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Dropkick Murphys, The Roundhouse, Uni NSW, Randwick, Sydney, Australia. Photo: Alec Smart, Wednesday 20 November 2024

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DROPKICK MURPHYS
+ Alkaline Trio
@ UNSW Roundhouse, Sydney,
20th November 2024
(Live Review)

Review and photos by Alec Smart (@alecsmart_fotos)

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Dropkick Murphys, The Roundhouse, Uni NSW, Randwick, Sydney, Australia. Photo: Alec Smart, Wednesday 20 November 2024

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Dropkick Murphys performed two sold-out shows at the University of NSW Roundhouse in Randwick, Sydney, supported by fellow Americans Alkaline Trio.

Alkaline Trio opened the night (no local support) to a receptive crowd. The band are touring their recently-released 10th studio album Blood, Hair and Eyeballs, recorded just prior to the departure of drummer Derek Grant, who was with the band for 22 years.

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Alkaline Trio, The Roundhouse, Uni NSW, Randwick, Sydney, Australia. Photo: Alec Smart, Wednesday 20 November 2024

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The trio features long-time collaborators Matt Skiba and Dan Andriano, with recent addition Atom Willard. Willard has performed with many distinguished bands, including Against Me, Social Distortion, The Offsping, Rocket From The Crypt and Angels & Airwaves, the latter with Blink 182 vocalist Tom DeLonge.

From 2015 – 22, during DeLonge’s stint with Angels & Airwaves, Alkaline Trio’s vocalist-guitarist Matt Skiba was his replacement in Blink 182. In that time he co-wrote and performed on two of their top-selling albums, California and Nine.

Apart from drummer Atom Willard, who’s a manic powerhouse of energy, Alkaline Trio’s front duo are static performers, seldom taking more than a few steps away from their microphones. However, they’re musically tight, and I saw many in the crowd singing along enthusiastically to popular songs from their 28-year career.

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Alkaline Trio, The Roundhouse, Uni NSW, Randwick, Sydney, Australia. Photo: Alec Smart, Wednesday 20 November 2024

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They appeared onstage wearing black suits, white shirts and black ties, looking like more real estate agents than punk rockers. Their music is renowned for strong melodies, so I considered it was Mod-meets-Hardcore, which I suppose could be termed ModCore or perhaps HardCod!

When Celtic-punk hellraisers Dropkick Murphys hit the stage the energy level accelerated several notches immediately and those loitering outside were drawn like moths to a flame. I then realised the purpose for the front stage extension to the edge of the crowd barrier – vocalist Ken Casey frequently thundered down it to the fans with whom he shared his microphone during rousing singalongs.

Banjo/mandolin player Jeff DaRosa and lead guitarist/piano accordion player Tim Brennan also sauntered out onto the gangplank to loiter with the partying pirates.

Casey’s energy is infectious – remarkable considering he suffered serious spinal damage in a 2018 motorcycle accident, which caused him temporary loss of feelings in his right hand.

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Dropkick Murphys, The Roundhouse, Uni NSW, Randwick, Sydney, Australia. Photo: Alec Smart, Wednesday 20 November 2024

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The band’s co-founder, principle songwriter and longest-serving member was then bassist as well as secondary vocalist (lead singer Al Barr has been ‘on hiatus’ since 2022 to take care of his dementia-stricken mother), so loss of feeling in his string-holding fingers was disastrous.

Nevertheless, a replacement bassist was recruited and Casey now commands the stage as the main frontman, sans instrument, like he was born to it.

The band, which formed the same year as the aforementioned veterans Alkaline Trio – 1996 – has released 12 studio albums. Their lyrics typically champion working-class solidarity and fuse traditional Celtic music with abrasive street-punk, which has seen them described as an American Clash meets The Pogues.

Shortly into the set, Casey read from a large green sheet of paper, revealing a handwritten song request from a woman in the audience whose mother was in attendance and celebrating her 81st birthday. He didn’t say which song, but the band played it specially for her later in the concert – it wasn’t on the original set list – as the crowd heartily sang along.

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Dropkick Murphys, The Roundhouse, Uni NSW, Randwick, Sydney, Australia. Photo: Alec Smart, Wednesday 20 November 2024

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The song, Fields of Athenry, written in 1979 by Irish folk singer Pete St John is poignant and lyrically relevant to Australia. Set during the 1840s Irish Famine, and inspired by a real historical event, the song details a man who stole corn to feed his starving family. Caught, he was sentenced to convict transportation to Sydney’s Botany Bay – which inspired dozens of folk songs, although no actual penal colony was established in Botany Bay.

Dropkick Murphys recorded and released the emotional ballad on their 2003 album Blackout.

