The Girls in the Band

Part I

Somewhere in her subconscious, Sammi knew that horrid ringing sound couldn't be her alarm clock -- that instrument of the devil had left its imprint on her wall several weeks ago when it had wakened her after she had spent a particularly intense night with a bottle of tequila. But what the fuck was it?!? A herd of coked-out cows rampaging through her bedroom? The apocalypse?

As one eye slowly slivered open, she spotted the object of her torture. "Fucking phone," she muttered into the pillow before grabbing it to shut it up.

"What?" she said in a tone significantly less threatening than she felt.

"Sammi! You're awake! Great!" chirped the voice on the other end. "I'm on my way over." Click.

Sammi blinked once and fell back into her pillow. "This is SO not right," she thought. Bethany was her best friend and best friends don't call you at ... what the hell time was it anyway? The only clock in the apartment was in the kitchen. That would mean getting up. That wasn't gonna happen. Grabbing the phone again, Sammi stabbed out P-O-P-C-O-R-N and braced herself for the grating tone of the time lady. "At the tone, Pacific Daylight Time will be seven thirty-seven and forty seconds."

With a groan, Sammi let the phone slip from his fingers and searched her brain for a way to come up with the energy to kill Bethany when she arrived. She was still searching when the doorbell rang 15 minutes later. In fact, she was still searching when Bethany, the designated keeper of her spare key, walked into her bedroom two minutes after that. She only stopped searching when she sniffed the heavenly scent of Sumatran gold and spied the mug from Grounds for Divorce in Beth's hand.

"Morning, sunshine, thought ya might need a little jump start," Beth said as she held the mug out to her friend.

"Don't go all perky on me, girl, I'm trying to decide whether I love you or hate you at the moment," Sammi replied before nursing thankfully at the Sumatran. "OK, now, tell me ... slowly ... why am I awake at 8 o'clock in the morning?"

"Better than tell ya. Show ya." Bethany whipped a newspaper from her '60s retro purse and dumped it onto Sammi's bed before curling into one of her convoluted yoga positions on the floor. "Cover of the entertainment section.

Instantly there was a spark in Sammi's eyes that had little to do with the day's first jolt of caffeine. Pushing the other sections off the bed, she found the entertainment section and the story she was looking for.

All their hot licks aren't musical

Homegrown has audience wanting to do more than just dance

By Jessica Powell

Chico Enterprise-Journal

Jump-starting its set with "It's Only Rock 'n' Roll," "I Love Rock 'n' Roll" and a searing cover of Led Zeppelin's "Rock and Roll," Homegrown left no doubt about what brought them to Madison Bear Garden Friday night. They don't just love rock 'n' roll; they hoist it onto an altar, sing its praises and whip its acolytes into a worshipful frenzy.

But it's more than just the music that has turned the Bear into a pulsing, roiling side street of chaos each weekend since Homegrown swept onto the stage a couple of months ago and became the No. 1 party band of the nation's No. 1 party school. In a word: sex. And in enough varieties to keep tables full of fans fencing with their fantasies.

For lead singer/guitarist Michael Costantino, the 47-year-old veteran of arena rock tours who is the architect of Homegrown, it's the nearly coal-black eyes, the bristling goatee, the tight, faded Levi's and "groupie bait" attitude. If there's such a thing as a male MILF, he's it.

Guitar-slinging Adam Costantino, Michael's 23-year-old son, is the lanky, laconic grunge slacker. He makes everything look so easy, the stoner grin never wavering even as his fingers blur over the frets, ripping off one incendiary riff after another. Adam need never worry about breaking the G-string on his guitar -- there are plenty of female fans ready to offer theirs to him.

Drummer Justin DiPaolo, the baby of the band at 21, is the darling of dark side set. With biceps bulging from beneath his trademark wife-beater and dripping with sweat long before the first set ends, DiPaolo is the ultimate up-against-the-wall fantasy.

But don't get the idea that it's just the women at the Bear who are having panty issues. Keyboard player Bethany Morgan and bassist Sammi Giannoni -- the yin and yang of female sexuality -- have their own legion of tongue-lolling fans.

Morgan, 22, a tie-dye clad strawberry blonde who adds the crystalline high end to the group's four-part harmonies, has the smile that can cut even through the Sierra Nevada-induced barroom fog. She's the one every guy wants to take home to mom. But not until they've stopped at a motel along the way.

