The Pogues
There is a sad truth about my music taste that it is horribly skewed towards more recent music and away from anything released outside of my life. While I certainly don’t think this quality is unique, every once in a while I make a conscious effort to embrace something from a little bit outside of that timeframe, and I’ve (fairly) recently become enamored with the Pogues. The UK/Irish band was around primarily in the 80s and came back in 2001 and then again in 2004 until now. They can be classified as Irish punk-rock, and their early albums are filled with Irish traditional tunes and original songs that draw heavily upon them. There’s something about the Irish genre within which they wrote that I find fascinating and unique. If you’ve heard of and/or listened to Flogging Molly, the Pogues are like a way cooler and more legit version of them. Shane Macgowan’s tongue-in-cheek storytelling is absolutely brilliant, and his songs can manage to play as both touching and heartfelt on one hand, and over-the-top and silly on the other. I’m absolutely enamored with their second album, Rum, Sodomy and the Lash, and I recommend it and it’s succesor, If I Should Fall From Grace with God. Here are two of my favorite tracks from Rum, Sodomy and the Lash.
The Pogues – Sally Mac Lennane
-Donovan
