose it all…

But in the end it doesn’t even matter…

🎼🎶🎤

As I sang the chorus of the song, I realized that the attention of almost everyone in the room was on me.

By putting my passion into singing the song, my voice helped me to easily reach a level of notes that I had previously found difficult.

When the first chorus ended, the crowd’s eyes lit up.

Every second I saw more people coming from the tables onto the dance floor to get closer to the stage to get a better look at me, more hands raised with the rock symbol on their fingers and more heads bobbing, but the highlight of this song was the second chorus where not only was I singing with passion, but the audience who had just heard my song was singing along!

People who didn’t know me, who had never heard my music, some who even thought I had done something wrong to get the best spot of the night to sing, were now singing my chorus together as they enjoyed the evening.

When In The End finally ended, I was a little breathless, but a message gave me more strength to carry on.

[+1 CON]

With one more Constitution point, I could already feel my body becoming more resilient, my energy reserves growing, and the only thing I wanted to do was keep singing.

“Woah, I got goose bumps from this crowd…” I said as I ran my hand up my arm, causing the audience to laugh and whistle at me. “As you liked In The End, which is a song about trying something and not succeeding in the end, this next song has a similar style but with lyrics that focus on someone who has suffered in an abusive relationship and had to move away to please the person and despite trying everything, the person was never satisfied.”

“To the girlfriend or boyfriend of yours who didn’t accept you for who you really are, to your parents who didn’t like your style and wanted you to be like your cousin or the neighbor’s son, to all those who wouldn’t let you be who you really are, sing it with me, Numb!” I tried to do the same thing I did with In The End, but with Numb, to see if it would help get the audience’s attention.

From what I could see in their eyes, it seemed to work as people were looking at me expectantly to find out what I was going to sing and if the song I was going to sing would be as good as the previous one.

🎼🎶🎤

I’m tired of being what you want me to be…

Feeling so faithless, lost under the surface

Not knowing what you expect of me…

Under the pressure of walking in your shoes…

🎼🎶🎤

The more I sang the song, the more people’s attention I attracted, mainly because of the beat of the song, but as their attention grew more and more on the lyrics, their heads kept bobbing, making the smile on my face bigger and bigger as I enjoyed the stage.