12 juillet 1992.

Twenty years (and a few extra moments) ago , I was at the Québec Agora. I was sixteen. It was a beautiful day and the setting sun had a greenish hue, because in memories, colors fade and change. A slight breeze blew from the river, but we did not care, because that night, that night, it was special. I recall the overwhelming trepidation. I can still smell the crowd, the excitement and the spicy smell of the remnants of the afternoon sun on our skins. It was Indochine in concert, July 12, 1992. That night, I lost my silver graduation ring, the one my mother had paid $110 for.

A colleague lent me a DVD yesterday, the show at Stade de France in June 2010, where the crowd roars and pumps its collective fist in the air, chanting the lyrics Nicolas Sirkis is crooning from the vertiginous stage, almost surreal. I have just been, after barely three songs, catapulted back twenty years. It takes a lot to do that.

Twenty years ago, I think Sirkis was the first man to make me feel that twinge, that slight twisting of the groin. The first instant where, while listening to the melody, the lyrics, the breathlessness caught me unaware. Question marks rolling around: what does that mean? Where does it come from? Indochine as a whole, but more specifically their lyrics, their music, were very sexual to me, and still are to this day, I realize. Maybe Paul McCartney did this for my mom, when she was sixteen. Huh. I'd rather not go there. ;)