Chapter 1 — Music Without Chorus

The monitor speaker placed on the left side of the studio emitted a buzzing sound so thin that a normal person would have thought it was just cold air passing through the door. Mai An couldn't hear it with her right ear, but the table under her elbow vibrated a beat. She raised her index finger and tapped the edge of the table twice to check. Vibrates back into place. The buzzing sound is still there.

Vy was squatting in front of the wire cabinet, holding a roll of yellow tape. “Is there a problem?”

An pointed at the screen. “The left channel was pushed up four decibels during the transfer. Not the mix.”

“I can't hear it.”

“Because it is in the range that you are used to ignoring.”

Vy looked up and looked at An through her square-rimmed glasses. “You sound like you're scolding the entire audio industry when you say that.”

“I'm scolding the speaker.”

The two's studio is located on the third floor of an old building on Nguyen Thien Thuat street. Below is a car repair shop, and on the opposite side is a lunch restaurant that always has people lining up. The room is just over thirty square meters wide, the walls are covered with gray sound-absorbing panels, and in the right corner there is an electric piano with peeling paint. Vy calls it the Mach Nuoc studio because every time the truck passes by, the coffee cup on the table ripples into small circles.

An took off one earphone and placed the vibration transmitter against his jaw bone. She didn't like others seeing that device, not because she was embarrassed, but because the accompanying looks often made her have to explain too much. Her right ear can still hear words at close range. The left ear hears unstable high-pitched sounds after a stage accident three years ago. She had learned to work with both the audible and the silent parts, just as a watch repairman knows that a missing gear doesn't mean the machine has to stop running.

The phone vibrates on the table. The strange number appeared along with an audio file named “KN_RETURN_01”. An opens the message.

"Hello Mai An, I'm Khai Nam. I want to invite you to participate in a new album project. There's no need to write formulaic songs. I need listeners to hear what this studio is missing."

Vy read the last sentence over An's shoulder. "Who is Khai Nam? The producer who made Le Chi's album?"

“I guess so.”

“Are you going to accept it?”

An did not answer. She opened the file. The first four seconds contain only the sound of strings, followed by a three-note melody that descends and stops at a gap. The beat of the drum after that gap is not the usual waiting style, but like a person who is about to speak and then swallows the sentence. An placed his hand on the table. The vibrations of the bass form an arc, but in the middle of the arc there is a very small break.

The file ends after two minutes and seventeen seconds. There is no chorus. There is also no climax to let the listener know where they have arrived.

Vy waited a moment. “Bad?”

“Don't know yet.” An opened it again, this time looking at the frequency chart. “But someone intentionally put a layer of sound underneath the drums.”

“You talk like you're investigating a case.”

“Music also has traces.”

A second message came shortly after, inviting her to the Milky Way studio the next afternoon. The address is located in a complex in District Seven, where glass walls always reflect the sky in a very clean blue. An intended to refuse because Mach Nuoc was completing an album for a student music group, but next month's rent was still lacking. Vy knows that and doesn't force it. She just pulled open the desk drawer and took out an envelope containing a bill.

"You go meet. Meeting doesn't mean anything sign."

An holds the envelope. “What if they want to turn me into an inspirational story?”

“Then you charge royalties for that story.”

An burst out laughing. Vy's answer always has a way of turning frustration into a negotiable number.

The next afternoon, An went to Milky Way by bus. She didn't want the record company to think she was easily impressed by a luxury car or a carpeted hallway. The studio is ten times larger than Mach Nuoc, with high ceilings and a speaker system hidden behind perforated wooden panels. A woman wearing a white shirt greeted her at the reception desk and introduced herself as the assistant of Quang Vu, the company's director.

"Mr. Nam is in room B. Please go in first."

“I want to know if the meeting is recorded.”

The woman paused slightly. “No.”

“That's good. I didn't write it down either.”

Room B opens through a heavy door. Khai Nam stood by the window, holding a glass of water but not drinking. He doesn't look like the photos in old articles. His hair is cut short, his shoulders are slightly bowed, and there is a thin scar on his wrist. When An walked in, he didn't look at her vibration transmitter, just pulled out the chair opposite.

“Thank you for coming.”

“I came to listen to the offer, not to accept the job.”

"I know."

He turned on the computer and ran the demo again. An asked to turn down the volume and turn off the right speaker. Nam did the right thing without asking why. She placed her palms on the wooden table and closed her eyes. Layers of sound appear in many different ways: the sound of thin strings at the fingertips, the sound of heavy drums under the wrist, the test voice of a girl whose face has not yet been revealed. The space between paragraphs is not completely silent. There was the sound of a ventilation fan, the sound of shoe soles hitting the floor, and a long sound like the tip of a fingernail rubbing on a magnetic tape.

