Dropkick Murphys of Boston, Massachusetts are one of (if not the) biggest not-so-Irish folk-rock band to ever grace our stages and on an unsuspecting, Wednesday night. Bristol’s O2 Academy played host to these party animals on their ‘Signed and Sealed in Blood‘ tour with support from the legitimately Irish, Blood Or Whiskey and psychedelic US rockers, The Bots! Kicking off the night were six-piece celtic rock band Blood Or Whiskey, from Dublin. Now, we fell victim to the mother of all traffic jams on the way to Bristol, despite leaving 2 hours early and unfortunately missed the majority of this promising opening act’s set, however as we wandered into the packed auditorium, we did manage to catch their ending track and judging by the chanting circle of fans, dancing uncontrollably to the party-folk rock, we’d say they’ve warmed up the stage quite nicely. The band take their influences from the likes of The Clash, The Pogues, Dexy’s Midnight Runners and The Dubliners and have a fourth studio album Tell The Truth and Shame The Devil available now.
Credit: Heidi-Charlotte MurrayNext up were one of Zane Lowe‘s favourite up and coming bands of this year, The Bots. Hailing from Los Angeles, brothers and band mates Mikaiah Lei (lead vocal, guitar and bass) and Anaiah Lei (drums and backing vocal) recorded their first album together when they were just 15 and 12. Their distinctive sound of garage punk, merged with rock and roll and American blues gives them a unique hold on the music industry and is sure to take them in leaps in bounds. Watching this explosive duo silence a full auditorium and deliver a performance both psychedelic and euphoric but equally heavy, distorted and gritty, these two blew us away with their originality and expertise.
Headliners Dropkick Murphys came storming onto the stage with an appropriate rendition of ‘The Boys Are Back’, the first track of their 2013 album, ‘Signed and Sealed in Blood’. The crowd, made up of people from all walks of life, from young teenagers with their parents to mod’s, rockers, ladies in gowns and gentlemen in waistcoats, went understandably wild for the introduction for what was set to be a memorable performance, one that the Murphy’s never cease to deliver! These infamous folk-rockers, who also take their inspirations from the likes of The Clash, as well as Stiff Little Fingers, AC/DC and Bruce Springsteen, wowed the excitable crowd with tracks ranging from ‘Citizen CIA‘, taken from one of their earlier albums The Warrior’s Code in 2005, to the more well-known tracks such as ‘Rose Tattoo‘, ‘Johnny I Hardly Knew You‘ and of course ‘Shipping Up To Boston‘. From beginning to end, there was at least one circle of dedicated and most probably drunk fans, holding down the party fort in each corner of the auditorium, not to mention one brave lad who even climbed up the outside of the staircase just because well, why not?! Featuring a live bagpipe player at numerous points across the evening only made this insane performance that much more enjoyable and as the show began to pull to a close, how else would you bid farewell to a crowd, than singing in the face of the person next to you, ‘Kiss Me, I’m Shitfaced‘. All members of the Murphy’s invited the ladies of the crowd to join them on stage for this particular track, inspiring the tightly packed in crowd to literally grab the closest person to them and jive their whiskey-fuelled hearts out. Ending on ‘Skinhead On The MTBA‘ as they always do, after an almighty encore that trailed on for at least 15 minutes, the uproar of the crowd was electric to say the least and the perfect way to end an otherwise average Wednesday! Boasting the motto “The power of your example is far greater than what you say” Dropkick Murphys truly set the highest example for performers everywhere! A show like none other is quite the understatement but it’s all we’ve got.
