Fucked Up -- David Comes to Life

I was an earlyish reader of Pitchfork, having discovered it in 1997 or so. It'd be nice to be able to say I stopped reading it regularly after it became too hip for its own good but that wasn't the case; mostly it was because--and this is what I think all Great Music Lovers like me fear--at some point it really seemed as though music, in any genre, had passed me by. Things very rarely connected with me in the way they had in my teens and twenties. (For instance, in 1997 I could've given you a list of the ten best albums of that year. In 2007, I couldn't even have named ten albums that came out in 2007.) It wasn't that Pitchfork's hipster attitude had become too much for me--it's that it (and more importantly, hipsterism generally) had lost me.

Yet I still checked in with Pitchfork occasionally if for no other reason than to see what the kids were up to these days. One day in late 2011 there was a link to a band named 'Fucked Up' performing the entirety of their latest album, which had apparently landed with some acclaim. Given the band's name I was interested enough to give it a click.

I don't want to say it changed my life but I'll say this: if I had been 17 instead of 37 when I clicked that link, there's a good chance it would've.

My previous experience with hardcore was as a Beltway Insider. That is to say, I wasn't a purist so much as I was a nationalist. That's probably what saved Fucked Up for me as I don't know--but am certain--they're hated by people more heavily invested in hardcore, hardcore being one of the most supremely conservative musical genres.

This is a concept album but to tell the truth I have paid little attention to the concept, or, indeed, to a large extent, the lyrics. On cursory examination the whole project comes across as almost too sincere...watch, if you can, the nearly overpoweringly twee video for "Queen of Hearts":
Yet to my ear it works, not unlike Aeroplane. What makes it work could be that it's different and new, more than anything else, and maybe new was what I needed in 2011. Hardcore literally hasn't changed in thirty years and then some (Canadian, no less) indie outfit with their indie outfits (h/t JN) comes along and plunks a giant, sweaty, hairy, screaming dude in front, and it works. It works.

Best Song
I'll go with "Running on Nothing".

Released
June 6, 2011.

Acquired
Never acquired. The poverty induced by both student loans and children coming due means that since 2008 or so I listen to most new music on Spotify or the like. It was maybe six months after release that I heard it in its entirety.

Next Closest
You should listen to Minor Threat's Complete Discography and you should listen to The Bad Brains' first album and then you should come talk to me about how ridiculous it is to call this album 'hardcore' and then I'll say "you're probably right" and then we'll talk about something else.

Brush with Greatness (note: may include name-dropping):
None.