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Interview: Joe Burcaw of Black 47 on New EP ‘Four On The Floor’ Featuring Living Colour’s Corey Glover

It’s approaching ten years since NYC Irish rock mainstay Black 47 took their final bow at the now-dark BB King’s Blues Club in November 2014, and what an indelible performance that became. For long-time bassist Joe Burcaw, who earned the nickname “Bearclaw,” life in the time since Black 47 has been a rewarding and fruitful respite from life on the road, going from a touring musician to maintaining has passion for music as a small business owner in Connecticut. Then came 2020 when the pandemic changed the world as we know it especially in discourse of social and political issues and garnered explosions in divisiveness.

But for Burcaw this sparked and inspired the need to speak out through his creative outlet as not only a way to release steam but to also invoke thought. This grew into a new studio project, recently releasing a new EP titled Four On The Floor. It is first-class in its talent, production, and writing, and features a distinctive rock and roll voice. Burcaw took a deep dive into the project with NYS Music, along with his music school Bearclaw’s Academy of Music and of course, some reflections on Black 47.

Steve Malinski: Can you tell us how things came to be with Four on the Floor ?

Joe Burcaw: The bass player for Living Colour lives up the street from me and I connected with him back in 2017 and took some lessons. I was at a point with my playing where it was it was a bit stagnant and I needed some inspiration. So, Doug’s an incredible inspiration and from Living Colour, one of my favorite bands. So I reached out to his wife actually, who manages him to look into doing some lessons and that led to us working together. He was familiar with Black 47 and he had asked me one session if I would be interested in doing some writing. He produces and writes and I said I would be honored . So we were writing a couple of tunes and were at the point where we need it and felt like it was all instrumental music, very dance oriented, very Euro sounding, with the emphasis on the bass guitars. But we felt like we needed a voice to mix things up a little bit. And he suggested, why don’t I call Corey ? I’m thinking to myself in the back of my head, yeah, sure love the world with Corey Glover. So he called Corey, and Corey was totally into it. He came up for a couple sessions and he and I just hit it off. Just had a really nice rapport. And I had said to him at one point and I asked him if he’d be interested in maybe separately doing some songwriting together and he said I would love to. We kept in contact and then came the lockdown. So he and I were always in contact with each other.

Then with the pandemic happening in March of 2020, here we are, everybody’s at home idle, not sure what to do with themselves or their lives, wondering what’s happening with this… this disease. So I thought to myself, first off, I couldn’t get over the amount of discord and the amount of pain that people were going through. And then, you know, I read the New York Times and it made me aware of how there was an uptick in the amount of domestic abuse happening with a lot of women and children who were stuck in situations where they just could not get out and were stuck with their abusive partner. And also with the George Floyd Marches – with him, you know, being killed, the injustices, and the Black Lives Matters uprising. Just like everything was coming to a head and I just felt, I felt the need to call my musician friends and do something about this and get this off my chest – and our chest – and write. So I called up Corey and the mutual friend of ours, Jamie McDonald, and the three of us would have sessions every week bouncing ideas off of each other, lyrical ideas. It was mostly lyrical ideas and just subject matter that we could talk about and put into the lyrics of the songs. And we did that for about two year and a half, two years, and then, you know, it kind of evolved into into this EP. We weren’t sure what we were going to do with it, and then it just kind of evolved naturally into the EP. So that’s a roundabout description of how we got together.

SM: So it kind of started as a way for you guys just to kind of have this release of all the all the stress from basically the world and the pandemic and then it’s like, hey, we got something going, let’s put it on record.

JB: Yeah, that’s basically what happened. And having Corey be so open minded and into the idea of writing with us and recording with us was, to me, it was an honor. I mean, he’s my favorite by far, my favorite vocalist ever. I think he’s very underrated as a vocalist and feel like he needs way more of a spotlight than he gets. He’s a very humble human being and one of those guys where you sit in the room with him and there’s just this ease. He’s just a real gem to be around and I consider him a friend now. So it for me it’s been mind-blowing to be able to call him a friend and a working peer.

SM : So awesome. And yeah, the the first track “Zig Zag” caught my attention with like the really strong bass funk groove. And then Corey’s voice comes in and I’m just like, holy smokes, this is awesome, his voice was so distinctive.