Criticising Donald Trump (whom they don’t support), Casey dedicated their song First Class Loser to him on behalf of “the 49% who haven’t lost their fucking minds!” This figure referenced the percentage of Americans who didn’t vote for the ginger-skinned president with the tiny, wandering hands.

Acknowledging the forthcoming Festive Season, the band revealed they don’t usually tour this time of year due to Thanksgiving and Xmas family commitments, except if they’re travelling to somewhere warm in the Southern Hemisphere, like Australia. They then launched into their hilarious The Season’ Upon Us, which details a raucous, riotous family Christmas gathering.

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Dropkick Murphys, The Roundhouse, Uni NSW, Randwick, Sydney, Australia. Photo: Alec Smart, Wednesday 20 November 2024

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Whilst on the theme of the Southern Hemisphere, Casey noted that water flows clockwise down a sinkhole in the Northern Hemisphere, but the opposite direction south of The Equator. Observing that members of the audience had begun a circle-dance in a clockwise motion, “the same direction as a toilet flushes in the USA!”, he then ordered the spirited crowd to reverse to a counter-clockwise surge, and much hilarity ensued.

The band finished their set on the lively I’m Shipping Up To Boston, which appeared in the soundtrack of the popular 2006 Boston gangster movie The Departed, directed by Martin Scorsese, which triggered a huge wave of popular interest in the band.The lyrics are simple and were found by Casey on a scrap of paper: “I’m a sailor peg, and I lost my leg, climbing up the top sails I lost my leg! I’m shipping up to Boston whoa, to find my wooden leg!”

They were written by iconic folk balladeer Woody Guthrie, and were adapted by Dropkick Murphys after Casey was invited by Guthrie’s daughter, Nora Guthrie, to view a sheaf of lyrics her father had written for which there were no tunes. The band had a new instrumental that needed words.

In an interview describing the song’s creation, Casey revealed, “…we got an invite from Woody Guthrie’s daughter, Nora, who runs the Guthrie Archives. She told us, ‘If my father had been born in your era he would have been playing music like you,’ which was such a huge honour.

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Dropkick Murphys, The Roundhouse, Uni NSW, Randwick, Sydney, Australia. Photo: Alec Smart, Wednesday 20 November 2024

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“She told us her father had thousands of songs that were never put to music, just pieces of paper torn from notebooks. I said, ‘My God, I’d love to come down to the archives.’

“I had to put on special white gloves, and I held these pieces of paper in the palms of my hands like I was holding a newborn child!

“So, I’m going through these lyrics, which are deep, political, rebellious, heartfelt. All of a sudden I stumble on I’m Shipping Up To Boston, which is only five lines long. I was just, like: ‘What the fuck is this?!’ It was so out of the left field. But within seconds I said, ‘My God – that’s the lyric!’”

Dropkick Murphys played a two-song encore at the Roundhouse, the excellent two-level venue (with a wide, easily-accessible circular balcony overlooking the stage and dance floor) in the grounds of the University of NSW. These were: The Boys Are Back followed by the rousing finale, Rose Tattoo.

Then they returned the following night to do it all again, for a second sold-out show!

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Dropkick Murphys, The Roundhouse, Uni NSW, Randwick, Sydney, Australia. Photo: Alec Smart, Wednesday 20 November 2024

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Set List

Worker’s Song
The State of Massachusetts
Mick Jones Nicked My Pudding
Johnny, I Hardly Knew Ye
Blood
Skinhead on the MBTA
God Willing
First Class Loser
Caps and Bottles
Bastards on Parade
Walk Away
The Season’s Upon Us
Captain Kelly’s Kitchen
Queen of Suffolk County
The Bonny (Gerry Cinnamon cover)
Barroom Hero
Turn Up That Dial
Rippin Up The Boundary Line
Citizen C.I.A.
The Fields of Athenry (Pete St. John cover – a fan request)
Out of Our Heads
Going Out in Style
I’m Shipping Up to Boston

Encore:

The Boys Are Back
Rose Tattoo

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Dropkick Murphys, The Roundhouse, Uni NSW, Randwick, Sydney, Australia. Photo: Alec Smart, Wednesday 20 November 2024

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Check out Alec Smart’s (@alecsmart_fotos) full gallery of this event HERE

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Dropkick Murphys, The Roundhouse, Uni NSW, Randwick, Sydney, Australia. Photo: Alec Smart, Wednesday 20 November 2024

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Follow DROPKICK MURPHYS
Website – Facebook – Instagram – Spotify

Follow ALKALINE TRIO
Website – Facebook – Instagram – Spotify

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Press Release 8th August 2024 (below) HERE

Destroy All Lines

DROPKICK MURPHYS 
sell out Sydney show
& add 2nd show
playing a different set

Australian Tour
with ALKALINE TRIO

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AMNPLIFY – DB