Dropkick Murphys Preach to the Faithful With ‘11 Short Stories of Pain & Glory’

Aryeh Harris-Shapiro

Boston bar-rockers the Dropkick Murphys settled into their niche a long time ago. After being heavily featured in Martin Scorsese’s 2006 Oscar-winner “The Departed,” their single “Shipping Up to Boston” took on a life of its own. That rowdy slab of Celtic punk set the template for the band going forward, and with each subsequent release the Murphys have leaned harder into the stomping, sing-along side of their once-frantic sound. Their new album, “11 Short Stories of Pain & Glory,” continues this trend, delivering a solid but uninspired set of songs that don’t stick in your head nearly as well as the Murphys best work.

Despite what the album title suggests, “11 Short Stories” isn’t a collection of story-songs or anything so formally ambitious. For better or for worse, it’s a Dropkick Murphys album covering all the usual bases. Which isn’t to say that there isn’t serious intent behind it; according to the band, the album was deeply inspired by their work with the Claddagh Fund, a charity they founded to help support addiction recovery. It’s a noble inspiration, but it doesn’t really come through in the music. Songs such as “Paying My Way” and “Rebels With A Cause” ostensibly focus on children abandoned by the system and working their way out of addiction, but the Murphys vision is so broad and their lyrics so general that the songs could refer to any sort of struggle and triumph.

The Murphys have years of practice crafting archetypal bar anthems, and “Blood” is as elemental and forceful as they’ve ever been. And there are even oddball comedy jams like “First Class Loser” and “I Had a Hat,” the latter of which takes a silly concept to ridiculous extremes. There are a couple songs here sure to become staples of the band’s live set – “4-15-13,” a heartfelt tribute to the victims of the Boston Marathon Bombing first among them – but the melodies just don’t hook the listener the way that “Shipping Up to Boston” or “The State of Massachusetts” did. The band also strips back their more eccentric Celtic elements for a more standard bar-rock sound. In some ways it feels more authentic to the type of music the band makes, but the friction between folky instrumentation and frantic punk energy was what made the Murphys such a sensation in the first place.

Diehard fans of the band will welcome another collection of strong, solid songs, but most others will stick to the Murphys much more interesting back catalog. It’s hard to sing along if you can’t remember how the tune goes.

“11 Short Stories of Pain & Glory” is available on Apple Music Dec. 6