After having heard the name Flogging Molly some times but never hearing any music of them Sven got the opportunity to get his hands on this CD. Without any clue at all as to what kind of music it would be, a Burning Heart band usually gets your Irish up and it certainly did. After a hard week of hard labour (yeah right!) Flogging Molly got Sven bouncing up and down his room with the stereo cranked up above maximum. Irish music is getting big! Flogging Molly combines traditional Irish music with the sound of punk rock. Inspired by The Dubliners and The Pogues; they could be compared to Stiff Little Fingers and The Dropkick Murphys, but Flogging Molly sounds even more Irish than these two bands. After recording their first studio album ‘Swagger’ in 2000 and being part of the Vans Warped Tour 2001 line up they have now released ‘Drunken Lullabies’ on Burning Heart Records. Drunken Lullabies contains a mix of up tempo songs (amongst others Drunken Lullabies and Rebels Of The Sacred Heart), and slower songs (like If I Ever Leave This World Alive and Death Valley Queen), which could almost be described as ballads.

Although the music sounds merry enough most of the lyrics have a darker touch to them. Dave King writes his lyrics about life, the good and the bad times. According to the band these lyrics are gut-wrenching tales of struggle and triumph. In their biography Dave King (lead vocals, acoustic guitar) states: “We record albums in the amount of time that are mere belches for other bands. We don’t want to over-do our albums, because we want to give the songs room for improvement. The album shouldn’t be the end-all, be-all of what we’re saying. There should always be room for spontaneity. The album’s just a blueprint of what the band should be about and then you take it from there. It’s all about the live show.” Sven certainly plans to find out all about that in August when Flogging Molly will do some shows in the Netherlands amongst others at the Lowlands Festival (for specific dates and other shows see Rockezine’s Agenda).