There was a time when I lived in an apartment with a backyard instead of a beer drenched, glass spattered alleyway. During that fruitful era it was more than common practice for a formidable group of youngsters to gather every Friday night for the consumption of beer and hamburgers and the rare giant pork product, courtesy of Bare, that resembled the mortal "hot dog" in only the most peripheral of senses. It was commonplace to drag whatever CD player Jerry had appropriated from his Step-Dad outside so we could blast lo-fi video game techno and retarded screeching Japanese girl music for the whole of West Philadelphia to hear. On occasion a mix like this would come up and we would have no recourse. Full of nine or ten beers, the lot of us would stumble inside lugging our propane tanks behind us and plop down in front of the Dreamcast to play until dawn. Eventually playing mixes like Rayza's would become less of a happenstance and more of a requirement, until there was nothing but one CD and no game was played on that Dreamcast save Streets of Rage 2.

There was another time, when a man who now seems to be my roommate in name only, Jon Skabla, actually lived with us. During those fruitful days I would scamper home sometime around 3:00 or 4:00 in the afternoon. Skabs would exit his room with aplomb and call down the hall "Dave, do you know what time it is?" I would reply, tentatively, "3:30? 3:35?" to which Skabla, always the master of the non-sequitur, would retort, "No bitch! It's Streets of Rage time!" With beers in hand and not a thought in my mind to the early hour, I would gleefully plop myself down on the couch while Skabla booted up the old Dreamcast.

Those days of drunken revelry are gone now, and sometimes I miss them. Skabla, though he still pays rent, apparently likes homework and sex too much to do anything but work on his Senior animation project and live in his girlfriend's apartment, which is conspicuously closer to his college. It's times like this that I can do nothing but sit down and soak in the nostalgia... Rayza, ever the gentleman, submits me to a soothing melody that wipes all impure thoughts from my mind.

What we have here is an absolute jam session. Until 0'46 the mix is unbearably slow, so slow that you might think I'm wasting your time. Not so! This is just the cool down for things to come. Once that breaking point is reached the session of 0'46 - 1'18 is nothing but funky bass and funkier piano. Along the way more and more synth action is expressed until 1'48 when the bass is given quite awhile to shine on its own. The siren comes in at 2'09 and kicks your ass for ten seconds until the horrendous beast that is the piano can be roused from its slumber to take you on home.

But Could I Drive To This?: If you're anything like myself, or Skabla, or anyone else in the crew, the time you'll be listening to this song is after you've imbibed more than your fair share of alcohol. As such, no, you probably should not be driving will listening to this song. However, if you so desire... I would prefer you did so with a little black boy in roller skates riding on your back. Now that's style!