New Sensation Read Free

grinned.
    "Enjoy your meal, you pair. It was lovely to meet you, Amy. And Rick, it's always a pleasure."
    They shook hands. "Say hi to Julia and the kids for me, okay?"
    As we started eating, the taste of impossibly fresh scallops began to melt in my mouth and I felt myself swooning at the flavours dancing over my tongue. "Oh my God, this is incredible. Just gorgeous."
    Rick looked up. "Brian is an amazing chef. He used to work in the music industry, you know. He was a private cook on yachts and stuff like that. Some rich rock star or band would hire him for three months and he'd go cruising around the Mediterranean with them, cooking their food every day. He 's seen some crazy shit, that guy."
    "What about you? Have you seen any crazy stuff or have you been the one doing it?"
    Rick sipped his wine. "Christ, that really doesn't go with beef. Still nice, though. Like I said earlier, I've done my share of stupid stuff in the past. But I was never one for smashing up hotel rooms or driving Rolls-Royces into swimming pools if that's what you're thinking."
    "What about drugs and alcohol? Seems virtually everybody in music ends up fighting their battles with those at some point."
    He shook his head. "Not for me. I like a drink, but I hate to get drunk. And, yes, I had my moments with drugs when I was earlier but the novelty soon wore off. I didn't find they contributed anything to my creativity like some people seem to believe. I always thought that was bullshit, just an excuse to behave badly. It comes back to ambition again."
    "What do you mean?"
    He thought for a minute, then sighed. "Where I came from, there wasn't much in the way of opportunity. My mother was an alcoholic and my father was gone before I was eight years old. I grew up in a trailer where we couldn't even afford to have the heating on a lot of the time. I know that ambition can be hardwired into your DNA, but I don't always buy it. I used to escape into books and music. They were my way out of that life. I swore I would never end up in that position when I got older. Creativity sets you free, gives you the ability to forge a new life that you sometimes can't get working on a production line or stacking shelves."
    I was intrigued. "What do you mean? You never doubted you would do anything other than become a musician?"
    Rick nodded. "Don't misunderstand me, there's nothing wrong with those jobs. It's just that where I came from, that was the best people aspired to. You were expected to go and work in a factory or grocery store, nothing more than that. But I wanted a bigger life, a better life. I remember seeing a programme on the television when I was about twelve years old about Paris. I was blown away. These guys were speaking a different language, seemed to have such a different culture to me. Yet they were listening to the same music I was! David Bowie, INXS, Led Zeppelin, Radiohead. Anything and everything, the whole spectrum. It just made me realise there's a big world out there and I needed to explore it. Now everything is more compact. I can create music in my studio and have it online the same night, reaching people all over the world and earning me royalties immediately. It's mind blowing. Anyway, enough about me. What's your story, Amy Reid?"
    I finished my scallops and sat back, completely relaxed in Rick's company. I felt like I could tell him everything about me, and for some strange reason I wanted to. "Well, I've been working on the magazine for two-and-a-half years now. Before that I was just a photographer in the North of England. We had an okay upbringing, nothing too dramatic. My father was an engineer, my mother a housewife. I thought coming to London would be the thing that made my career go into the stratosphere and, while it's fantastic meeting people like you, that hasn't quite worked out as planned."
    "I wondered about that. How come you're photographing and interviewing me? Don't they have other people to do one of those jobs?"
    I shook