Las Vegas Weekly

February 7, 2009 · 2:34 PM

It’s been a rough week

By Melissa Arseniuk

It’s been a rough week: First off, I’ve been sick. Secondly, as I slept through the Super Bowl, my best friend from high school gave birth to a baby girl – talk about a reality check. Twenty-four hours later and still running a fever, my boyfriend and I broke up and I became increasingly convinced the whole marriage thing just isn’t going to happen to me. Then, the next day, I grew another year older.

It’s becoming obvious that I’m a mere hop, skip and a jump (and a few felines) away from being crowned “crazy cat lady.” Indeed, this is what I have to look forward to – even though I hate cats.

The icing on the cake, however, came last night when I saw the lead singer of one of my favorite bands from the ‘90s play cover songs at Wasted Space.

Granted, the cold and flu are going around; my girlfriend is happily married and happily doing the whole grown-up, real-life thing; the break-up was a long time coming, so good riddance; and the birthday, too, was taken in stride, but to see one of the rock ‘n roll heroes of my youth reduced to a cover song-singing shell of the rocker he once was? That was almost too much.

Suddenly, I felt old.

(OK, so I know I’m not really old – and I refuse to truly apply that title to myself for at least another five years or so. But it is somewhat shocking to be faced with the reality that you’re not exactly young anymore, either.)

Some background: The Age of Electric got their start in 1993 and peaked in the late ‘90s. They officially broke up in 1999 and I hadn’t heard much about them since, so it was somewhat surprising to learn that the lead guitarist and singer, Todd Kerns, had, like myself, made the pilgrimage to Las Vegas.

Kerns now heads up the Sin City Sinners, and last night I saw the group play their standing Thursday night gig at Wasted Space.

I’m not going to lie: It kind of made me want to cry.

It wasn’t that the band was bad – they’re actually pretty solid. Their set was tight and the crowd really got into it.

But I realized Kerns, too, is more solid than I remember – he’s certainly not starving, judging from his thicker-that-I-remember physique – but I guess that’s a sign of his success and should be considered a good thing.

Still, he is older, fatter and less attractive – and, I realized, so am I.

Suddenly I couldn’t help but think about all that has changed in the last 10 years. It was like a rollercoaster retrospective, culminating with me standing, alone, at Wasted Space watching as Todd Kerns belted out Def Leopard and Lynyrd Skynyrd.

I confess, I used to pull out old Age of Electric CDs from time to time, just to give myself a fun blast from the past. While I haven’t done so in a while, I hoped to get a live musical stroll down memory lane last night – but no such luck.

Instead of “Remote Control” (AOE’s biggest hit from back in the day) I got “Pour Some Sugar on Me.” And while I would’ve loved to hear “Ugly” (AOE’s break-out song from 1993), I was instead treated to more classic rock revival.

Suddenly it hit me: I’m no spring chicken anymore. All my favorite bands have broken up, my friends are getting married and having babies, and I’m getting crows feet.

But despite the 10 years that have passed and all the additional candles on our respective birthday cakes, Kerns still wears tighter jeans and more black eyeliner than I do.

That has to be worth something, right?

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