Moms wouldn't want any part of Giannoni. Maybe its the punky jet black hair or the manic energy as she slams bass line thunder off the back walls and howls Merry Clayton-esque background vocals. More likely, it's the "Don't F-- With Me" tattoo on the 26-year-old's hip, clearly visible above her impossibly low-slung and tattered black jeans. There's nothing subtle about her sexuality when she stares down a stage-side fan and uses one hand to cover the "Don't" in the tattoo.

Asked about how big a part sex appeal played in Homegrown's popularity, Costantino took the philosophical road reserved for the band's father figure. "Rock 'n' roll has always been about sex, from Elvis to the Beatles to the Summer of Love, right up to today," he said. "It's a music that is designed to be sensual, to appeal to people's sexuality."

Giannoni was considerably more direct. "If you don't want to f--- by the time we're done playing, we haven't done our job," she said. "And if you don't want to f--- us, we haven't done it well enough."

Based on the crowd's reaction Friday night, they did their job -- and they did it well.

* * *

"You sure give good quote, sis," Bethany giggled as Sammi got to the end of the end of the story and looked up. "Did you really say that?"

"Yeah. Afraid Cuervo got my tongue. Didn't think she'd use it though. Shit. Can you imagine what it's gonna be like tonight?"

"Oh, I can imagine," Bethany said with a wink. Having played with Sammi in a variety of bands off and on for nearly four years, it didn't take much imagination.

Funny thing about images, she thought. Sammi had about the filthiest mouth she had ever heard and a facade carved from maybe watching too many Gina Gershon movies and listening to too much Joan Jett. And, given the right mood and circumstances, Bethany knew that her friend would fuck just about anything that walked upright. But she also knew that Sammi had never gotten past the whole Italian-Catholic guilt thing that went with anything she did.

Bethany, on the other hand, knew she looked the "take her home to mom" part that the E-J writer had used to describe her -- the whole bright-eyed, scrubbed-clean, long-hair-pulled-back, isn't-she-just-the-sweetest-most-adorable-thing persona that made people think prom date, not porn dollie. She couldn't stifle a giggle at the thought of that.

Part II

Nine o'clock and the Bear was packed. Business at Kevin's bar had been screamin' almost from the moment that Homegrown had started playing there four nights a week. But even so, for a Wednesday this was ridiculous. Delightfully ridiculous, he thought, as his mind went through the mental gymnastics of calculating the take from his liquor sales. "God bless 'em," he mused, "and God bless that girl reporter who wrote the story this morning."

Wrenching himself from his capitalistic coma, Kevin picked up the bar-side mike and yelled over the din that can only be made by three hundred or so half-drunk college students, "Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls of all ages -- over 21 of course -- the band that makes ya wanna ... Homegrown!"

As the stage lights came up, the Bear exploded under the assault of Justin's drums, Sammi's bass and the keening wail of Bethany's keyboard before Adam's Slash-like guitar soared above it all with the opening riff of "Anything Goes." Michael knew the buzz that the E-J story had created and because of that had picked Guns 'N' Roses anthem to hedonism as the opener.

I been thinkin' 'bout thinkin' 'bout sex/Always hungry for somethin' that I haven't had yet/Maybe baby you got somethin' to lose/Well I got somethin', I got somethin' for you

My way -- your way anything goes tonight/My way -- your way anything goes

Panties round your knees with your ass in da breeze/Doin' dat grind with a push and a squeeze/Tied up, tied down, up against the wall/Be my rubbermaid baby an' we can do it all

The rest of the set was more of the same -- ear-splittingly loud, rowdy, metal-edged, and aimed directly at every crotch in the bar. Guitar picks and drumsticks flew into the crowd; dollar bills and phone numbers flew back.

When the last strains of "You Shook Me All Night Long" died away, Sammi thought she couldn't wait to get backstage and get rid of her soaking wet halter. But ... maybe just a quick one first. Something to take a little of the edge off the white powder above her upper lip that stood out against her olive skin and all-black outfit.

"Hey, Kev. A Sierra and a shot of ...," she started as she reached the bar.

"Damn, girl, you sure made me wanna fuck you!" the voice bellowed into her ear before she could finish her order.

"Yeah, well, that's what we get paid for," Sammi muttered without looking up. "Cuervo, Kev," she finished to the bartender.

"Lemme get that for you," the voice in her ear continued. "Give us a chance to get to know each other."

Sammi glanced up and thought, "I am SO not into this." Taking the bottle in one hand and the shot glass in the other, she looked into the face of her "fan," said, "Oh, I think I already know you," spun away and headed for backstage.

Part III

"What the fuck is wrong with me," she sulked to herself. "He wasn't a bad-looking guy." Her inner conversation about the apparent hibernation of her libido jolted to a stop when she opened the door to the dressing room and saw a naked Bethany standing with one foot on the floor and the other on the shoulder of an equally naked guy treating her like a condemned man's last meal.

