A former Hell’s Kitchen nightclub on the western edge of Manhattan, Terminal 5 has more in common aesthetically with a Nine Inch Nails music video set or a serial killer’s “workshop” than it does with a concert venue. In fact, I can remember trekking there for the first time late one night to see some indie-rock-band-of-the-moment four years ago, clutching my female companion tightly while silently praying “Please don’t rape us… Please don’t rape us…” as we passed each menacing stranger. Though my unfounded anxiety surrounding the neighborhood has since subsided, trekking to Terminal 5 last week to see Dinosaur Jr. perform led to an evening as pleasantly disorienting as my first exhilarating concert experience inside this cold, industrial warehouse three years ago.

I walked through the doors to the Dino Jr. event to find the place packed primarily with the predictable: white guys in their late 20s to early 40s, plenty of ripped jeans, and more than one Hüsker Dü t-shirt. It would appear that most of the attendees were there for some essential (yet arguably mediocre) alt rock from a few old legends way past their prime. But when opening band Fucked Up took the stage, it became clear that this wasn’t Dinosaur Jr.’s show.

If you’ve never heard of Fucked Up before, it’s an experimental Canadian hardcore band. If you’ve never heard their music, it’s a scream-drenched blend of frenetic post-hardcore and hardcore punk, intermittently punctuated by sugary sweet melodies sung with disillusionment. And, if you’ve never seen them live, it’s a meteor shower of lollipops and kicks to the face.

The spectacle that is Fucked Up is difficult and easy to categorize at the same time: what they’re offering is something entirely novel, yet the amalgamation of all things familiar. Visually, the band resembles a tween power-pop quintet fronted by a giant, hairy, half-naked bulldog. With the help of one stone-faced security guard (author’s interpretive thought bubble: “What the fuck is wrong with these white kids?”), singer Damian Abraham (aka “Pink Eyes”) thread his microphone cable through the raised arms of fans and performed the entire show from the moshpit-turned-hugpit in the center of the venue. Frantic teens literally clawed their way through others just to touch their (in any other context, repulsive) idol: a shirtless, sweaty bear-of-a-man, continually barreling through charged up kids and jaded veteran grunge fans alike. He returned his followers’ gratitude wholeheartedly, handing the mic over to anyone gesturing for a chance to scream along to the music.

At the end of the performance, Abraham got back on stage and called to a roadie for the t-shirt he abandoned only seconds before shouting his first lyrics of the night. He then threw it into the now-rabid front row, and young men and women actually fought for it (which, I can only assume, must have smelled at best like homelessness and cheese). The band walked off, and Abraham delved back into the crowd to take photos and administer hugs for another 15 minutes as Dinosaur Jr.’s team set up.

I had been interested in Fucked Up ever since the release of their Polaris Prize-winning second album, The Chemistry of Common Life — but after seeing them live, I was now less sure than ever that they’re not warping the traditional hardcore genre for irony’s sake, bastardizing a purer form of music for consumption by the pop masses. Or worse, I thought, what if they’ve been manufactured – the shoegazing majority of the band carefully manicured to contrast the image of their heavily tattooed and fearless singer to sell more concert tickets? And should we take their moniker at face value, the use of expletive rebelliously serving as a slap in the face to mainstream culture – or can there be any truth to the fantasy of this cynical old bastard, that their name was manipulatively created by corporate music industry-types with exactly that thought in mind: “Let’s name them something ‘counter-culture’ to make it seem cooler. That’ll sell records to those kids.”?? Is this some giant fucking conspiracy being fed to us by 21st century tastemakers like Pitchfork.com and the A.V. Club,?!? AM I BEING USED LIKE A PAWN???

Probably not. I do believe that Fucked Up is an organic amalgamation of real people, creating music out of honest passion for multiple genres and aesthetics. And witnessing them perform on a bill hosted by Henry Rollins, the man who helped pave the way for post-hardcore headliner Dinosaur Jr., suggests that they could be the next true wave of hardcore for the Internet Generation.

Purists may long for a still-active hardcore band to connect generations the way the Rolling Stones or Paul Simon do, but the fact of the matter is that senior citizens can’t keep up with angry music. Most hardcore vets either turn the volume of their music down, and/or turn to alternative forms of expression such as production, writing, or public speaking (e.g. Rollins, Jello Biafra, etc.); the others, such as Keith Morris (Black Flag founding father and member of OFF!, third band on the Dino Jr. bill), simply can’t physically deliver what a hardcore show requires. At Terminal 5, Morris often seemed tired and uninspired, failing to connect with the crowd over topics such as “people who use cell phones while driving” — a rant which seemed better suited for 2002. Morris’ early work is undeniably important, and even his new music is vital, but his live show simply won’t convert any new believers to the Church of Hardcore. We need fresh blood.

Fucked Up’s dichotomous vision of “Heaven onstage, Hell in the pit” is incredibly unique. Label them commercial opportunists or hardcore revolutionaries, but don’t ever label them unoriginal. They have undeniably created something refreshingly new and terrifyingly exciting, and ultimately, it doesn’t matter if you like their music or not – you need to see Fucked Up live simply because you’ve never seen anything like them before.

Fucked Up Live @ Terminal 5 - 6/23/11:

Click HERE to visit Fucked Up on MySpace