JB : It’s undeniable that when you hear that voice and you know who it is, that’s for darn sure. And with Corey, he doesn’t have that ostentatious way about him, he’s not trying to show off. He is one of those people that has an incredible register. He never goes out of pitch, which is, for me, incredible to watch and he has so much power. I feel like his voice has gotten stronger now than it was back when Vivid came out or Time’s Up or Stain which were popular back 30 plus years ago.

So, getting back on “Zig Zag,” that song talks about having a conversation and avoiding having the conversation. And what I mean by that is that folks in this country need to really step up and be aware that racism is a is a is a problem. Still, it’s been a problem for hundreds of years.

And we’re creating a platform for people to come and talk about this and see about being able to resolve the issues and problems that the black community has been suffering and going through for all these years. Musically, I had written the music for that about a year prior to showing it to the guys. The impetus of the song really came from The Pretenders, who I’m a fan of. I was listening to…what was the song…, “My City Is Gone,” and heard a really great bass line played by Tony Butler from the band Big Country. He did session work on the Learning to Crawl album and just always that bass line just kind of stuck in my head. So I kind of (no pun intended) based the song kind of around that line; the groove is very similar to that Pretenders song and I showed it to the guys and they were really into it.. So that’s the lead single. It’s the song that we just really feel encapsulates what we’re trying to do with this project. It’s a project of community service and trying to get back to the community through our music and for inviting people to listen to it and join us on the ride.

SM : Getting further into the songs, “Mighty Real” – the thing that stuck out to me is the intro, layering all the the voices with dance type feel and then it jumps from a minor key to the major key where you get to the that classic disco feel. What can you say about that song?

JB : Corey and I are big fans of Sylvester , and that’s a remake. Sylvester had a disco tune that came out in maybe ‘79 in the “ disco sucks ” era, unfortunately. But Sylvester was a drag performer. He was part of a troupe called The Cockettes . They’re based out of San Francisco and they would travel from coast to coast to New York and San Francisco and other areas around the country. And that was his biggest hit. It was such a great dance track and I just remember when I was a kid hearing it, just loving it, because of the bass and the drums, the interplay between the rhythm section… it just really it really floored me as a kid. When I learned that Corey was into it as well we just discussed, why don’t we do a more modern version of the song and kind of make it our own? And add a guitar solo because on the original track there’s some rhythm guitar but there’s no solo whatsoever on that. I envisioned having this really big thought-out masterpiece outro solo. I had Vernon Reed and Missus Smith in mind. I reached out to Missus Smith first and she was totally into the idea of it.

I love, the idea of having this dance form, dance floor feel and then having this rippin’ guitar solo that lasts for 60+seconds. Just bombastic shredding. I think it really it makes the listeners kind of tilt their head going whoa, wasn’t expecting this! because it starts out really dancey and then it as it continues to the bridge section it gets harder and harder with the guitars being more upfront in the mix. We did that intentionally to have a build-up crescendo towards the end. So that song is the second single.

“Ode to Ustad”: Ustad Sultan Khan was a classical Indian musician and I first got turned on to him through Warren Cuccurullo who’s the guitar player used to play with Frank Zappa, Missing Persons, and Duran Duran. I’m a big fan of his playing and he put a record out with this gentleman, titled The Master . And it was all Indian-fused music with a lot of drones and a lot of chanting in it and just I’ve always loved the music and it just really struck a chord with me and was one of those instances where I was thinking to myself, wow, I know this guy really has influenced me and I haven’t really paid homage to that and I wanted to do so. So that’s why II titled it “Ode to Ustad.” And I wanted to have the music be more focused on Indian ragas and Indian drones and it’s all me playing it on the bass. I played six string synth bass and four string bass on that particular track.

There’s also an ongoing theme of all four songs on the EP. The reason it’s called Four on the Floor is because all the songs are 110 beats per minute or higher. So it’s kind of got that dance, you know, four on the floor kind of kind of feel.

SM : Lastly, “House Arrest” seems to link directly to the pandemic times. What kind of message are you getting to in this song?

JB : Well, it’s strictly about domestic abuse. It’s coming down on, as I said at the top of the conversation, coming down on people who are abusive to their partners and their children and also shedding light that there is hope. And there if somebody needs to get out of a situation you do it . And I know that’s easier said than done. But I’m hoping that people can listen to the track and get some inspiration and maybe make a choice that they weren’t thinking about making before listening to it, to get out of a situation that’s tumultuous, dangerous, something that that could harm the person or their family. I specifically got that idea from a New York Times article that I read. It was probably May of 2020 about when the uptick in abuse since COVID happened and people were blocking down together. That was a reaction to that. I had the first stanza down and then I showed it to the guys and we collaborated on finishing the rest of the lyrics. So, a lot of lyrics on that.