"Don't just stand there, sis," Bethany said with a smile. "C'mon in and close the door. This isn't part of the show."

Maybe it isn't, Sammi thought, but it sure as hell caught her attention. Sliding the door closed behind her, she took a couple of tentative steps into the room. The movement allowed her to see beyond the man's dark brown mane and to watch as his tongue flickered through her friend's soft down and across her pinkish lips. "This is insane," Sammi thought, but she couldn't move away, her eyes locked almost hypnotically on the sight before her.

Sure she'd seen Bethany naked before -- probably hundreds of times as neither was shy in dressing rooms -- but not like this. Not with her nipples hardened to dart-like points. Not with the lips of her pussy swollen in excitement and need. And certainly not with a man's mouth starting to encircle the stiffened bud of her clitoris.

"Mmmmmmm," Bethany moaned, her front teeth biting down on her lower lip. "Oh god yes! Suck it just like that. Just like that. Ooooh, feels so fucking good! Don't stop, oh god don't stop -- make me cum!"

Sammi watched the man's cheeks hollow as he drew Bethany's clit back and forth between his lips, heard her friend's mounting cries of excitement, smelled the scent so like her own. "Ohmigod!" she gasped as Bethany wailed out her orgasm and a trickle -- no, more than a trickle, much more -- of her pussy juices spilled down the man's cheek and onto her thigh.

A sound somewhere between a growl and a giggle pulled Sammi out of her trance. "Whew!" Bethany whooped. "Girl, he does just fine. Ya want some?"

"I ... I don't ... I mean ... I ..."

Bethany tumbled to the floor laughing at her friend's confusion. "Take your time, sweetie, I still have lots to do," she added with a wink. "Oh, where are my manners? Mark, Sammi. Sammi, Mark. It is Mark, right?"

"Yeah it is. Nice to meet ..."

"Hush now! You just lie back. Gonna show you that organ on stage isn't the only one I can play."

As Mark sank onto his back, Bethany looped a sleeve of her tie-dyed shirt around one of his wrists, wrapped the shirt around a leg of the couch and secured the other sleeve to his other wrist. "There. Perfect. Now, let's see what you have for me."

Bethany wrapped her long, slender fingers around the shaft of Mark's cock, squeezing it just below the head. "So nice and hard. I think you liked licking me didn't you?" she said, stroking him faster as the words spilled out. "And putting your tongue inside my cunt? And sucking my clit?"

Mark could only gasp and groan unintelligibly as Bethany used the fingers of her other hand to knead the spongy tip of his cock as she jacked him off. "Know what? I like to use my mouth too. To suck cock. You like having yours sucked?" she purred as she rested her face on his thigh. "Would you like me to suck it? Lick it? Take it all the way to the back of my throat? Hmmm? Tell me. Tell me ... tell me ... tell me ..."

"Yes! Yes! God, yes!" Mark was finally able to get out and the words had barely left his mouth before he felt his cock swallowed by Bethany.

Sammi watched in awe as her friend made a very nice sized cock totally disappear before pulling all the way back up to the head and letting her tongue lash over it. Mark seemed just as stunned and the only sound in the room was the slurping of Bethany's lips as she bobbed her head, twisting it slightly on each downstroke, dragging her tongue along the underside of the captured cock on each upstroke. The insistent suction and friction was becoming overwhelming and Mark mewed pitiably as he fought to keep from cumming.

"No, no, not yet," Bethany said, freeing his cock from the velvet vise of her lips. "Hey, sis, wanna see me fuck him?" Sammi nodded mutely and watched as her best friend started to kneel over Mark, then hesitated, turned and straddled him in a reverse cowgirl position. "If you wanna see, then you're really gonna see."

Spreading the lips of her pussy with one hand and clutching Mark's cock with the other, Bethany lowered slowly, sinking down inch by inch until her cunt was pressed against his balls. "Ooooh, look at that," she cooed as she started rhythmically bouncing on him. "Look at the way he stretches my cunt open."

Sammi watched in fascination, her own pussy now mirroring the wetness she saw in Bethany's as she rode up and down on the glistening cock. The sight, the sound, the smell drew her closer, her eyes locked on that junction of pleasure as the lovers ground and writhed against each other.

"That's right, come closer," Bethany whispered, and as her voice lured Sammi in, her hands reached out to hold those her friend and guide her to her knees. "See how much better up close? The way my lips fold around his cock each time I press down? The way his balls tighten when I grind on him like this? Mmmm, feel them."

