Dropkick Murphys, The Briggs, The Tossers – Live (Nov. 9th, 2007)

Dropkick Murphys, The Briggs and The Tossers all together in one night of pure chaotic glory? The show was easily poised to be one of the more memorable shows of 2007; so much so that it was sold out weeks in advance and people were desperately searching for extra tickets hours before doors opened. If they were able to scavenge up some tickets they were lucky, because anyone who missed the show definitely missed out.

After local openers Run Runners finished their energetic set, Chicago’s Celtic punk rockers The Tossers hit the stage, set to play a wide selection of songs from their entire catalogue. Opening up with the raucous Goodmornin’ Da, the band played mostly their high energy tracks, successfully getting the pit moving along with them. With very little said in between songs other than the occasional “Cheers!” and song explanation, The Tossers just stuck with the music; switching from No Loot, No Booze, No Fun to Siobhan and Where Ya Been Johnny? without any hesitation. The addition of Altercations got the crowd singing “Fuck The Police!” back at them while the inclusion of the three minute instrumental The Sheep In The Boots toned it down a bit too. Despite not doing anything extraordinary with their thirty minute time slot, they did not fail to entertain at all with their more traditional take on Celtic Punk and those in the crowd who hadn’t known them before were sure to remember their name in the future.

Next came up LA’s The Briggs and even now, a good twenty hours since seeing them hit the stage, I’m still in awe. It has been far too long since I’ve seen a performance like the one they put on last night. Tearing up the stage for a solid forty five minutes, the band was frantic, engaging and energetic. They jumped into the crowd, climbed on the speakers, crowd surfed and pulled the fans close towards them. They rarely, if ever, took a moment’s rest and instead crammed as many songs as possible into their set. Opening up with One Shot Down, the band played through songs like Back To Higher Ground, Keep Us Alive, Third World War, Dead Men (Don’t Tell Tales), Song of Babylon, Wasting Time, Waiting In The Shadows, and Song For Us. Within no time the band, and the crowd, were drenched in sweat. The band had no gimmicks up their sleeve, other than the urging for the crowd participation of “woooaah!,” and they didn’t need any either as the music and intensity had the crowd under their control anyway. It was one of the most memorable shows I’ve seen in a while and a band I would rush out to see again if the opportunity arose and I’d urge anyone to do the same. Once the band finished up Bored Teenagers and left the stage, I couldn’t help but think to myself that if the show was to end right there I would have been happy. It was just that good of a set, I don’t know how else to explain it.

But of course, The Briggs weren’t there to end the show, but to warm the crowd up for Boston’s almighty Dropkick Murphys who took the stage after a twenty or so minute set change. The band stepped into Famous For Nothing and the crowd was instantly awash with movement and knew what to expect for the evening. Just like always, the band filled the stage with members and excitement. They sounded good and even brought out a piano on the stage for the inclusion of songs like Tessie. Tthe only downside of the evening was that Al Barr’s vocals were a little muffled throughout the set, something that normally doesn’t happen for them.

The band focused mainly on newer material like God Willing, (F)lannigan’s Ball, The State Of Massachusetts but also dipped into some older cuts like Wild Rover, Heroes From Our Past, Captain Kelly’s Kitchen, Boys On The Docks, Citizen CIA, The Gang’s All Here, Fields of Athenry, The Warrior’s Code, The Auld Triangle and fan favorite Barroom Hero. It was no surprised that they performed mainly newer songs from The Meanest Of Times and The Warrior’s Code, but I will admit I was shocked not to hear Spicy McHaggis Jig, Walk Away or For Boston; at least they made it up with the inclusion of Worker’s Song though.

Of course, without the performance of Spicy McHaggis Jig, the band still needed to get the ladies up on the stage and opted to use the great drinking song Kiss Me I’m Shitfaced to accomplish the task for the final song of their set. Once the stage was cleared of the fans and a rousing chant of “Let’s Go Murphys!” came to an end, the band walked back on the stage with the newly popularized Shipping Out To Boston before ending the evening with two old tracks, Skinhead On the MTBA (which one again got everyone up on the stage) and a cover of Gang Green‘s Alcohol.

The odd thing of the night thought was that despite the band not doing anything wrong, I couldn’t help but feel slightly disappointed. There’s no real explanation for it, and for the most part the show was great, but there was something there holding it back from it becoming phenomenal and while there was no real reasoning behind it, it was still my least favorite time seeing them live; so when I think back on this night it is The Briggs who shine through instead of the headliners.