Dropkick Murphys / The Unseen

live in Cincinnati (2003)

RyanNewton

We arrived ay Bogart's about 20 minutes before Roger Miret and the Disasters began. Checked out the merch (DKM's was exactly the same as it was on Warped, some shirts even said June 12 - August 10) and staked out a spot on the near empty floor. The Disasters soon began their set for about 100 people. They sounded great, but failed to get the audience warm and ripped through a short 20 minute set.

The Unseen were next and played a full set including a myriad of songs off their new release. The room was about half full by now and a huge circle pit continued all set long. So This is Freedom set the whole place off, and the pits got so big, they had to put the spotlights on the crowd and have security on the floor.

Right before DKM came on, the room and the balcony were almost full and after what seemed like an eternity, the lights dimmed and Foggy Dew rang from the speakers. Scruffy came out and began to play Cadenace to Arms followed by the rest of the guys. They continued into a string of 4 straight songs: Do or Die, Blackout, Barroom Hero, and Caught in a Jar. Then came a barrage of Blackout songs broken up only by Upstarts and Broken Hearts and Heart Attack. In fact the boys played all but 5 songs off the new release just about all in a row. The string ended when they broke into The Gauntlet and Spicy McHaggis Jig, with about 50 girls on stage dancing. DKM then slowed things down with Forever, dedicating it to a fan that recently passed away. A nice surprise toward the end was the singer of Gangreen coming out to sing and play lead guitar for Alcohol. If I Had a Hammer featuring Stephanie was somehwere toward the end and Worker's Song closed the set, followed by a short encore consisting of Boys on the Docks and Skinhead. During Skinhead, so many people got on stage they started a pit and had people crowd surfing…never quite seen that on stage at a show before.

If you have been to Murphys shows before, this could have either been refreshing or dissapointing. Refrshing if you like the new album, and dissapointing if you planning on hearing favorites like Road of the Rightous, Finnegan's Wake, Gang's All Here, Rocky Road to Dublin, or Wild Rover. Nonetheless, DKM were full of energy, worked the crowd very well, and played as well as ever. It was also nice to only have to pay 15.00 for such a great show.