Going Out in Style
Click to listen to the Dropkick Murphys’ “Memorial Day”
“No mercy, no quarter,” bellow the Dropkick Murphys in the raucous opener of their seventh album, a phrase that sums up their philosophy of music (and drinking). The Boston Irish-punk septet never met a shout-along chorus they didn’t want to crash into, with a bagpipe tooting along for an extra shot of old-world poignancy. Going Out in Style, a theme album about a fictional Irish-American named Cornelius Larkin, veers into tears-in-your-pint sentimentality on ballads like “1953.” But reservations disappear at the sound of full-fathom burner “Peg o’ My Heart,” a sweet, boozy love song with guest vocals by another guy who takes no quarter: Bruce Springsteen.