Funny how things fall into a pattern.

My predilection for hanging on to and reveling in old stuff, cutting across almost everything in my life, is part of my charm, with my wife constantly ragging on me to let shit go all the while forgetting we’ve been in each other’s lives well over 40 years.

Which I don’t bring up because there is nothing to be gained.

But one old thing I get no shit about from her is my choice of music, except when jams get too long, loud and perhaps tedious and she demands I change the record or station, ignoring my pleas to listen closely and she’ll “get” them. Nope…she likes her music more succinct and prefers other genres which was why she nixed seeing Neil Young and Crazy Horse but dragged me to see Tommy on Broadway which despite enjoying the people watching nearly put me in a coma from boredom and redundancy. Those comprised the first half of my “See ‘Em Before They’re Dead ‘24” tour despite Townsend and Daltrey being alive and well and nowhere near NYC…I was hoping/expecting the show and its music to finally be put out of its misery. Enough already…

And for good measure she chose the other two shows.

I last saw the Stones in the ‘70s and given the records I never bought and subsequent concerts and tours I missed they were not a favorite. I respect their legacy, talent and repertoire, but I feel they’ve become caricatures and their music overplayed and rote. I view them as part of the landscape of my life, much like the Beatles. I’ve never said, “I feel like listening to the Stones”.

And neither has my wife, which was why I was surprised when she wanted to see them at the Meadowlands. So I was faced with dual dilemmas…seeing a bunch of 80-year-olds I had no interest in and having to get to “Fucking Jersey” in the middle of rush hour. But I bought “reasonably-priced” tickets, only $205 per, for what I hoped would be a beautiful May evening and dragged another couple along to share the adventure.

New Jersey could be a decent place if you didn’t first have to get there, especially from Long Island, and the prospect of heading there gives me the shakes. I could either sit in brutal traffic no matter the route or deal with three trains, two of which are NJ Transit, adding more nostalgia and perhaps even time travel to the ordeal. And when the day of reckoning arrived with rain in the forecast, making it 3 for 3 for the tour, we chose the latter. After I anally plotted our journey to ensure we made our connections, we spent over two hours wending our way through Penn Station and Secaucus before reaching the Meadowlands and our upper deck seats at the 35-yard line. I’ve sat in similar seats for football games with no issues but the end zone stage seemed miles away with the catwalk reaching the 30 meaningless. So we would be relegated to watching the big screens to see anything beyond a tiny Jagger running around and the rest of the band intermittently huddling together but mostly standing apart.

After sitting through a torturous opening act, we got good news…no rain, so we settled in and waited. And waited some more. I never understood why bands took their sweet time hitting the stage well after everything looks ready to go. It’s gotten better over the years but still fucking annoying. Just like the musicians, I ain’t getting any younger and my mental calculator was already at work figuring out when my head could hit the pillow. My rudimentary math said 2/2:30am at best…depending on connections. I’m entitled to seek convenience with my music and was not happy.

When they finally hit the stage I was thankful for the monitors. Not so I could see the life-like skeletal remains of Jagger, Richards and Wood running, prancing, huddling and whatever else up close, but because the video guys seemed as enthralled as I became focusing on Richards’ and Wood’s hands as they played. I had a new appreciation for their skills but even more for how tight and how much better they were live than on record. Jagger regaled us with his shtick and they moved around more than anticipated while playing several old cuts that were phenomenal. Great show, mostly worth the effort, but it still hasn’t made me want to listen to the Stones. Glad they too were still alive.

The final stop on the tour promised to be something. Indoors in June so no worries about the weather, only about people keeling over and blocking the exits God forbid there was a fire. I’d been to the Westbury Music Fair numerous times and the demographic invariably skews “older”. Not like “Broadway Older” which comes with a side of “Broadway Weird”, but “Suburban Older” or “Rock and Roll Older”, both troubling for someone of a certain age who doesn’t deem himself a parody of his former self, despite my still shoulder-length hair. I also still walk upright without assistance and sleep through the night without bathroom breaks, so fuck that.

My wife caught wind of the “Happy Together 2024” tour, named after the most popular song of the Turtles, the headliner. That they were the headliners left much room for undergrowth, aka opening acts, of which there were five. She decided to drag her older sister and our brother-in-law along to further ensure she and I remain below the median age. My people-watching fetish was quickly satiated as we hung outside for a bit after slipping the parking attendant 5 bucks for a prime spot and before entering the venue. What a crowd! Other shows had plenty of guys in old or ill-fitting band T-shirts, or long hair with big bald spots or no hair at all, and women who tried to look like they did “back then” or were just weird-looking old “rocker chicks”, but this crowd was different. These were not “rock” bands per se, but “pop”, another animal, and the crowd had its moments of strange but was mainly just “old”. I half expected to see shuttle buses from the local assisted living facilities in the lot.

It was a “musical revue”, not some battle of the bands. Same backing musicians for each group playing a few hits before scurrying off for resuscitation or whatever else necessary. The Cowsills were just fucking adorable, with little girl Susie, now 60 something, hitting most of the notes while decked in hippiewear with her brothers perhaps playing instruments. Then came one guy from Badfinger, a Beatle-esque quasi-cover band, hacking on a Les Paul while straining to hit any note between painful banter about his relationship with the Beatles. Followed by the Vogues in matching outfits with no original members and one catchy song along with a few utterly maudlin ones. The Association had one original and a couple of long-term members in matching white suits to speed through their handful of hits, as did Jay and the Americans, only with matching dark suits and turtlenecks and a William Shatner doppelganger sounding exactly like Jay Black, so much so I had to reconfirm Jay was really dead and not in disguise. And finally the Turtles, with one original member and a guy from the fucking Archies, intermittently singing and conducting sing-alongs, ending obviously with the tour’s title cut.

I was numb. And done. It was like fucking karaoke night but the crowd ate it up like they ate up the fake ‘60s tour merch and overpriced refreshments during the lengthy intermission necessary to accommodate the also lengthy lines for the bathrooms, with the men’s room line especially slow-moving with many guys getting anxious and agitated. Yes…my evening’s highlight was standing in the lobby during the intermission and enjoying that show.

With that, the tour was over. Nothing wrong with flashing back to the past but the older I get the weirder it gets. Maybe because I don’t feel that old or maybe I just never really left it behind and have brought it along with me to the present.

My wife is right.

But I’m still looking forward to next year’s tour.