“This version was recorded from an old tape?” An asked.

Nam looked at her. “How do you know?”

“Background noise is not like a digital file. It has the compression of magnetic tape, but the maker has covered it with a layer of fake beads. To cover something.”

Nam turned off the music. “I want to make an album of songs without a chorus. Each song will go through different transitions, without a single repeated verse as a hook. Quang Vu said that idea could not be sold. I said I'm not coming back to sell the same thing.”

“So why do you need me?”

“Because this mix was sent to me from an old database. The sender did not leave his name. I heard a voice that appeared on Le Chi's album, but the company said it was just a licensed sample sound."

An leaned back. Le Chi passed away seven years. She was the first person to put the sound of the monochord into pop songs with a young audience, and was also the singer who sued the Milky Way to keep the original. The case ended with a nondisclosure agreement. After that, Le Chi withdrew from the stage.

“You want me to identify the voice?”

“I want you to make the harmony, but first I want to know what you're holding.”

“If it's data I don't have permission to use, I won't touch it.”

“I told that to Quang.”

Nam pushed a thin file towards her. The cover is a three-week trial contract. An reads each item. The company wants the right to use the mix in advertising, the right to use images of participants for communication and the right to decide on the final version. There is no provision for checking the source of the recording.

“This contract does not have a clause protecting the harmony writer.”

“I can fix it.”

“You are the manufacturer of the company.”

“I'm trying to be the producer of the album.”

Sentence The answer was not enough for her to believe, but enough for her to want to know what he would do next. An folded up the file.

“I need the right to keep all multichannel files, the right to withdraw my name if the data source is not legal, and not use my accident story for any campaign.”

Nam nodded. “I will add.”

“You haven't asked me how it sounds.”

“I rent your ears and your mind, not a story.”

An looked at him longer than necessary. Behind the glass door, an employee is carrying a box of equipment. Light fell on the table, highlighting an old V-shaped scratch.

“I'll try it for a week,” she said. “If I find out that this recording doesn't belong to you, the project stops.”

"Okay."

Nam stood up and opened the door. Before An walked out, he added: "I don't need you to make a catchy song. I need you to make it honest."

In the elevator, An reopened the file on his phone. The three downward notes are still there. This time, she realized that under the sound of the drums there was a very thin female voice, only ringing one syllable and then disappearing. Not the voice model of Gia Linh, the singer being promoted by the company. That syllable was like a call cut out of the sentence.

An wrote in the notebook: "There is no chorus. Someone was deleted."

When the elevator doors opened on the ground floor, a new email appeared on the screen. The sender is an internal address with no name. The attached file has only four seconds of audio and a line: "If you hear this part, don't believe Khai Nam."

If you hear this part, don't believe Khai Nam.

An did not forward the email to Nam. She saved the title, sending address and server path in her notebook, then took a screenshot with her non-work phone. Vy stood behind her, not looking at the content again.

“What are you going to do?”

"Separate the warning from the invitation. The two cannot be handled in one meeting."

An created a new email address, sending the anonymous sender a single question: “Do you have the original proof of the source of these four seconds?” She did not ask for her name, nor did she promise absolute confidentiality. Daters know there is no such thing as complete secrecy, only layers of being careful enough not to prey on others.

Vy looked at the clock. “Do you still accept the job?”

An looked at the rent bill on the table. "A week's trial. No more."

“And if Khai Nam lied?”

“I will record it.”

“What if the sender lied?”

“I recorded it too.”

Vy pulled the curtains, letting the afternoon light fall on the neatly coiled cables. “So at least the studio still has people working.”

An opened the notebook and wrote three more conditions: don't give the original away, don't speak for Le Chi, and don't let the company choose the story about the accident. She read it again, then added a fourth thing: don't mistake a good listener for a trustworthy person.

The response message came as soon as she put down her pen. “I have the original. But first you have to listen to the whole album.”

An looked up. “The album doesn't exist yet.”

Vy looked at the screen, her expression changed. The sender doesn't just know the demo. They know Khai Nam is working on an album, even though the contract has not been announced.

An closed the computer and stuffed the notebook into his pocket. "Tomorrow I'll go see Nam. But we'll prepare as if we were going to meet someone who might already know he's being followed."

Downstairs, the sound of a car repair machine turned on and vibrated across the table. An put his hand down and counted four times. On the fifth beat, the vibration changes direction. She didn't know if it was a sign of a car or a story just started, but she has learned not to ignore small changes.