The singer, bald now, struggling to fit into those tight leather pants from his youth, can’t quite hit the high notes anymore. The bass player refused to join in on the reunion, citing a lack of artistic integrity within the rest of the group, going so far as to say they’re “only in it for the money”. The guitarist, who long ago forsook his experimental, roughshod roots for a poppier, more mainstream sound, strains to recreate his past. He looks bored, as if he’s only going through the motions. The drummer, of course, died in 2004 and was replaced.
The concert ends with the band’s biggest hit, played without flourish, sounding just like it does on the radio. The lights come on, and for the first time you notice the rest of the crowd – they’re all so young, and you’re a bit embarrassed. You leave the venue, and on the drive home you reach for that old CD, the one you fell in love with almost two decades ago.
You turn it off before the first song ends.
It just isn’t the same. In fact, it’s an entirely different album from the one you loved so much just 2 hours before. You question what you liked about it in the first place, and you think “maybe it’s not the band that’s changed, maybe it’s me”. One day, perhaps, you’ll find it - out of its case and scratched all to hell, sitting underneath your Nissan’s manual, crushed in the glove box with some napkins and half a pack of gum. Maybe when you throw it on some of that old magic will be there, and the embers of your love will reignite like a rising phoenix.
But maybe, you think, you ought to have left the past alone, and left your good memories as they were, memories. You keep driving, vowing not to taint the fond thoughts of your past any further. "There's no way I'll watch Alternative," you tell yourself.
