The rock'n'roll novel lends itself to a certain treatment - the documentation of a band's rise to success, in which the writer affects a privileged tell-all point of view, on the road with band and crew. An uncanny sense of destiny permeates these histories of "getting there" and "losing it", with their fantastic, fanatic elements. Kevin Sampson, in his second novel Powder, promises hard-core authenticity.
Powder begins with Sensira, who, alongside the Grams and another Liverpool band, The Purple, make up the new underground music scene. Sensira have just Got Big - Wembley-sized. But they are a hyped sham band, whereas the Grams are the Real Thing. This apparent injustice, along with local rivalry, mean Sensira are the band against which the Grams will chart their success.
The building excitement as the hustling Grams break through, along with plentiful fast-living anecdotes, should ensure that Powder grabs its readers. With little attention to character development or self-analysis, Grams hurtle over a landscape mapped out by generations of rockers before them, falling foul of nymphomania, booze and mind-blowing drugs. There's Keva, the melancholic singer and songwriter; James Love, apeish all-loving druggie guitarist; unmentionable Beano and Snowy; and Wheezer, their asthmatic manager.
Given that Sampson managed The Farm, Powder's tone is in-the-know, with all the right technical details, yet its "exposure" of the rock'n'roll industry reads more as fantasy role-playing.
Beyond a few oblique references to guitar licks infused with genius feedback, the Grams suffer only nominal rock star sensibilities: they go through the steps towards what might be called spiritual advancement: idealisation, realisation, indifference (behaving like a dog), loss of money, disillusionment, seclusion. Keva, taking in the view of London, while mulling on his loneliness, vaguely remarks "Powder". This, followed by an audience screaming, "We want Grams!" makes Powder seem a wild, Terry Southern-style account of modern society engaging enlightenment: what sex did for Candy, cocaine fixation does for rock'n'roll. Yet Powder at times seems to take the industry too seriously.
With the surprise of success comes the reality of individual expectation. Deciding that the others are taking too much money and not contributing enough, Keva withdraws and wonders if he ought to go it alone, signalling the beginning of the end of a year's triumph - just as he reaches his thirtieth birthday.
What kind of expression of reality is this - is it good satire, or morally bracing? If Powder lacks insight, perhaps it's due to a cast of characters who don't know what it is to have the road own them. But perhaps slapstick-style fiction - for a laugh, to take the piss - is enough.
