Punk Nostalgia for Hot Buffalo

Why is it that music created in Washington DC in the late 80s reminds
of Buffalo NY circa Summer 2001-3?

Yes, I've been listening to a lot of Rites of Spring lately, the early
Dischord band with members who would go on to form a little band called
FUGAZI. Rites of Spring are pulled taught, propulsive, URGENT,
something I just don't hear in any of the dancey art crap Pitchfork's
been recommending to me every day (yes, sad, I read it every day).
Sample lyrical lines:

"The world is my fuse!"
"Drink deep, it's just a taste, and it might not come again!"
"I believe that if you get it then I might set myself free."

I was introduced to Guy Piccioto's first band via the book Dance of
Days (another ROS reference), the definitive retelling of the DC punk
saga. Its author was visiting a small indie bookshop in Buffalo with
the editor of Punk Planet Dan Sinker for a reading and a book signing.
That week I bought some old Fugazi CDs, started a zine, made giant
activist puppets, and got all excited about turning Buffalo into the
next punk summer youth mecca. Then some anus knocked down 9-11 and we
all had to get lame.

Anyways, Buffalo, summer. Hot stink sweat smell, fat girls, big cars,
green grass, old cemetaries, decaying corner stores, bars open til 4am,
road races and puppies, sweating into my coffee while reading a
McSweeney's book. Wandering past Buff State, down Grant Street, to the
old school Italian market, cool on the subway, hot on the sidewalks,
ink-smears of the local arts weekly staining my arms, Labatt Blue
bottles everywhere. Scribbling manifestos at 4am before the blare of
MTV re-runs, old black men shuffling the streets, dive bars without
names disgorging hipster steam onto asphalt summer tundra.

Is music destined to serve us nothing but nostalgia?