Someone Should Pay for Your Pain: A Novel

by Franz Nicolay

Someone Should Pay for Your Pain by Franz Nicolay follows singer-songwriter Rudy Pauver, his conflicted relationship with a successful former protégé, and a young niece who wants to travel with him and whose surprise appearance forces a reckoning with himself and his past. In the doldrums of a career as a cult figure, singer-songwriter Rudy has been overshadowed by Ryan Orland, to the point where Rudy is now identified as an imitator of the younger man. Ryan is generous and supportive of Rudy, but Rudy finds it hard to be grateful. Forced to confront the limitations of his own talent and ambition, his resentment triggers a confrontation that ends in their estrangement. When Rudy’s niece, a teenage runaway who admires the freedom of his lifestyle, turns up asking to join him on the road, he has to come to terms with the nature of his obligation to family and accountability for his past. Someone Should Pay for Your Pain is an exploration of the nature of creativity and popular success; artistic and ethical influence; the pathos of the middle-aged artist; changing standards of sexual morality; and guilt and penance in a post-religious society.

Genres: Fiction, Novels, Contemporary

230 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 24, 2021

About the author

Franz Nicolay's writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Slate, The Paris Review Daily, The Kenyon Review Online, the Los Angeles Review of Books, The Ringer, Ploughshares, Threepenny Review, LitHub, Longreads, and elsewhere. He has taught at UC Berkeley and Columbia, and is currently a faculty member in music and written arts at Bard College.

His first book, "The Humorless Ladies of Border Control: Touring the Punk Underground from Belgrade to Ulaanbaatar," was named a “Season’s Best Travel Book” by The New York Times; his second, the novel "Someone Should Pay For Your Pain," was called "a knockout fiction debut" in Buzzfeed and named one of Rolling Stone's "Best Music Books of 2021" (“Finally, the great indie-rock novel"). Hua Hsu, in The New Yorker, said "Band People: Life and Work in Popular Music" “might be one of the least bacchanalian books ever published about the rock-and-roll life style, but also one of the most honest,” and it was named a Rolling Stone "Best Music Book of 2024."

Reviews

[Mike · Rating 5 out of 5]

Authentic to the core. Really enjoyed this story of a struggling musician. The competition, the envy, the drink.

[Ruth · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a fan of The Hold Steady, it was cool to see another side of Franz Nicolay's creativity. The story of Rudy told through back and forth time periods was compelling and a bit sad. Nicolay captures universal themes of those who haven't quite 'grown up' or still feel like their teenage self full of dreams. Aside from the music scenes he describes in vivid detail (and most likely with accuracy), the road trip aspect of the story appealed to me but also effectively illustrates Rudy's isolation.
Much like his Instagram feed, Nicolay has Rudy noticing wacky signs seen out on the road including the billboard ad with the title. Someone ^should^ pay for your pain, right?
There was a twist near the end that kind of threw me. Hard to go into without spoiling it but it was out of the blue (for me) so then I wanted more resolution. But Nicolay stayed focused on his theme and on Rudy so that's cool.

[Matthew Pennell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Revealing fictionalised version of life on the road following not so much a 'has-been' but more of a 'never-was'. The story flows smoothly back and forth through time, never exciting but reliably functional, just like its anti-hero protagonist.

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm a huge Hold Steady fan—the band felt incomplete without Franz. And I also dug what I've heard of his solo stuff. Just seems like a smart, interesting dude. So I was stoked to see he wrote a novel. It's, of course, about an aging has-been musician. He drives across North America from gig to gig, making and breaking connections with friends, bandmates, lovers, family. My favorite passages were the On the Road-esque, stream-of-consciousness travelogues, mostly through the Midwest. Some really strong writing there.

