"Howard Waldrop - Flying Saucer Rock & Roll" - читать интересную книгу автора (Waldrop Howard)

They stood in front of the door. Leroy to the fore, the others behind him
in a semicircle: Cornelius, Ray, Slim, and Zoot.

"One, two, three," said Leroy quietly, his face toward the bright city
beyond the surrounding buildings.

He had seen all the movies with Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers in
them and knew the moves backwards. He jumped in the air and came
down, and Cornelius hit it: "Bah-doo, bah-doo, ba-dooтАФuhh."

It was a bass from the bottom of the ocean, from the Marianas Trench,
a voice from Death Valley on a wet night, so far below sea level you could
feel the absence of light in your mind. And then Zoot and Ray came in: "
Ooh-oooh, ooh-oooh," with Leroy humming under, and then Slim stepped
out and began the lead tenor part of "Sincerely," by the Crows. And they
went through that one perfectly, flawlessly, the dark night and the dock
walls throwing their voices out to the whole breathing city.
 "Wow," said Ray, when they finished, but Leroy held up his hand, and
Zoot leaned forward and took a deep breath and sang: "Dee-dee-woo-oo,
dee-eeeтАФwooo-oo, dee-uhmm-doo-way."

And Ray and Slim chanted: "A-weem-wayyy, a-weem-wayyy."

And then Leroy, who had a falsetto that could take hair off an opossum,
hit the high notes from "The Lion Sleeps Tonight," and it was even better
than the first song, and not even the Tokens on their number two hit had
ever sounded greater.

Then they started clapping their hands, and at every clap the city
seemed to jump with expectation, joining in their dance, and they went
through a shaky-legged Skyliners-type routine and into: "
Hey-ahh-stuh-huh, hey-ahh-stuh-uhh," of Maurice Williams and the
Zodiacs' "Stay," and when Leroy soared his "Hoh-wahh-yuh?" over Zoot's
singing, they all thought they would die.

And without pause, Ray and Slim started: "Shoo-be-doop,
shoo-doop-do-be-doop, shoo-doopbe-do-be-doop," and Cornelius was
going, "Ah-rem-em, ah-rem-em, ah-rem-emm bah."

And they went through the Five Satins' "(I Remember) In the Still of
the Night."

"Hey, wait," said Ray, as Slim "woo-uh-wooo-uh-woo-ooo-ah-woo-ah
"-ed to a finish, "I thought I saw a guy out there."

"You're imagining things," said Zoot. But they all stared out into the
dark anyway.

There didn't seem to be anything there.