Once again this St. Patrick’s Day, the never-ending pandemic has forced the good people of Boston to be shipping up to nowhere. So as is tradition, Dropkick Murphys will be stepping up to provide some Celtic-punk entertainment.
Much like they did last year when they delivered a livestream event to keep us in the green, the Dropkicks will perform another St. Patrick’s Day livestream this March 17. It’s dubbed Dropkick Murphys St. Patrick’s Day Stream 2021… Still Locked Down, it gets started around 7 p.m. Boston time, and it streams around the world via www.DKMstream.com.
The show is presented by Boston-area tech company Pega, and donations will be accepted to help the band pay their expenses and crew during this extended downtime. Those who chip in some coin in advance or during the stream will have their name featured in the ticker at the bottom of the screen, so bottom’s up.
“Instead of charging for tickets, we’re going to ‘pass the virtual hat’ so you can donate what you’d like to help support us in our efforts to keep paying our employees,” says Ken Casey. “When we did the first two free livestreams for charity, our fans were super generous and we raised lots of money for good causes. But frankly, we’ve been out of work for over a year, so this one, we’ve gotta make about us. Of course, a portion will also go to charity, as always! ”
Those two livestreams Casey cites were last year’s Streaming Outta Fenway and Streaming Up From Boston. The former was their May show at Fenway Park with Bruce Springsteen, which raised $700,000 for various charities (Boston Resiliency Fund, Feeding America, Habitat for Humanity, Greater Boston). The latter was their aforementioned St. Patrick’s Day gig, held digitally instead of in the clubs, just as everything was shutting down; the show has been viewed more than 13 million times across multiple online platforms and raised more than $60,000 through the band’s charity organization The Claddagh Fund.
A new Dropkicks album is set to be announced next week.
