By Justin Lee
A couple of weeks ago, after finally managing to get my co-worker Dan to cover for me at work–thanks to some persuasive rhetoric and ol’ Dan’s merciful heart–I was set out to interview David Usher, one of Canada’s premiere rock stars. Talking to Usher made me realize why we envy rock stars to begin with.
Forget the fame, forget the money, hell, let’s even try to forget the chance to vandalize a $1,000 a night penthouse suite at the Ramada. No, what I want to talk about is groupies–the one determining incentive that first motivates any guy who ever picks up the guitar, bass, drums or any other musical instrument in the first place.
For those of you who are not familiar with David Usher, you were probably born with a penis. I only say this because it seems as though every young female in Canada have deemed this Vancouver-bred, Thai and Aboriginal-Canadian a rock ‘n’ roll sex god. My hormonally-challenged friend Desiree acted like she was going to meet the Pope himself when I invited her to accompany me to the interview.
Now, maybe I would have been singing a different tune if I was about to interview the magically delicious Alicia Keys. Still, I really don’t understand why people become so star struck to the point where they forget their own name, which proved poignantly true in Des’s case. After the interview, I asked Dave if he could sign some autographs and take pictures with Des and two fellow Gauntlet staff members.
Take three intelligent and mature female university students and place one David Usher in front of them and watch them degrade into a trio of boy band groupies. That was the true highlight of the day. Forget the interview and concert. Watching three girls gush and drool over some pretty boy automatically gives the entire male population the right to read Playboy for the informative articles.
After the quick autograph and photo-op with N*Syn… I mean David Usher, Des and I walked through the frosh-invaded halls of MacEwan Center. We sat down at a table and for the next half hour, she gleamed at the Polaroid I took of her and David.
"Don’t we make a cute couple? I love him. David and I are going to get married," she announced to me with a playful grin.
For those few minutes, Des was a giddy school girl who had just met her favourite member of a boy band, and maybe I’m just a sucker to see a cute girl in bliss, but all the trouble it took to arrange that one interview was immediately worthwhile. Yeah, I know. That’s the type of corny BS that you would expect to hear in an N*Sync ballad, but I what can I say? Maybe I should have tried out last Monday for the Pop Stars II audition.