Jeff was prepared for the con. He was prepared to walk the Tokyo streets until sunrise. He was even prepared to lose a good amount of money at Pachinko, but he was not prepared for this. Conversation, not only with a girl (her name was Erika, apparently), but with a girl clutching her own custom RPOT pillow of Blue. He couldn’t even remember how he had found the courage to strike up a conversation, or the talent to carry it, he just knew he didn’t want it to end, and whether he knew it or not, neither did she.
Here’s something that makes me nostalgic:
Nostalgia is probably the most important song on the entire album for two key reasons:
First, it acts as a turning point for Jeff. Up until this point, he’s been stuck in a sort of routine that he’s always followed when coming to Tokyo. From losing at Pachinko, to hitting up the beach, to being a loser at Pai Con, these are all things he’s done before. Meeting Erika breaks that cycle, turns his from a passive character to an active one (when they decide to do something unheard of and leave the con that they just flew across the globe for), and opens both of them up to something bigger. He’s not aware of it yet, but he’s found the thing that he was looking for on Neon Night.
Second, Nostalgia is the song that essentially gave me the idea for the concept of Pop City. Despite being a little ironic, Nostalgia, at least at that point, was probably the most straightforward and emotionally vulnerable song I had ever written. Granted, I’m singing in character, but the delivery and feeling behind it, for the first time in the RP catalog, is sort of genuine and earnest. Pop City in general, and ESPECIALLY in the back half becomes progressively more emotionally honest, and I don’t think I would have opened myself up to that kind of writing without Nostalgia.
For all that emotional weight, I actually got the initial idea for the production sound of the song from Catalina Breeze by The Blue Jean Committee. Go figure.
Flash back
To twenty o three
To you and to me
With nothing that we rather would do
Than come home to see
A flickering screen
With all our favorite anime and cartoons
I don’t need the details of your life
The things you did
Just tell me all the TV shows
That you watched as a kid
Doo
Doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo
Share your Nostalgia with me
Doo
Doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo
Share your Nostalgia with me
We lived
A boy and a girl
In fantasy worlds
With our animated friends every day
Now we’re face to face
And so out of place
Because we’re running out of things we can say
I don’t need the details of your life
The things you did
Just tell me all the TV shows
That you watched as a kid
Doo
Doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo
Share your Nostalgia with me
Doo
Doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo
Share your Nostalgia with me
Talking with another person’s oh so hard to do
Try to think up things to say original or new
Plots and show synopses keep on coming out my mouth
We really need some subs to help us figure all this out
So much
We probably could share
But somehow we’re scared
Our time together might just come to an end
If you’ll stick around
For more common ground
I’ll gladly talk about Toonami again
I don’t need the details of your life
The things you did
Just tell me all the TV shows
That you watched as a kid
Doo
Doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo
Share your Nostalgia with me
Doo
Doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo
Share your Nostalgia with me
Tell us what you think of the song!