Ditto his characters. You feel like you've maybe seen Rudy Pauver play in some hole-in-the-wall venue before; you doubtlessly have strong opinions on Ryan Orland; you used to drink beers with Jules; maybe you were Lily at some point. These characters allow Nicolay to ruminate about rebellion and settling down; growing up and world-weariness; the hopefulness of youth and the fatigue of middle age. All themes of import and personal interest, so I connected with the novel on that level.

I'm just not sure how well it worked as story, and the work as a whole came off a bit as (pleasingly) minor. Perhaps the rushed denouement and understated ending had something to do with that. The conflict between Rudy and Ryan (really, Rudy and Rudy) seemed like it was going to be the central thrust of the story... but then you only basically got one quick conversation in a bar and that was it. And the #MeToo angle (Orland is Ryan Adams, right?) felt a little tacked on. I would have preferred another 40-50 pages in the third act to give this a little more dramatic and thematic heft.

But that doesn't seem to be the book Nicolay wanted to write. And that's okay. I'd read another novel from him. Or even better—a short story collection.

[Dave Mason · Rating 4 out of 5]

story about a musician’s life without any real fame or fortune… just trying to survive… great read if u can handle the darkness…

[JM · Rating 5 out of 5]

A haunting love letter to (permanently) suspended adolescence, the tragedies of wasted youth, and the dark, bleak, hope that can be found between subtle chords and on America’s back roads. The earnestness Nikolay has always inserted into his music is on display in full force here as well. This is not a feel-good story. Rather, it is someone far more rare: a tragedy that makes you want to keep on going.

[Seán · Rating 4 out of 5]

Someone Should Pay For Your Pain is a lot of things. It's a road novel; it's a snapshot into a scene; it's a a character study of arrested development mapped onto a tour diary.

Our protagonist is Rudy, a touring musician and cult figure who has just about enough fans to tour most of the year, but not enough fans to guarantee a good turnout at a gig. In his early days he was in a punk band with a devoted following, his chief fan being Ryan, a young hopeful with a lot of enthusiasm. In fact Ryan has what Rudy doesn't - the ability to connect to people face to face, not just through a song. Ryan's empathy, genuine interest, and open communication rapidly gains him his own following, which in turn makes him something of a star. The teacher/protégée dynamic is flipped, and Ryan asks Rudy to be his opener on tour. Rudy, a perpetual adolescent, resents this and embarks on a decade of itinerant solitude.

It's tempting to try to relate Rudy to Nicolay. The touring life is obviously written from experience. In fact, it all feels like it's written from experience. The level of detail and poetic eye turned to the mundane clearly come from someone who has trained themselves to experience beauty and amusement wherever they can find it, in the gaps between the mindless limbic spaces of a life on the road. I can't say I was much interested in picturing Nicolay in Rudy's place though. Everything in this book is so clearly an amalgamation of people and places picked up over the years, or a literarily-exaggerated version of the real thing. (Which is not to say the characters don't ring true - they all feel very real).

I raced through this, and hope more Nicolay novels appear in the future. I bought this from the man himself at a superb gig in Bristol. I even got it signed.

[Michael Malone · Rating 4 out of 5]

Entertaining novel about a guy from a fairly iconic punk band who goes on tour as a solo act years later, playing miserable bars across the country for spartan audiences that are both indifferent and contain a few souls who adore his music.
Rudy Pauver is that guy. He's quick to absolve himself of responsibility, as life on the road as a solo act merits, but that changes when his teen niece, a runaway, turns up at one of his gigs, and ends up traveling with him for an extended period. The book is at its best when Rudy and Lily are on the road.
Another fun wrinkle is a musician Rudy embraced when he was a teen fan of the Expats, Rudy's old punk band, Rudy even permitting the kid, Ryan, to open up for the band one night. Ryan ends up a red hot musician with an enormous following. He signs Rudy to his label, but the two have a major falling out.
Nicolay plays keyboards for The Hold Steady. Someone Should Pay For Your Pain is a fun, worthwhile read, and an intriguing look at the life of a low-level musician.

