I sighed and bought it for ten bucks, put it under my arm, went looking for Thomas. I spotted him near the wall to the left of the stage, glaring furiously at the band.

“You were right, they fucking suck,” Thomas said.

“They’re actually better than I thought they’d be,” I said. I did think that, but I mostly wanted to contradict him.

He turned his attention to me. “I already have that,” he said, nodding at the record.

“You never see it around, so I figured I should grab it,” I said.

“Right, because rarity is an accurate proxy for significance.”

“I’m with capitalism on that one, yeah.”

Thomas turned his attention back to the stage. “It’s gonna get all fucked up in the pit.”

I put the record on the floor, leaning it against the wall, my carelessness intended as a further misguided rebuke to Thomas, and walked away into the thickening crowd.

“I want to thank all you motherfuckers for keeping it real and keeping real punk the fuck alive,” the lead singer of Class of ’36 said. “This is our last song, it’s about not giving a fuck whether you live or die. Everybody stay safe tonight, look out for each other.”

They started into “Suicide Mission,” and people surged forward, shoving and skanking and, in a few cases, wildly swinging their fists. A skinny guy with a buzz cut caught my eye and gave me a frantic, bobbing thumbs-up. I gave him one back.

“Up, up!” he shouted. He lifted one foot off the ground and pressed his hand into my shoulder. I didn’t understand that he wanted to crowd-surf until he tried to plant his foot in the middle of my leg, at which point I bent down and let him use my thigh for leverage. He stomped down on me and dug his fingers deeper into my shoulder and remained poised in that precarious state until a girl in a tank top crouched under his other foot and hoisted him up onto the heads of the people in front of us, who put their arms up and passed him forward. The guy lay on his back, aloft, and pumped his fist slightly out of time with the lyrics of the chorus:

“I said CHELSEA, I’m not coming back, the smoke is coming in and we’re under attack. It’s a SUICIDE MISSION, there’s no turning back, the flames are getting high and the walls are turning black…”