So you’ll aim toward the sky
And you’ll rise high today
Fly away
Far away
Far from pain

It’s like Jason Lytle saw it coming, more than 17 years ago, as Sophtware Slump trailed off with such a melancholic beauty. Of course we all see it, know it: Mortality is right there, eye-to-eye with us. But when news broke that Grandaddy bassist and co-founder, Kevin Garcia had died on May 2 after a massive stroke, it was still unbelievable. On the brink of the band’s broadest-scale reunion? With a family he loved and a bass guitar perpetually over his shoulder?

Just an outrage, an injustice, but nothing short of a tragic rupture for his family. And for the band. As for the family, they live on. There’s a GoFundMe campaign for them as they retool for a completely different world than they knew Monday morning. As for the last minutes of Sophtware Slump: It’s never had greater meaning for the Grandaddy family. Alas.