It’s a lengthy one but we just felt like we needed to have all of those words in there to get the point across. We’re happy with the way that came out, that the song has a (as far as the bass line is concerned) more of a chic-meets-Duran Duran kind of feel to it. I wrote it specifically for Corey’s voice, for a lot of the inflections that he adds to music and wanted to not get in the way of the vocal line and create a lot of space for it, especially during the verse sections where he could ad-lib a little more and not have me get in the way of the music.

SM : So who how did the virtual/remote production process go given all the moving parts?

JB : What happened was, as far as the tracking I have a DAW set up at home, I have Logic [production software] and then Corey had Garage Band And our mutual friend Jamie has Pro Tools. So, we were sending files and I was just recording my bass at home and sending it over. Jamie was doing a lot of tweaks. He’s really good with engineering. Then I had another person come in and do some mixing as well to help out with that. And then as far as you know, then I sent it to Disk Makers for mastering, had that mastered and then here we are. So yeah, everything was done on our own.

It was a real DIY instance since we weren’t able to go into the traditional studio to record and track. It was… it was different. I mean it proved to me that it’s possible to make a decent sounding record from home. Would I do it again? I don’t know. I like the idea of getting into a room and bashing out parts with other musicians there to kind of vibe off of each other. So that’s kind of more my preference as opposed to virtually recording.

SM : Yeah, I suppose it’s different if you’re just recording a backing track that somebody else wrote for you but when you’re putting your heart and soul into it, definitely the whole face to face thing is priceless.

JB : It is, yeah. We’re human beings and that’s how you work off each other. You feel what’s coming from the other human, whether that’s good or bad. With us it was great. So, I would love for us to get into the studio and do some more. There’s talk of us doing some more. I think going forward we’d like to make more in the way of singles as opposed to a full length album or EP. It’s just easier by doing it that way. We got lucky just because of lockdown that everybody was around that we were able to do that [full EP]. But now that things have opened up a bit more, I don’t know, Corey’s out on the road a bunch with Living Colour right now.

They’re playing with Extreme and had a success with that. So he’s not home much, but I did talk to him right before he left for his tour and we’re going to get back together once he gets home and work on some more ideas.

SM : I was going to ask if you guys were going to get together again and record, but do you think you might also schedules a line up to maybe do a short live show somewhere.

JB : Yeah, we’re we’re in talk talks of doing that right now [later in 2024]*. I own the music school [Bearclaw’s Academy of Music] and we’re looking to do a fundraiser for kids who can’t afford instruments or lessons, and we want to raise some money for kids that are under-privileged and not able to do so. So it would be maybe a half hour set if if that. It’s not going to be a real long thing because you know again it’s going to be during the afternoon, it’s not going to be at night. But yeah, we’re talking about that if Corey will be around.

So I think we’ll be able to do that with this project. It’s not a touring entity. It’s a studio project built around community service and giving back and writing about topical situations that not everybody talks about, ones that sometimes get thrown under the rug, like with the racism, with gay rights, with immigration oppression, domestic violence. So the idea of doing what I did with Black 47, hitting the road consistently… I just don’t think that would be feasible at this point. But one-offs, definitely. We’ll definitely do one-offs here and there.

SM : So to shift gears a little bit, how are things with your music school? You’ve been running the school for 8 or 9 years now?

JB : Yeah, yeah, it’ll be 8 years. Oh, it’s great. I love it. I really enjoy being able to be a small business owner and to teach and to kind of run the show on my own. I mean, it’s a lot of arduous work. I’m a one-man operation so I have to do everything as far as coordinating all the scheduling of my teachers and financial things as far as taking care of payroll and all that. So it’s a lot on top of teaching since I have a lot of a lot of students that I teach bass guitar and ukulele too. It’s very satisfying. I love that I can wake up and know that I don’t have to go into a nine-to-five because I’ve done that in the past and this way don’t have to listen to anybody barking orders at me. My wife is a small business owner too, she’s a music therapist so she’s taught me a lot as far as just how to run a business properly and has given me a lot of advice and assistance with that end of things.

