The most successful punk band ever

It was a historical moment.  A grey Saturday afternoon in a Western German suburbia. That day,  Hannah, Julia, and I decided to form a band. I had been playing piano for about a year, Julia owned an e-piano but didn’t know how to play and Hannah was a passionate singer. What more could you ask for? A guitar player, he was found, when Tommy from across the street agreed to join our band.

The tasks were divided quickly, Hannah would sing and write the melodies, I would write the lyrics and play the bass keys on one e-piano because bass players were always the coolest. Julia would play the keyboard chords, sing the backing vocals and play the synthesizer drums on her e-piano until we found a drummer. Tommy was to play the guitar and look cute but shut up otherwise. 

But then, Hannah’s little sister Judith wanted to join the band, too. The problem was, the only instrument she knew how to play was the flute. Who had ever heard of a punk band with a flute? – we said no. She started to cry and ran to her mother. Mum told Hannah that she was grounded if she didn’t let her sister come in our band. What could we do? 

During the first band practice we figured out that little Judith knew only how to play “Old McDonald had a farm”. Never mind, we said, so a punk version of “Old McDonald” would be our first hit. I changed the lyrics to sound like a protest song against McDonalds and pro animal-rights. After we decided that, we spend the rest of the band practice to make up our outfits.

When we met for the second time  in our "garage" (that is the attic of my parents' house) things became more difficult. Each time Hannah started to sing, Judith blew her flute as loud as she could. In the end, Hannah had no choice but to lock her sister into a closet. Then Tommy decided that as he had nothing to say about the band's artistic development, he might as well listen to  football on the radio instead of practising. 

The original band members continued with vocals, bass, drums and keyboards until my father came up complaining about the noise. Of course, Judith used that chance to protest against her imprisonment. Discovering that we had locked her in that closet, my father told all of us to leave and as a punishment we were not allowed to use the attic anymore. After being stripped of our garage and one e-piano, which wasn't to be taken out of the house, the band split up even before our first performance.

In the end, I have to be thankful to my father. Since he caused us to split up right in the beginning, we never had the chance to be tempted by commercial success. We never sold out our art. In this way, true to the punk anti-philosophy, we were so unsuccessful that we were the most successful punk band ever.