Sid Stills' Blues (Three-Quarters in the Bag in Alphabet City) is a 2011 story written by shukyou and illustrated by serenity_winner, originally published in the zine Shousetsu Bang*Bang in issue 34.
Sid Stills is a sixty-one-year-old jaded musician who hasn't released any music in fifteen years. He is content with fading away into obscurity until he meets one of his fans, Nathan Vaughn, the twenty-five-year old former lead singer of a pop punk band who is now embarking on a solo career. Slowly, Sid realizes that maybe he still has something left to offer the world.
It can be read here
. It was also published in e-book format under the name Whitney Bishop.
Sid Stills' Blues (Three-Quarters in the Bag in Alphabet City) contains examples of:
- Big Applesauce: The story takes place in Manhattan, where Sid lives. One of Sid's songs is called "Times Fucking Square", which is about how much Times Square has changed over the years.
- Closet Gay: Nathan didn't want anyone to know that he liked men. This led to the breakup of his band, as when he broke up with a man he was dating in secret, the man told one of his bandmates, Jason, who didn't take the fact that Nathan had kept it a secret well.
- Concert Climax: Sid goes to Nathan's concert, where they perform a duet of one of Sid's songs.
- Definitely Just a Cold: When Sid starts coughing, he initially brushes it off. It turns out that he has lung cancer.
- Experienced Protagonist: Sid is a famous musician who has been making music for more than thirty years, although he is basically retired at the start of the story and his fame has dimmed somewhat.
- Faux Yay: Discussed. Jason, one of Nathan's old bandmates, wanted to do stage gay to excite the girls in the audience. Since Nathan actually liked men (and loved Jason), he refused. Sid has trouble understanding the concept, since pretending to be gay on stage and being straight off of it is the exact opposite of how it was in the past.
- Forced Out of the Closet: Nathan's ex-boyfriend outed him to his bandmate Jason, leading to the breakup of the band.
- Good Morning, Crono: The story begins with Sid being woken up by a phone call from his agent wanting him to watch a YouTube video of a musician named Nathan Vaughn doing a cover of one of his songs.
- Humble Hero: Sid thinks he's just an old has-been and doesn't understand at first how popular he still is. When he meets Nathan's new bandmates, he checks behind him because he can't believe that they're so surprised and excited to see him.
- Jade-Colored Glasses: Sid used to be a carefree musician but has become jaded and cynical in his later years, not having released any new music in more than a decade and becoming reclusive. He views himself as an old has-been who has worn out his musical usefulness and is not very famous anymore, and is surprised at how excited younger people are to meet him. He is so convinced that he has nothing left to offer the world that he is prepared to simply let his lung cancer kill him.
- May–December Romance: Sixty-one-year-old Sid enters into a romantic relationship with Nathan, who is twenty-five.
- Real Award, Fictional Character: The main character, Sid wins a Grammy at the end of the story for "Best Alternative Music Album".
- The Voice: Damn Agent (Sid's music agent, real name Randall) never physically appears. He communicates with Sid entirely through phone calls.
