Issue 506

The Dropkick Murphys The Dropkick Murphy's lead singer Al Barr wants to clear the air about a few things; first of all, he isn't Irish, and his band have never said they were Irish. While they may have enjoyed the majority of their success in recent years from 2007's 'The Meanest Of Times', after their single I'm Shipping Up To Boston was used by everyone from The Simpsons to Martin Scorsese and the AFL; Barr is eager to dispel the notion that their Celtic roots is the defining feature of the Massachusetts punks. "It's the same thing for you, if you came to the States and somebody introduced you as being from Australia, and somebody said 'Oh, let me go get you some Fosters and we'll watch Crocodile Dundee.' You'd say 'Well, where I'm from no one fuckin' drinks Fosters!' That's the first thing you learn when you get to Australia, you won't see anyone with a Foster's thank god! "What happened was, when the band started to use bagpipes, people started to use that to identify us. I'm not Irish, I'm Scottish and I'm not from Boston, I'm from New Hampshire. There are guys in the band who have Irish heritage, and we're all proud of our heritage, but we're all Americans. We get people criticising us, saying things like 'I'm sick of people pretending to be Irish, it's bullshit and they're lying.' Well, I've got new for you, I'm fucking sick of people as well who say thing to us like 'Oh, your favourite film must be Boomdock Saint, and you must drink a lot of Guinness and wear Irish pyjamas to bed.' Of course, we're steeped in Irish tradition and we take a lot from music of the old country, but we also take from American folk music, like Woodie Guthrie. It's just circumstance which has built this stereotype, and don't get me wrong, it's gotten us a lot of attention, but we don't use it as our defining feature and we've never tried to. Our music is more about the comradery we exude, not this misplaced focus." So with that out of the way, the band are on their way as one of the headline acts for No Sleep Til, which will be touring Australia for this first time this December. It's an eclectic line up in the sense that it's bringing bands like Megadeth, Alkaline Trio, Gwar and Parkway Drive alongside the likes of The Murphys and NOFX, but Barr is still very impressed with the company he'll be keeping around the country. "We just did the Warped tour where the bands weren't really my cup of tea; the 20 something bands like 'Save My Hairdo', and that's not to put them down, it just wasn't my thing. But to be on the bill with these bands, I mean Megadeth; whatever, but The Descendents and NOFX, Me First & The Gimmie's are great and Frenzal Rhomb, we've know those guys for years so seeing them again will be great. We'll see who's going to swing the first punch," he laughs. Enduring for over 15 years now, The Dropkick Murphys are reaching the time in their career where family has begun to take precedent over touring, but at the same time, Barr confirms that the band is unlikely to slow down anytime in the near future; they're still taken aback by the interest they receive and the staying power of their music, which is something he assures me has never been a considered or calculated factor of the band's music. "When 'The Meanest Of Times' Came out in '07 I went over to Europe to do press on my own actually because everyone else had something to do, funnily. That's the same when it comes to doing press in Australia; everyone else is unavailable. But seriously, when I went over there what struck me was in the first three interviews that I did were with guys who were all 25, 26 years old and each of them had been listening to us since we were teenagers, for about ten years. That's crazy to me, because when I look at the music I listened to as a teen there might be a few bands that I still listen to but in general, a band in our genre doesn't have that staying power. So for us to be able to still have people with us after so many years, that's a pretty special thing. Why we have that, I don't know? I couldn't explain that. I think has something to do with our guitar players because they're really good looking. And in honesty, I'm not saying that our popularity will grow and we'll ever become a mega band or anything, but I can see us still going, like when I'm 50, and maybe not touring but still playing shows, writing songs and that." The Dropkick Murphys are at No Sleep Til, coming to the Adelaide Entertainment Centre of Wed 15 Dec. Their latest album 'Live On Lansdowne, Boston MA' is still out (and has been since March 19 this year) through Dew Process. By Ryan Winter