[Lee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fans of The Hold Steady will see some familiar threads in Nicolay's multi-decade story of down-on-their luck musicians and the vicissitudes of their lives. The story centers on Rudy Pauver, a singer/songwriter as he struggles to figure out his life, first in a band, then on his own. Lots of characters come in and out of his life throughout the course of the story, and it's to Nicolay's credit that things are never solved simply. Even at the end of the book, Rudy hasn't lost his ability to frustrate the reader with his self-centeredness even as he lurches forward in trying to become a better person. Better than the character study -- which is excellent -- is the writing itself. Nicolay has an unsurprisingly attuned ear for dialogue and an eye for the grimier side of touring life, but his command of language is really on display here. Highly recommend if you like music, musicians or just quiet books about people struggling with why they are the way they are.

[Eliot · Rating 4 out of 5]

I didn't have my expectations set too high given how flavour of the month the topic of touring musicians and their rise and fall from stardom seems to be at the moment in fiction. Someone Should Pay for Your Pain knocks all of the more pedestrian efforts in the genre out of the water. A very tender and poignant character study into Rudy's life on the road. Nicolay uses great command on the English language as well as humorous philosophical insights to deliver a thoroughly entertaining and thought provoking read. Every character that dips in and out of Rudy's life has an astounding realness and relatability. There are also comical musings on everything from parenthood to human relationships. Often I had to stop and really appreciate some of the outstanding prose on offer. Just as it risks meandering Nicolay ties it all up with a very satisfying and well rounded ending. A really fantastic first novel from the author.

[Patrick Book · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a delightfully authentic work that offers a remarkably-authentic view of “the scene” and what comes after. Nicolay has the heart of a punk, the soul of a poet, and an anthropologist’s eye for detail. Every page rings with lived experience, from life in a bunk on a touring bus to the ignobility of performing for a dozen people in a two hundred cap room.

It’s easy to guess with whom he most identifies, given his biography and lyrics and song titles from this book appearing on his most recent album. Hopefully Nicolay doesn’t share Rudy’s dwindling enthusiasm for creating and performing music, but if he does, this hopefully represents a second act that keeps his pen lively.

Check out his non-fiction too: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2.... Guy is a genius.

[Alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

Taking the mid-life crisis of an early-aughts indie rock never-was as his starting point, Franz Nicolay delivers a tight-fisted gut punch of a novel, weaving a road-weary world with a lyricist's skill for evocation, emotion, and economy at once. A solo-acoustic requiem for the un-glamor of every minor scene that briefly felt enormous, and an unflinching and finely rendered vision of old anthems clashing with new ideals, Someone Should Pay for Your Pain is a story of an xennial reckoning unto redemption, which fans of Nicolay's band, The Hold Steady, will appreciate, and which will leave anyone who reads it brimming with ragged hope. A knock-out fiction debut from a long-time troubadour.

[Peggy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is about , Rudy , an aging singer and song writer who once had a cult following , when Ruby was in the heyday of his career he met Ryan , a devoted admirer who became his protégée. Ryan now becomes the admired one and Rudy is thought to be an imitator of him. Ryan tries to help Rudy reestablish himself . Rudy cannot accept this. His niece runs away from home to join Rudy on the road. Rudy is not only confronted with a failing career but family issues, guilt and responsibility.
It was a hard book to start but was very enjoyable and entertaining after getting into it. I received this book from The Library Thing in exchange for a review

[Amy Casey · Rating 4 out of 5]

In his first novel Someone Should Pay for Your Pain, Franz Nicolay comes at his story with a lyricist's love of beauty and a seasoned performer's world-weariness. The resulting tension creates a story with a sticky floor and a hazy smell, where moral ambiguity abounds. You could tell a young, starry-eyed scenester "It's not all it's cracked up to be", or you could just hand them this novel. Both rough-edged-honest and blithely cynical, Someone Should Pay for Your Pain is an ode to all the acts who never made it big, fell in love too hard with the life to let it go, and are scheduled to play a weeknight basement show somewhere in Ohio, wondering what it all means now.

