When I began this project, I knew I would record at least one song from my “pre-piano / pre–Kiss Me Goodbye” era, purely for sentimental reasons. My goal was never to assemble a collection of songs I believed were destined for the charts. The point was simpler than that: to finally record the songs that, for whatever reason, still matter to me, and to hear them the way I always imagined they could sound.

Of the early material, “Through the Looking Glass” is the only one you could plausibly argue was worth the effort. The rest are probably best left where they belong: as birdcage lining.

Written at 14 years old in 1985 (a full year before Mechanical Resonance was released, so if you're reading this, Tesla, you're welcome), my original intention was to record it and keep it for my own listening, which many might argue was the correct decision. But when I laid down the intro and played it back for the first time, I burst out laughing. Not because it sounded horrible, as I expected, but because it sounded like a glorious eruption of 1980s, teenage, testosterone-driven, hair-metal chaos.

And it opened the memory floodgates.

This is the only song on the project list that actually saw stage time (and if anyone actually remembers us playing it, I owe you a free can of Aqua Net). It has sweat in it. It has muscle memory in it. It has instrumental lines baked in under stage lights. I still remember Josh's fantastic bass lick running through the intro, Park's laser focus as he hit the solo, and watching the guys play it onstage like it actually mattered. And that's why it matters now. Not because it's a great song. It isn't. But because of what it represents.

I did have some difficult choices to make when I started rebuilding it. We never played it live the way I heard it in my head. Aside from the acoustic guitar part (which we didn't have), I had written an arrangement that exceeded our ability to perform it. More specifically, my ability, a recurring problem throughout my early songwriting career.

The arrangement called for three guitars, which meant I'd have to play one, and at the time I simply couldn't. I tried, but Nathan’s devastatingly accurate assessment of my technique quickly dissuaded me:

“Scott, you are the only person I know who can play a guitar that's in tune and make it sound like it's out of tune.”

Even beyond that, the second rhythm guitar was a nasty mix of syncopated sustains and palm mutes that only Malcolm Young could possibly pull off.

This isn't bragging, mind you. It's criticism. Writing music that only a computer or an absolute master can play isn't necessarily exceptional songwriting. Sometimes it's just bad writing with excessive ambition. And when the person responsible for that ambition can barely play the damn guitar, the problem becomes considerably worse.

So what ended up onstage was a highly simplified version, and that created a dilemma: should I record the version we actually played, or the version I always heard in my head?

Once I reminded myself why I was doing this at all, to take songs that had existed only in my private imagination and finally hear them in reality, the answer became clear. I needed to record what was intended. That was the version I had never heard.

But when I finished recording the studio version, I realized something was still missing. And no matter how much I tinkered with it, it just didn't feel right. Then it struck me what was absent.

This one was meant to be played live, with all the energy, chopped notes, sweat, and havoc that goes with it. The studio recording finally captured the arrangement I'd imagined, but it couldn't recreate the experience of standing onstage with those four guys and letting the whole thing rip.

But how does one accomplish that? It's not like the five of us are ever likely to play together again.

Well… if I can generate an entire orchestra on the computer, surely I can generate a crowd and a couple of explosions. And so the second version was born: a live performance that never actually happened, assembled to capture the sound, energy, and atmosphere of the concert I wish we'd been able to give.

And perhaps it is most fitting this way. Just as we never played the song the way I recorded it… we should have. And just as the live performance never really happened… it should have too.

So, for Park, Nate, Jim, and Josh: this is my final labor of love for you guys. I will cherish you always. And with this recording, you can finally hear what I meant when I said, “No, no… it goes: jut, jut, jut, ka-chack, jut, WAAAA.”