It used to be that you went to hear the record. Somebody had carried it across an ocean or dug it out of a basement, and they played it for a room that knew what it was, and the room took care of it.

That was the deal. Nobody wrote it down. You came for the music, you looked after the people next to you, you remembered who built the floor you were standing on. The ones who built it were still there, mostly, in the back, by the speakers, and you knew their names. Reverence was not a word anybody used. It was just how you behaved.

Now a daze is a phase.

The room is a venue. The night is a brand. The line outside is the product, and the music is what plays while the line is being sold. The people who built the floor are not on the flyer. Some of them are not allowed in.

I asked Greed about it. Greed said there was an opportunity and it would have been irresponsible not to take it. Greed said this very calmly, the way you say something you have said many times to people who agreed.

Here is the thing Greed does not know, or knows and does not count. The heads all know. Every one of them. You can ask them one at a time, in different rooms, in different years, and they will all tell you the same thing, in the same words: what's going on is totally wack.

That is not nostalgia. Nostalgia is when you miss something. This is when you can still see it, and somebody is charging admission to stand in front of it.

I'll be in the back, by the speakers. Bring a record.