So it’s going great. But again, it was difficult during the COVID days of 2020 and even for the last two, two and a half years it’s been kind of a rebuilding because back then virtually everybody, I mean the world, shut down and thank goodness for virtual teaching and for virtual lessons. I was able to continue doing that and it kept my business afloat while we were not able to get into the building. I look forward to branching out and to expanding and to get back to where we were right before COVID, we were doing really well with a lot of lot of students coming in. Now we’re about 75% and we’re picking up. But again, you have to keep in consideration so many people lost their jobs, so many people moved out of the area. You know, there’s so many circumstances and variables that that affect people not coming back.

SM : Yeah, different folks re-prioritizing things…

JB: Yeah it’s true. I’ve been really, really happy with that. It’s my new life. You know, I had an old life as a touring musician with Black 47, and now I’m small business owner. Like what ? Really. I mean, I do still perform. I have a Jimi Hendrix tribute band that I play in with some buddies of mine from Boston and we play out every once in a while with that, which is nice. So it keeps me in the game a little bit as far as live performance is concerned because I really don’t get to play live that much. I have a three-year old as well, so I’m a relatively newer dad.

SM : Oh, Congrats!

JB : Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. So got a lot on my plate, that’s for sure.

SM : So do you work with both kids and adults?

JB : We do. I mean primarily kids, but we do have some older adults that are more retired age come in for lessons. I mean we’re “everybody’s welcomed with open arms” but we just find that most it’s mostly kids that do come in for the for the lessons. I do have a couple of students that I teach virtually as well that are overseas that are adults Amsterdam, UK and it’s great. I love being able to do that. It’s so convenient that you can walk down into your studio in your house, get hard wired in, get on Wi-Fi, and boom. You know, it’s fantastic to be able to communicate with somebody that’s thousands of miles away on the other side of the planet.

SM: I’ve had experience taking some group drumming lessons with a teacher in Scotland, so it’s like 5:00 PM there and we’re just having our coffee over here while we’re all in different locations. Definitely it works, but not preferred, I’ll say that.

JB : Yeah, I have to say with at least for me with bass guitar and teaching guitar it’s fine. I can understand for some instruments like drums it might be a little difficult. I mean you can do it. Obviously piano is a little more difficult because of the hand situation where you have to get the camera where it’s looking down on the kids’ hands to see if their positioning is correct and also being able to look at the person and being able to dictate what you want them to do. So it is hard with the with the piano, but I found I’ve had no problem. The only problem I ran into is there’s a bit of latency, so using a metronome is a little dicey. So, I wouldn’t recommend that until we get more software that’s more reliable. But aside from that, I love it. I really enjoy doing that.

SM : Before we wrap up… Black 47, obviously that’s been a big part of your life. I see the six albums hanging up there on your wall.

JB : Yes, there they are.

SM : So you recorded six with them?

JB : I did. I did 3 studio and then one of them is the DVD Live at Connolly’s and then the other two are compilation records. So there were three I recorded on – Iraq , Bankers and Gangsters , and Last Call , as far as the studio albums are concerned.

SM : Yikes, it’s been 9, going on 10 years this coming November since Black 47 wrapped up. Having this much time since then, what does the experience feel like now versus, say, like the day after that last show at BB King’s in NYC?

JB : I don’t even feel like it was the same person. I don’t even know who that guy was. My, life has changed so drastically since that last night at BB King’s, just, you know, I got divorced. I got remarried. I had a kid. Both my parents passed away and I opened up my own business. You know, within 10 years all of this stuff happened. So it was very surreal to say the say the least. But I wasn’t despondent, you know, there wasn’t any type of despondency.. But it was a lot, you know, it’s a lot to take in. I mean first off, when you’re in a band and play with the band for just under a decade, these guys were my family. That’s the thing with Black 47 people need to understand as well, is that these guys took me under their wing, accepted me. I was never… I mean the joke was I was always the new guy, Bearclaw, the new guy. But I was never treated that way. And I always felt like I was there from day one, even though I was too young to be a part of the band. Back then, you know, when they started out, I was still a teenager. So that wouldn’t have worked out. But every night that I got on stage with those guys… I never took it for granted. I would look around at these five musicians and just thank, thank whoever the source for putting me there with them because I love the band. I was a fan before I got to play with them. Well, I first got turned on to them on 120 Minutes on MTV and saw them do “40 Shades of Blue” as one of the lead tracks that they were pushing on top of “Funky Ceili.” And I just thought to myself, wow, this is very interesting having the uilleann pipes mixed in with the Irish theme on top of having the sophistication of songwriting like Bruce Springsteen mixed in with The Clash. So then I got to see him at TT the Bears Place in Cambridge, MA when I was up in college in Rhode Island. I was just floored. My jaw hit the hit the ground just in awe at the musicianship and just the power that they exuded. That really struck me, the power of that band. And then almost 10 years later, I’m pinching myself. I’m standing on stage with him.

