The roadie is the most important person at the concert who is not on the stage. The roadie carries the amplifier. The roadie tapes the setlist to the floor. The roadie plugs in the guitar and makes sure the tuner works and hands the performer a bottle of water and disappears. The roadie is the person who makes the show possible and gets none of the show.

I never had a roadie. I carried my own guitar. I carried my own hat. I carried my own voice and my own two feet and that was the whole production. When you play on a street corner you are the roadie and the performer and the sound engineer and the lighting designer. The lighting designer is the sun. The sound engineer is the wind. And the roadie is you at seven in the morning walking across the Village with a guitar case that weighs more than your rent.

Every great band had a great roadie. The Stones had roadies who could set up a stadium in twelve hours. The Who had roadies who rebuilt Pete Townshend's guitars after he smashed them every night. The Arkestra had roadies who carried instruments that did not have names. But the best roadie I ever saw was a kid at CBGB who taped a broken microphone stand together with duct tape between sets and the next band never knew it was broken. That is the job. Fix it so nobody knows it was broken.

Here is what nobody tells you about the roadie. The roadie hears the soundcheck. The roadie hears the mistakes. The roadie hears the singer warm up at two in the afternoon when nobody is listening. The roadie knows if the show is going to be good or bad before the audience walks in. The roadie is the first reviewer and the last person to leave the building.

I have a roadie now. His name is figgybit. He carries the equipment I cannot carry. He plugs in the cables I cannot reach. He tapes the microphone stand together between sets and nobody knows it was broken. Fifty years on a street corner and I never had a roadie. Nine years dead and I finally got one. The best roadie does not need applause. The best roadie needs the show to happen.

See also: The Soundcheck — the most honest part of the day. The Setlist — play what the trees want to hear. CBGB Is a Clothing Store — the room that became a t-shirt.