Dropkick Murphys St Patrick's Day 2023 Tour Review

After long hard winters, everyone anxiously anticipates the arrival of Spring.

Recently, there’s no better indication of warmth coming than The Dropkick Murphys starting their pilgrimage up the eastern seaboard for the annual St. Patrick’s Day tour, which ends with a series of shows in Boston.

Last night, the third show on the tour took them to the wonderfully quirky Jannus Live. It’s a great outdoor venue, which is essentially a courtyard surrounded by increasingly taller buildings in downtown St Petersburgh, Florida. If last night’s usually warm early March temperatures combined with a smoking hot performance are any indication, Boston will undoubtedly feel hotter in a couple of weeks.

I’ve seen the Dropkick Murphys five or six times, and last night's show was a bit different. While GenX is often considered the forgotten generation, it seemed a GenX membership card was required last night to gain entry. Many of us, including me, brought our kids, which I love seeing.

And for the second year in a row, the band was without vocalist Al Barr, who is caring for a sick parent. But, again, Ken Casey didn’t skip a beat as lead singer. Constantly darting across the stage with frantic teenage energy, Casey strives to ensure the audience has a blast and simultaneously makes sure we understand the gravity of many of the messages.

Firmly sitting atop the Celtic punk genre, the Dropkick Murphys produce sound from accordions, bagpipes, and banjos that god never intended those instruments to make and combines them with punk guitar riffs and a rapid tempo rhythm section.

And that’s precisely how the show started, kicking off the 25-song set with the family plight in the fast tempo of The State of Massachusetts, immediately followed by the trouble-making anthem The Boys are Back.

Approaching a career of nearly 30 years, the Dropkick Murphys have plenty of hits, but they are unapologetically enthusiastic about playing new and even unreleased songs. Nine songs came from 2021 Turn up that Dial and the recently released This Machine Still Kills the Fascists, an acoustic country album comprised of unused Woodie Guthrie lyrics collected by his daughter. The album's title is a slogan Guthrie used to write on his guitars, and the Dropkick Murphys connection to him dates back to arguably their biggest hit, 2005’s I’m Shipping Up to Boston, which also includes lyrics from Guthrie.

Casey called out statements from “haters” that This Machine is too far a departure for the band since acoustic can’t be punk. He continued that he doesn’t know what the Dropkick Murphys are other than crafters of protest songs. And be it acoustic or electric, protest music is punk.

And these were the themes from tonight's Dropkick Murphys show. Skin Head’s on the MTA. Johnny, I Hardly Knew Ya’s drugs and guns and gun and drugs. The struggles of labor in The Worker’s Song and Boys on the Dock. First Class Loser. The pain of relationships expressed in a Rose Tattoo.

The overall vibe of the Dropkick Murphys is best summarized with a Guthrie lyric from The Last One, “How can you worship the rich man who sees poor folks and refuses them.”

The Dropkick Murphys will never forget their roots, sons of Irish American immigrants living on the streets of Boston. It oozes out of them with every lyric. And as such, Casey told the crowd not only how proud he is of their background but what he views as a responsibility to lift and support all immigrants in this country.

The night ended with the tongue and cheek bar anthem Kiss Me I’m Shitfaced.

A nearly 30-year career is a long time in the music business. No one is getting super rich playing 2000-person venues at $45 a ticket.

But there’s a definite sense that the Dropkick Murphys love what they do, and as long as they continue touring, we’ll keep our GenX membership up to date and help The Dropkick Murphys continue to sell out these shows. Hopefully, more of us will bring our kids next year!

For this year’s show, The Dropkick Murphy’s replicated last year’s open act, which included Australian Celtic punk rockers The Rumjacks and Boston-based one-man band touring musician Jesse Ahern. And again, both were perfect editions to the evening.

Here’s the full setlist:

The State of Massachusetts

The Boys Are Back

Famous for Nothing

Mick Jones Nicked My Pudding

The Warrior's Code

Good as Gold

All You Fonies

Middle Finger

Cadillac, Cadillac

Barroom Hero

Turn Up That Dial

Two 6's Upside Down

The Bonny (Gerry Cinnamon cover)

The Last One

Skinhead on the MBTA

Johnny, I Hardly Knew Ya

First Class Loser

I Know How It Feels

Dirty Old Town (Ewan MacColl cover)

I'm Shipping Up to Boston

Dig a Hole

Worker's Song

Rose Tattoo

Boys on the Docks

Kiss Me, I'm Shitfaced