Tugging Sammi's unresisting hand forward, Bethany cupped it around Mark's balls and immediately felt his cock twitch inside her. "Uhhhhh. Oh, squeeze him again like. Makes him feel even better inside me." Sammi did as she was told and could see the reaction on Bethany's face, hear it from the man fucking her so beautifully. She squeezed them gently, rolled them between her fingertips, drew her fingernails over his sack behind them. Everything she did seemed to make Mark piston his hips faster until he groaned that he was going to cum.

"I wanna cum too," Bethany cried, pulling Sammi's hand from Mark's balls to her clit. As she rocked to meet the thrusts of the cock inside her clit slid over the pads of Sammi's fingertips. Consumed by her second orgasm, Bethany missed the first spasm of Mark's cock but then pulled it from her pussy and aimed it so the second stream of cum splashed against Sammi's exposed tummy. Continuing to pump his cock, she milked the last bit of white of foam from it and onto her fingers.

"Yummm," Bethany said with the innocent little-girl giggle that now seemed so shockingly out of place. She nearly had her fingers to her mouth when she hesitated, cocked her head slightly as if lost in thought, then reached out to Sammi. Like a make-up artist applying finishing-touch lipstick to a runway model, she traced her index finger over Sammi's lips, leaving a sheen of bubbly, nearly clear fluid behind.

"Mmmm, beautiful," she sighed before leaning forward to flick her tongue over Sammi's lips, enjoying the slightly salty tang her finger had left behind. The sheer erotic force of that made Sammi gasp and as she did, her lips parted, unintentionally (or was it?) inviting a kiss from the girl who had been her confidante for so long. Bethany accepted the invitation gratefully, her tongue dancing over Sammi's teeth before searching inside her mouth.

Sammi knew she could stop it, that if she pulled back even slightly Bethany would smile at her, still love her like the sister she'd never had and that everything would be OK. But she didn't want to stop it. She loved the utter sensuality of their lips brushing together, the way their tongues darted over each other, the feel of Bethany's warm, sweet breath spilling over her mouth.

Finally it was Bethany who pulled back, but not without a loving look and a reassuring finger pressed against Sammi's lips.

Turning her head, she murmured, "Mark, you were an absolute delight, darlin', but I think we need a little private time, OK?" From almost anyone else, it would have sounded dismissive, insulting. But not from this girl, Mark thought. There was something so totally sincere about her, so caring of the needs of others even at the height of her own sexual cravings, he could only smile and nod, slipping out from under her as he fell just a little bit in love.

As Mark dressed, he watched the two kiss again. Sure it's erotic, he thought, seeing two women kiss is always erotic. But it's more than that. She's right, this should be private, he agreed as he eased out the door, closing it silently behind him.

Part IV

"Beth, are you sure we should ... " Sammi couldn't even finish the sentence as she gazed into the pale blue eyes that saw her as she really was, the scared little girl who hid her vulnerability behind leather, denim and tattoos.

"Sssshh ... I'm sure ... very sure."

There were no more words; they didn't need any. Sammi silently marveled at the tenderness as Bethany untied her halter and slipped it over her head, the way the younger girl touched her everywhere and ignited her nerve endings, the look of pure joy on her face as she explored the curves of her small breasts. Bethany made them feel fuller, more responsive, more treasured than ever before. Sammi felt the tightness in her nipples, felt them straining, felt them searching for a voice of their own to scream to be touched. And then they were. Bethany's fingertips, which had been circling her areolae, closed over her nipples and tugged slightly before continuing their maddeningly light touch.

"They're beautiful, Sammi, so firm, the skin so soft, the nipples so ... kissable."

Hearing the word made Sammi tremble. Seeing Bethany lower her mouth left her nearly unable to breathe. Feeling the moist lips close around her nipple took her to a place she thought only mythological creatures were allowed to dwell.

There was a purring sound from deep in Bethany's throat as she nursed at the nipple, her lips pulling over and over and over again, drawing it deeper as her tongue fluttered over the tip. Just when Sammi thought that her whole being had been concentrated in that one tiny bud, Bethany released it, kissed across her chest and up the slope of the other breast. But it wasn't the soft pressure of lips that Sammi felt this time. "Ohmigod, she's biting me!" she thought. It would have been painful if Bethany had even slightly increased the pressure of her teeth, but somehow she knew just exactly how hard to do it, how to heighten the sensation there until even the pleasure was nearly unbearable. Back and forth Bethany went from one nipple to the other -- kissing ... licking ... teasing ... sucking ... biting -- her own excitement spiking as she brought Sammi to a world of wordless whimpering.