Tear Here by Matthew Pitt

Content warnings: Sexual relationship with a minor

A refined, edgy take on a rock & roll band’s attempts to break into the mainstream

Tear Here follows the story of Some Assault, a group composed of recalcitrant high schoolers and their headstrong, charismatic drummer Liddy. The narrative is a bittersweet tale of an ensemble in transition who are inspired by the friendship of a dying teacher and soon begin a chaotic rise to the top of the music charts in spite of a revolving door lineup.

Charlie Shales is a dying Algebra teacher at the local high school. He has cancer, his cells eating him up inside, when he catches Liddy cheating on a test. After hearing of his situation, Liddy offers to do “something” for him if he wants, and he accepts even though she is his seventeen-year-old student. Later, he provides lodging for her, and she hooks Charlie up with one of her bandmates who has access to marijuana, hopeful that it can do something to ease Charlie’s suffering from the adverse effects of chemotherapy.

Charlie hangs out with the group of teens at the zoo, where they opine on various topics while enjoying the mellowing effects of the potent herb. Over time, Charlie becomes one of Some Assault’s biggest fans, cheering them on as they rock various local venues, and he becomes a source of life advice to Liddy, Jilt, Claw, and others in the group. He’s a deeply complicated character with a short life span, a sympathy card for dying, likability points for his helpfulness to the group, but ultimately a problematic cornerstone, he’s a teacher who embarks on a sexual relationship with a student while she’s underage. She’ll turn eighteen soon, but that’s not exactly a saving grace. Charlie is kind of like the fruit from the poisonous tree, a fallible and false idol; a sort of mythic figure in a band’s origin story.

Liddy knows what it’s like to live on borrowed time; she was born with Cystic Fibrosis. The harsh blow she was dealt by her compromised immunity was coupled with the abandonment of her mother when she was a child. As Liddy matures, she begins to exert the control in life that has been lacking up until this point. She is unafraid of making the necessary moves to further her band’s chances of achieving stardom, from mailing demos to record labels to jettisoning troublesome bandmates. The band is capable of breaking up at any show, due to crippling addictions and large egos. Charlie is their unifying force, someone who sees each member’s potential along with the minefields that could trip them up. Charlie’s death, then, hits the band hard, but maybe Liddy the hardest, he may have been the love of her life.

The narrative hits its stride as the band begins its radical evolution, which hinges on the brazenness of Liddy. While initially being the sole female member of Some Assault, she is the core that holds it all together. She begins to add new members to the group’s roster by stealing rival band members and manipulating talented but emotional fragile youth such as Oliv. Various original members are cashiered for real or perceived infractions, the group’s home has gone from a former crime scene to a closed women’s penitentiary, and the popularity of Some Assault has hit the zeitgeist. Yet there is a growing danger as Liddy’s grasp on reality becomes tenuous, members of the band become slavish, and a string of deaths commence.

Tear Here is an unconventional yet profound story about enigmatic figures who grasp at stardom only to find themselves in a whirlwind of despair. The defining quality of the story resides in its ability to consistently surprise the reader.

While Liddy emerges as the predominant character in the story, a fictional Grace Slick combined with a modern-day cult leader, the action is often seen through the eyes of those affected by Liddy’s increasingly erratic behavior. The degeneration of a band from a group of friends who care about the music into a hive mind collective concerned with only good press and records sold is a poignant and genuine aspect of the story.

Author Matthew Pitt has written a thought-provoking ode to the sex, drugs, and mayhem that typify rock and roll legend while alluding to the cult of personality that drives the following of artists and bands.

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