ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact
As many parents who waited until the Cold War was over to procreate will agree, a recent study confirms their suspicions that the sole reason why their children love 80’s pop is because of Grand Theft Auto: Vice City.
A shiver went down Jenny Cartwright’s spine when she heard the opening riff of “I Ran (So Far Away)” by A Flock of Seagulls scream out of her television after a nonchalant visit to Karrinyup Big W.
That was in 2002, when the planet was still reeling from the collapse of Ansett.
Today, the 58-year-old West Australian recalls the moment when she bought her 12-year-old the video game that dug up those long repressed memories of youth.
“The last time I heard REO Speedwagon, I was bent over a Potts Point table that had a full-length coke-covered mirror on it, which we called a stockbroker’s trough.” she recalled.
“These days, I’d put less icing sugar on a Sunday afternoon sponge cake than what I’d put up my face over the space of a weekend in 1986. That was a long time ago. However, when I bought my son Vice City, that video game, all those memories came back. Of my youth.”
“While my son was running over was people and shooting up that Vice City nightclub to Laura Branigan, I was pumping a grinding on my co-workers from Mojo. Singo had a crush on me. Then I married Steve.” she explained.
Mrs Cartwright’s sentiments were echoed by son Jason, now a full-time 26-year-old Modular Records fan who’s brain is exposed to close to 90 nangs a week. This might also explain his gaming addiction.
He freely admits that his penchant for 80’s synth pop, glam metal and autoerotism began around age 12 when his mother returned from his local Big W with a copy of Vice City to put under the Christmas tree.
“The best was that katana you could slice heads off with,” he said. “You couldn’t do that now, with all this terrorist shit and what-have-you.”
“Then that nightclub you could shoot up or blow it up… I loved ploughing those scooter cunts, too. Fuck the Faggios were shit haha.”
“But yeah nah. I love 80’s pop becasue of Vice City. Pissa.” he said.
