I met a friend at Dick’s Last Resort for a little dinner before the Flogging Molly concert. The food was great, the service was as surly as ever, and the people watching was great. After that we headed over to the House of Blues for the show. It was a sold out show, so we were expecting it to be crowded and weren’t disappointed. There were two opening acts, both of which were excellent. The first was Dave Hause, a one man singer/guitar act. His lyrics were good, and his interaction with the audience was fun. The second was Skinny Lister, a new group out of England that does a punkified version of English folk music. They were great, and I picked up [amazon_link id=”B00AGKH43A” target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]their CD[/amazon_link] for the drive back.

Flogging Molly was filming this show, so hopefully there will be a DVD with shots of us at some point soon. Their show was fantastic, better from the floor, just outside the pit, than it was from the balcony. They did some of their favorites, staples of their live shows, as well as some newer and older songs they haven’t done in a while. The crowd was energetic, but not obnoxious, and everything was self-policed so that everyone could enjoy themselves as they pleased. They closed the show with one of my favorites, [amazon_link id=”B000ZM2MI6″ target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]If I Ever Leave This World Alive[/amazon_link]. It’s a bittersweet song, but one that I can identify with on many levels.

On the way home, I popped the CD in to the Jeep’s radio and started listening. I got about 5 seconds in to the first track and it skipped, then locked up. And when I say locked up I mean the radio’s display said “Err” and it wouldn’t eject. I’ve been having problems with the radio for a while, with it randomly powering itself off and the display being all messed up. I guess I shouldn’t have put the CD in, but hope springs eternal. I’m going to pull the radio out of the dash tomorrow and see how mangled the CD is. Not the best end to a great evening…