Dropkick Murphys Concert Review

I have blogged previously about the rock punk band Dropkick Murphys. Well, I finally got a chance to see them live.

I should preface my concert review by saying that my only interest in them was that they incorporated the bagpipes into their music. I'm not a fan of this particular kind of music. But I like to think of myself as an open minded individual; after all, I do play a decibel blasting instrument of war and run around in a kilt.

With this in mind, my initial impression of the concert was that it was LOUD! As most concerts are of course. I got there for both of the pre-show acts and I was very impressed by the first act, The Tossers. The Tossers are a Chicago based band that has been around since the early 1990's. They are an Irish punk rock band but the really unique thing that I enjoyed about them was that the started a lot of their songs by speaking the lyrics, so it had a really neat poetry vibe to it. I also loved their energy! I don't think I've ever seen someone play the accordion with so much enthusiasm. Here's a decent clip I found of them on youtube.


The Dropkick Murphys were about what I expected. I've listened to parts of many of their songs. Notice that I said parts, even when I'm listening to their music in the serenity of my home I have trouble making it for a full song.

They played a lot of very intense rock songs. And it was fun to see and hear how they used the bagpipes in their songs. It was amazing how distinctive the bagpipe sound really was. During the first half of their set they pretty much used the bagpipes in every song. It was also great fun watching the crowd, there was a lot of slam dancing and attempts at crowd surfing.

My overall review of them is that after a while, a lot of their songs really started to sound the same to me. They didn't really seem to have a very distinctive "voice" as a group. Writers often distinguish themselves by their writers "voice" and musicians are the same. To me, they just didn't stand out. Bearing in mind of course that I wasn't really a fan of this music in the first place, so I didn't really expect to come away from the concert converted to punk rock.

I much preferred The Tossers and will most certainly be acquiring some of their music in the future. They were energetic and their "voice" was really unique.

So am I glad I went? Yes, of course. I got to see the bagpipes incorporated in a very nontraditional way, and I found a new group!

Pipe on!!