[Blake Cateris · Rating 5 out of 5]

A novel that captures such a wide spectrum of the western human experience through the lens of a touring musician.
Elegantly and unpretentiously, Franz Nicolay's command of the English language rolls so mellifluously over the mind poetically painting sceneries, scenarios and shitty backroom bar shows.

You can tell this has been inspired by all the minute and major truths of living a life as a musician, whether well-known or unknown, on the road or static in a single city.
I laughed, I sighed and I almost cried.

[Brie · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was... interesting to read. I enjoyed most of it (although something about the time skips was harder to follow than other books that utilize the same non-linear storyline) and Rudy was an intriguing main character that was well-fleshed out and had a lot of depth. But at the same time, the ending was sudden and disappointing, and the blurb on the back had me expecting Lily to be a much more important character than she was so it felt like an unfulfilled story.

[Steve Wilson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Full disclosure--I'm a huge fan of The Hold Steady so I was naturally curious about this book. This is a quick-paced, well-written story ample enough twists. Franz has a masterful command of language and nails the details. He clearly draws from his insight as a traveling musician and pulls back the curtain to reveal life as an obscure artist. The characters are well developed, the story is engaging and honestly, left me wanting more.

[Glen Baity · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautifully written and keenly observed account of an ancient (i.e. mid-30s) punk on an endless tour. Nicolay is a career rock musician, and all the characters that populate the novel's dive bars, motels, and truck stops feel deeply real. This is a loving yet unsentimental account of a difficult way of life, and a clear-eyed assessment of the petty grievances, jealousies, and resentments that bloom there. I loved it.

[Brendan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a thoroughly enjoyable debut novel. Nicolay’s writing style is engaging, erudite without being overly pretentious, and his characters, especially Rudy, are well-rounded. The time-shifting story told here is excellent, a suitably dark and mildly depressing examination of the grind of a not-so-famous touring musician, warts and all. Worth reading.

[Lisa Gray · Rating 2 out of 5]

I got this book free from Library Thing's early reviewers program. Really not much of a fan of this book. A quick read, but I didn't like the characters and found myself skimming over large swaths of the book.

[Stephen Johns · Rating 5 out of 5]

I used to think of Franz Nicolay as a musician who was also a writer. After reading Someone Should Pay for Your Pain, I think maybe he's actually a writer who's also a musician. Or maybe he's just brilliant. Anyway, this book rules.

[Travis Andrews · Rating 5 out of 5]

Terrific novel, at times hilarious and heartbreaking, at times both simultaneously. If you're even a middling fan of rock music, live shows, the idea of touring or simply the question of how we become who we become, this book is for you. Come for the rock references, stay for the gorgeous prose.

[kyle · Rating 4 out of 5]

I like this book more than The Hold Steady. Because apparently everyone who reviews this book needs to include their thoughts on the author’s band.

[Kc · Rating 4 out of 5]

Opens up a very interesting conversation.

[Charlie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Real feelings, untidy in the way feelings are. Tough lessons and the real difficulties of middle-aged adjustment. I was sad when it was over.

[Fred · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting story that gives an honest view of life on the road for an aging club-level touring artist, which I'm guessing comes from direct experience.

[Jeff Clarke · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun and bittersweet portrait of playing in bands, life on tour and the fate of the minor artist in the process of accepting that truth, among other things.

[Jake Resetarits · Rating 4 out of 5]

The various threads come together nicely, though the conclusion remains authentically thorny and complicated. Keep writing, Franz!

[Alex R · Rating 5 out of 5]

Simply, one the my favourite books I've ever read.

If you're interested in DIY music, touring life, or you're a parent, I'd highly recommend this book.

Amazing.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

A look into the life of a musician on the road also known as a tour of broken dreams and disappointments.