SM : And that was just a lucky chance, too, right? I recall you mentioned last time we spoke that it was an ambiguous newspaper ad?

JB: Advert, yeah. And at that point I was in New York City, just banging the pavement, playing with everybody and answering all these different various adverts. And there happened to be “one touring band looking for a bass player ASAP. Please submit.” So I sent my EPK and didn’t hear from them until, I don’t know. Hammy [drummer] called me a week later, using a pseudonym. He didn’t even lead on to who he was until a couple phone calls later and he got a good feel for me. And then yeah, he invited me. He just asked if I was playing out. I happened to be playing out with a band on a particular weekend that he was available and he came down to the show. I didn’t think he showed up because he didn’t introduce himself.

So I finished performing with this band and nobody was there. But I come to find out that there was a torrential downpour during this gig and he got soaked and wanted to go home before the end. But he did get to see me and was really impressed and asked me to come down for an audition. And yeah, he left me a voicemail and asked if I’d be interested in coming down. And yeah, the rest is history. So awesome. They put me on retainer for about a month after my audition then for 8 to 10 shows to see how it goes. And then after New Year’s, I think going into 2006, they asked me to become a full, full time member. The rest is history.

* Editors’ note: the potential date of the fundraiser event changed since the time of the interview from spring 2024 to fall 2024.

Steve is an engineer by day and photographer/writer/musician by night formerly from the Capital District, now based in the lower Hudson Valley. He is also the local music director for and guest host on WRPI in Troy, hosts the weekly Grateful Dead program "Shakedown Street" on WVBR-FM in Ithaca, and musician in the L Train Brass Band in Brooklyn.

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Celtic rock, for me, always has a great mixture of instruments and themes throughout the songs, and I love the fact that it just makes you want to get up on your feet and dance. I’ve been listening to Black 47 for years, and when I had the chance to go and see them live, I was a little apprehensive, as I thought that over the 20 years that they’ve been performing, they might have lost some of their original spark. However, I couldn’t have been more wrong, they absolutely brought the house down and played the most incredible live set I’ve ever seen.

Watching Geoffrey Blythe play such an incredible saxophone solo gave me goose bumps all over, and the way that everyone in the audience was getting behind the musicians, standing up and singing along made the whole show that much more enjoyable. They played a great selection of tracks, from their early work and their self-titled albums, to their new album, Last Call, which they played several tracks from. It was awesome to hear the new music performed live, as it was the first time they’d played it in concert, and it’s such a great album!

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Black 47 Celebrates 30th Anniversary with "After Hours"

February 18, 2021 • Black 47 • Celtic Cross • Gary Og • Martin Furey • Pat McGuire • Press Release • Rory K • Screaming Orphans • The Gobshites

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE | New York, NY (February 18, 2021) 

Valley Entertainment announces an upcoming release featuring new versions of Black 47 songs with special guests.  On the 30 th Anniversary of the release of Black 47’s eponymous first album comes the first part of the new release After Hours . Executive produced by Peter Walsh of The Gobshites and Black 47’s Larry Kirwan, After Hours will be released in 3 parts, each comprising six or seven reworks of favorite songs from the Black 47 catalogue.  The first volume is set to be released on March 17, 2021.

Black 47, renowned for its political stances on Ireland the U.S. and the war in Iraq, played over 2500 live shows in 25 years on three continents. This collection features musicians that the band met along the way while performing everywhere from stadiums to theatres, rock clubs to Irish bars.

In addition to this 3 part music release, Kirwan has been working on several other projects:  His latest novel Rockaway Blue  will be published by Three Hills/Cornell U. Press on March 15th.  He conceived and co-wrote the Broadway bound musical Paradise Square  that tells the story of the amalgamation of immigrant Irish and African-Americans in the Five Points neighborhood of New York City during the Civil War. 

