With Irish blood rushing through every member of the crowd and the sweet sound of bones cracking in the mosh pit, Boston's own Dropkick Murphys left Buffalo with a few scars that won't soon go away.
Focusing on their two most recent albums, The Warrior's Code and The Meanest of Times, the band produced just as much energy as what's heard on their studio tracks. Despite a rather long break between sets, Dropkick came out demanding respect, their enthusiasm just as important as the songs themselves.
"We're from Boston, but if it's always this crazy in Buffalo, we're moving here," said bassist Ken Casey.
As the music rang out into a sea of fans both young and old, a mosh pit formed, the product of pure punk vigor and a Ireland-influenced desire to fight.
The first highlight of the set came with "The Warrior's Code," a hard-nosed chant to rough nights, strong drinks and drunken brawls. Between vocalist Al Barr and Casey, not to mention the rest of the group, the jagged, raspy yells only increased the tone of the music, and the crowd was more than willing to echo the vocals, screaming in sync to nearly all of the band's songs.
And when singing wasn't an option, citing Meanest of Times recent release, those up near the stage simply pushed one another until the lyrics were just a background sound to the symphony of painful screams covered in adrenaline.
Behind the grass pit area, near the monument located in the middle of the square, a few young, inebriated rockers attempted to bring the party to them, throwing friends in the air to be crowd surfed by a group of older fans, who were there for the music and unwilling to participate in such shenanigans.
"I knew it was going to be a good night when a old dude with a long gray ponytail choke slammed a kid who crowd surfed into him," said sophomore economics major Jake Shillman.
The perfect compliment to the performance came with "Kiss Me, I'm Sh*tfaced," in which the boys from Boston summoned all of the girls onto the stage. The result was a group of middle-aged rockers jumping around with a countless amount of barely to not-legal girls, clearly overwhelmed by the spur-of-the-moment invitation.
Unfortunately, the excitement got the better of some dedicated listeners.
"There was one really big kid holding his nose, charging through and trying to get out (of the mosh pit). And another four kids were pushing out of the crowd holding this girl who was crying," said sophomore psychology communication major Jeff Pollock.
Yet, despite the casualties, nearly the entire crowd couldn't help but jump, or at least sway, to the fast-paced bagpipes-fused loving that was going on.
Playing for just about an hour and a half, the Murphys ran off the stage after "Shitfaced," leaving the crowd with an urge for both a pint of Guinness and one more song.
Between "Dropkick Murphys" and "One More Song," the chants continued for minutes, the crowd waiting impatiently for an answer to their call. Before long, the boys came back with "I'm Shipping Up To Boston," a song made famous by its opening credits appearance in Best Picture Oscar-winner The Departed.
For a moment, the moshing was never harder, the crowd determined to end the night on the highest and most violent of notes. After completing said mission, the last few lines of the song were enjoyed rather calmly, and the Murphys left Buffalo with something resembling blood and sweat in the crowd's mouth.
Photo: Courtesy of Laron Fomby
