Flogging Molly, Take Three

Last night, I had the pleasure of seeing Flogging Molly in concert for the third time in a year. The show was over at 9:30, and I went with Bryan and Jeff from work, and Bryan’s fiancé Katie.

I can’t lie – it wasn’t as good as the first two times I saw them. I wasn’t really expecting it to be, though; I knew that seeing them without BP and Sharon just wouldn’t be the same. It was a 21+ show, so the folks in the pit were bigger and capable of doing a lot more damage.

The Rolling Blackouts opened the show with a lackluster set. They were fun to watch, but not very good. Scotch Greens were a lot better – sort of a blue-grassy punk sound – but they played a full-length set, and must have been up there for an hour, so Flogging didn’t even go on until like 10:30. I wound up leaving before the show was even over: I went to take a leak, and decided I had been hit in the chest enough times for one evening. And, the last train was only 15 minutes away, so it was that or $20 for a cab ride home.

Flogging’s set was as good as always, but it took the sound guy three or four songs to figure out what he was doing – the backup mics weren’t even on for the first song. They didn’t play Within A Mile of Home before I left, which was disappointing. The Guinness was $6 a can, which almost makes Rochester look good (which reminds me, I met three different people from Rochester before the show).

So yeah, it could have been better. I blame Scotch Greens for the fact that I couldn’t see the whole show, but what can ya do? Against Me! will be here in April, and my hopes are higher for that one.