The Gobshites most recent single is  Carry Me Away . The band is currently recording an album of modern Irish Irish/American popular songs done in its own inimitable style entitled: Saint Patrick’s Favorite Band and are looking forward to resuming their show schedule later in the spring.

The music on After Hours includes songs from the entire Black 47 catalogue, each one featuring a guest artist:

• “Forty Shades of Blue” Celtic Cross
• “Too Late To Turn Back”  Pat McGuire
• “Sleep Tight in New York City” Screaming Orphans
• “Livin' in America” The Gobshites
• “Desperate” Rory K 
• “James Connolly” Gary Óg
• “Rockin' The Bronx” Martin Furey

CONTACT Erika Page • [email protected] • 1-212-580-9200

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Black 47 (a name deriving from the year 1847, the blackest year of the Irish potato famine) is a New York-based band made up of Irish expatriates and led by songwriter/playwright Larry Kirwan. In addition…

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Listening Booth: Black 47’s Larry Kirwan

By John Donohue

When Yeats wrote, “Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; / Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,” he wasn’t, of course, referring to tonight, the first St. Patrick’s Day in a quarter century without a show by Black 47. But, for many, it must feel that way. Ever since the band came slouching like a rough beast out of the Bronx, in 1989, with a mix of Irish melodies, hip-hop beats, and rock charisma, its St. Patrick’s Day shows have been raucous touchstones of identity for a certain subset of the tangentially, momentarily Irish.

And, for the more determinedly Irish, the band’s regular shows in the nineties along the East Coast were rites of passage of another sort. Named for the worst year of the Irish potato famine, Black 47 has consistently delivered a strident political message in the dynamic cacophony of its sound. With songs about the revolutionary leader Michael Collins, the socialist hero James Connolly, and the hunger-strike protester Bobby Sands, the band introduced a generation to the history that shaped Eire.

Black 47 was started by Larry Kirwan, an East Village rocker and playwright and from County Wexford, and Chris Byrne, a New York City police officer with a thing for Donegal, the Uillean Pipes, and rapping. In the mid- and late nineties, the group rode the band to major-labels deals, late-night-TV appearances, and stadium-concert heights, before upheaval in the record business and changing tastes slowed them down. Byrne left amicably the band in 2000 to work on his own music, but Black 47 carried on before calling it quits last November, playing a show in Manhattan on the precise day of its first gig, twenty-five years earlier.

Kirwan, in addition to having led the band, writes plays and novels. Many of his musical compositions are first-person adventures with a singular point of view, and his playwriting skews beyond the ordinary, too. His most recent play, “Hard Times: An American Musical,” puts the composer Stephen Foster in a Five Points bar during the summer of 1863 and reframes his classic tunes though the eyes and ears of the Irish Americans and African-American immigrants who lived in the gang-ridden neighborhood.

Kirwan would never consider giving up performing, and tonight he’s at the Cutting Room, in Manhattan. The transition to life after his band has been abrupt. “I had been so intent on finishing up Black 47 on a high note with recording and constant touring that I hadn’t given any thought to solo work,” he told me recently. “Then, on my first solo gig in Ireland—days after Black 47’s last show, I realized I was playing the acoustic guitar like a Stratocaster. In other words, there was no going back.”

To mark St. Patrick’s Day, I asked Kirwan if there was one song that was especially influential or meaningful to him. “I would have to say it’s still ‘Patriot Game’ and especially the version by Liam Clancy in the ‘Live from Carnegie Hall’ album from 1962,” he said. “Clancy’s delivery is chilling and still a thing of wonder. Which begs the question of why political songwriting is either so obvious or anemic of late?”

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For Black 47, the Pipes Are Calling

By Michael Malone

• Nov. 7, 2014

Larry Kirwan stood at the microphone in his well-traveled green suede shoes. Fighting bronchitis, he sipped his Jameson’s whiskey with honey and surveyed the crowd. His band, Black 47 , has had 2,300 performances over the years. It moved from humble origins playing in Irish pubs in the Bronx to appearing on David Letterman’s show and playing in stadiums.

But on this cool October night, only a dozen shows remained before the band calls it quits after 25 years, and the gig at Emmett’s Castle , a pub on the grounds of a golf course in Pearl River, N.Y., was something new. About 100 people were there, and perhaps a third of them appeared dressed for golf, maybe expecting to hear Irish ditties about green fields and whiskey on Sundays and the bustle of dear old Dublin.

