Song of the Day: "Queen of Suffolk County"

Here's an honorable mention from the Top 20 Songs of 2021, a feature that will be published toward the end of the week. I'm folding honorable mentions into our Song of the Day column yesterday and today. If you wanna see previous Songs of the Day/Week/Whatever, click HERE. If you wanna see which 20 songs were better than this one in 2021, then you're gonna have to wait buddy boy.

"Queen of Suffolk County"

Dropkick Murphys

from Turn Up That Dial

2021

Here we have a case of an artist needing to stay in their lane. No one is coming to Dropkick Murphys to get anything but dumb drunk Irish punk energy. I know I'm pretty harsh on the whole "Fake Irish in Northeast Philadelphia" thing, but credit where it's due—Irish music and punk rock music (and yeah, copious amounts of Guinness® stout) are a fantastic combination.

So excuse me if I'm going to stick with Dropkick Murphy songs like "Queen of Suffolk County," which is content to stay in that lane, painting a vivid, devilishly fun portrait of the neighborhood tough girl, over a great fiddle riff, culminating in an elevated classic punk finish. This is what Dropkick Murphys do well. They will never be a GREAT band, and they don't have to be. They have their niche, and they are flourishing there.

So you should also excuse me if I see other songs on this album that make me want to give 'em the old NEasty middle finger and say fuck off, because Turn Up That Dial is occasionally not about staying in your lane. Some of it slips into that "can't we all just get along" bullshit that I fucking hate (remember Sophistafunk?).

 

Here's "Chosen Few" (which is apparently a remake of an older D.M. song): "For a democracy to work we gotta see it from both sides / Stop pointing fingers, shut your mouth and compromise." I'm not interested in seeing anything from the side of white supremacists, et al. I have no obligation to do so. Yes, I'm sure there are plenty of Fake Irish Northeast Philadelphia racist fucks who absolutely love Dropkick Murphys, and yes, I understand that there might be a delicate balancing act on Dropkick's part, from a bleak capitalistic POV, that they don't want to isolate any of their fans, but come on. Don't give this bullshit. Don't fucking equivocate with me. If y'all are racists, just tell me so I can bail. If you are progressive, then just tell those Nazis to fuck off. If you don't give a shit about politics, then fine, but don't try to tell me how to think if that's the case.

Anyways, this is only a fraction of the Dropkick Murphys' whole deal, and if at least 80% of their songs continue to be fun, harmless distractions like "Queen of Suffolk County," then I'll continue to come back.