Though possessing a heavy-duty indie history featuring such luminaries as the Pixies, Mission of Burma, and Throwing Muses, Boston is also famed for its booze-sodden Irish exile rock. And the Dropkick Murphys--clearly influenced by the Pogues at their most uproarious--are the cream of the present crop. Yet this is not simple jigging traditionalism. Despite employing bagpipes, mandolins, and tin whistles to add Celtic flavor to their sound, these guys are full-blown punks, harking back to the immediate post-Pistols era of the Angelic Upstarts.
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