Each Friday I pick a song–new, old, borrowed, blue–that’s been on my mind and in my ears, and write a short post about it.

This is “Rise Above” by Black Flag:

This week I went to see Flag, which is a kind of revival of Black Flag formed by guys who were once in Black Flag.  You can read more about them here. It’s hard to overestimate how important Black Flag is to the culture of rock music in the United States and to punk rock in particular.  The Atlantic published a good assessment of Black Flag’s legacy back in June, which you can read here. One of the great things about the Flag show on Tuesday was just how much fun Dez and Chuck and Bill and Keith and Stephen seemed to be having, old guys performing these old songs for other old (and young) guys (and a few women), who were stage diving and crowd surfing and singing along. There’s a risk, in this kind of show, of the whole thing becoming an exercise in nostalgia or cynical moneymaking, but the guys in Flag hurdled those obstacles and made their revival into exactly what it should be: joy.