The Murphys’ Celtic Punk Invasion tour is well on its way, invading North America, Latin America and Europe, and little ol’ Albuquerque has not been spared. The band will play at 8 p.m. today at the Sunshine Theatre with Blood or Whiskey and Bryan McPherson.
Here is a Q&A session with Kelly on the band’s experiences and directives through the years:
Why do you think the band has stood the test of time for so long?
“You have to keep it interesting. We change up our set list every night because we have people coming to multiple shows, and if you play the same set it is going to get boring.
“I always hate when I see a band come through and play the same 15 to 20 songs. We will never fall into that trap; literally every time we come through a town we play a different set list. It keeps it fresh. We will play some of the same songs, of course; but you know, if there’s 25 to 27 songs we will be sure to switch out 18 of those songs. It is a luxury we have because we have been around for a while; we have eight full-length albums and a bunch of singles and EPs.
“Not to use clichés, but we shoot from the hip, and I think people respect that, in a way. I think it is what keeps us relevant. We are not trying to rewrite our first record every time we record, we are trying to expand on the sound that we have. I think that is what keeps people coming back to support us.”
Have you toured in Albuquerque before?
“We have played at the Launchpad many times, but we have only played with a few local bands and, well, funny story: We came through there in 1998 and most of the shows were all-ages at the time, but the Launchpad for this show it was 18-plus. There were these punk rock kids outside out in the boondocks, and we sneaked them in, and a couple years later — next time we came through — they had formed a band and wrote a song about how we sneaked them into the show and how thankful they were about that. I don’t remember the band’s name, but the girl in the band, her name was Tic; she was at the time an amateur tattoo artist, but we haven’t seen her for years.”
Apart from the general celebratory vibe of the songs, what are some of the messages embodied in your music?
“Pride in yourself, pride in where you come from, awareness of what is around you, the pitfalls of alcohol. We have always been a pro-union band since day one; that has been a very important message. Being charitable, maybe not through the lyrics, but we have a charity called the Claddagh Fund (claddaghfund.org).
“We are trying to use our popularity for things aside from self-aggrandizement, because the band has enjoyed a lot of popularity, and to not revel in it and to use it for something good is nice. We try to promote, for example, veterans returning home with disabilities or no home, or for those who have been killed leaving underprivileged children in urban areas.
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“The Murphys is not your slash-and-bang, drink, fight, f**k, so to speak. A lot of people misconceive our lyrics as celebrating the virtues of drunken revelries, when if you really read the lyrics it’s about the pitfalls of said behaviors, the dark side of that, but it’s put to upbeat music in the tradition of Irish music. Grim subject matter, but with jovial-sounding songs: it’s the dichotomy of Irish folk music.”
To what extent do you believe the band has influenced Irish-American culture?
“I think maybe, if anything, we have introduced a younger generation to look at their roots more carefully and where they come from, whether they be of Irish descent or anything, to just be interested in your ancestors, where they came from and what your ethnic culture is. This is America, although it being a young country, there’s not a lot of domestic culture, so I think we facilitate to fill a void of culture and folk memory and traditions.
“For example, we cover traditional songs that will maybe make kids delve deeper into that and ask, ‘What’s this song? What’s the original?’ And then they might discover The Dubliners or the Clancey Brothers.”
What culture influences you more: Irish or American?
“Probably American. If you want to subdivide it, Irish-American culture, because that’s what I grew up with. There were musicians at the family parties, whether it be people playing the fiddle, the concertina, the piano, the bagpipes.
“We don’t live in Ireland; it’s about 3,000 miles away from us, so the culture is filtered through the American experience. Places like Boston had a lot of people coming from Ireland to live and work there. Now there are established multi-generational Irish families. My great-great-grandfather came to America from Ireland, so I am attached to that ancestry; it is what goes on in my own backyard. I could probably speak for the rest of the band as far as that their ancestry too, but we are all true, blue Americans.”
Seeing the band’s heritage comes from Irish immigration, where do you stand with regard to the immigration debates held about the Southwest?
“That’s a tough thing. It’s not black-and-white, and not being immediately affected by it is like, ‘what the hell do I know about it?’ Being in Massachusetts, well, that’s in the other side of the country. It’s like asking ‘what are the troubles in Northern Ireland?’ — it is none of my business.
“Granted, it is my business because I can vote. There has to be immigration reform. There are a lot of things that go on on both sides of that issue. It affects so many people, whether they be trying to come to America or Americans who live in the borderlands. In a perfect world people will go about immigrating legally; in a perfect world people won’t get shot when they come to the country, but it’s a hard thing to pin down, especially with the perspective of somebody coming from Massachusetts.
“The last thing that we want to do is roll through a town telling people how to run their lives, because some bands do that and it pisses me off, being preachy. It grinds my gears because you know better than we do.”
Do your fans influence the music you produce?
“They do influence what songs we play live, but as far as influencing songwriting I don’t think so. We write songs that we want to hear: big choruses, not some throwaway, fantasy subject matter. It’s a cliché that if you try to please everybody, well, you’re not going to please anybody; you might as well keep your integrity and do what you think is right.”
How would you like your fans to describe you?
“A band they can believe in.”
Mateo Rocha is a freelance reporter for the Daily Lobo. He can be reached at culture@dailylobo.com or on Twitter @DailyLobo.