Mr. Kirwan, 66, has said he is looking forward to resting his ragged voice and his beaten body. Black 47’s final show will be on Nov. 15, at B.B. King Blues Club & Grill in Midtown Manhattan, but the band does not seem to know how to phone it in. At the Pearl River show, Mr. Kirwan strapped on his Stratocaster and set his whiskey on an amp. “Welcome to our very first golf club gig,” he told the crowd. “We thought we’d done everything.”

The band — with horns and pipes, sounding like a New Orleans marching band crashing an Irish pub — launched into “Elvis Murphy.” Men in the audience spun women like tops. Young ladies step-danced like pistons. Beer spilled. The golf people looked on curiously.

The impish Mr. Kirwan smiled. In a matter of days, this would all be over. And after that, who knows?

The characters in Black 47’s songs are primarily Irish immigrants making their way in New York, an experience Mr. Kirwan knows intimately. Jim Kirwan, Larry’s father, was in the merchant marine, and when he would return home to County Wexford in southeastern Ireland, he would bring tango and calypso records from far-off ports. Larry’s mother loved opera. Traditional music — ballads conveying local history — was all around.

It piqued a curiosity about the world, and when Mr. Kirwan immigrated to New York in the early 1970s, he was instantly stimulated.

“In Ireland, everyone’s Irish,” he said. “It was not that way here.”

He worked in construction, typed papers for N.Y.U. students and teamed up with a boyhood friend, Pierce Turner, in the new-wave band Major Thinkers , which had a minor hit with a song called “Avenue B.” He and Mr. Turner became the house band at the Bells of Hell, a Greenwich Village bar owned by the Irish author-actor-raconteur Malachy McCourt . By the mid-80s, Mr. Kirwan had shifted away from music to be a playwright. He wrote feverishly in his downtown apartment, and one day he felt the need to get out, get air, and hear Irish music and Irish voices. Walking up Second Avenue, he heard both spilling out of a bar on East 28th Street called Paddy Reilly’s .

There was a “trad” Irish band playing. Its piper, Chris Byrne, grew up on Staten Island and Brooklyn but spent summers in Donegal, Ireland, where he discovered the uilleann pipes , an Irish cousin of the bagpipes.

A police officer by day, Mr. Byrne recognized Mr. Kirwan from the music scene and brought him on stage. After, Mr. Byrne mentioned that his band was breaking up. Mr. Kirwan offered his services. He also suggested the name Black 47, a reference to the famine that decimated Ireland in 1847. It was ominous, political and Irish. Mr. Byrne loved it.

The pair took their act to the Bronx in late 1989, where live music flourished in the pubs. Their first performance preceded a speech by the Irish activist Bernadette Devlin McAliskey .

Back then, Mr. Kirwan, who had bright red hair and large glasses, would smash into the pub door with his amp and demand the televisions go off. “It was war the minute we walked in,” Mr. Kirwan said. “The bartender would say, ‘The lads are watching the match,’ ” Mr. Kirwan recalled. With a bit of profanity, he would instruct the bartender otherwise. “They’re here,” he would say, “to see Black 47.”

Songs were stage dramas in miniature — fleshed-out characters with full story arcs. “I wanted to write about New York,” Mr. Kirwan said. “The cops, the construction workers, the junkies, the nannies, the immigrants — the Bronx, the Lower East Side.” Other songs were intensely political, depicting historical figures, such as the Irish labor leader James Connolly.

Mr. Byrne loved hip-hop. Mr. Kirwan came from punk. The blend was by all accounts chaotic. “It was something you’d hear standing in the middle of the street in Jamaica, Queens, coming out of the apartment windows,” said Mike Farragher , longtime music critic for The Irish Voice.

Yet according to Mr. Byrne, Black 47 was “proactively” despised. “If you don’t like the band, you just leave the bar,” he said. “But instead of just leaving, they’d come over and tell you how much you suck.”

The Beatles had Hamburg; Black 47 had the Bronx. There were more pubs than bands along Bainbridge Avenue; when Black 47 was fired from one place, band members hauled their gear next door. They did four sets a night. After a few months in the Bronx, Black 47 headed to Paddy Reilly’s. Thomas Hamlin, who played with Mr. Kirwan in Major Thinkers, came to watch with a trombone player, Fred Parcells; the two ended up sitting in. “It became a casual ‘we’ll stop by with our instruments’ kind of thing,” Mr. Hamlin said. “You never quite knew who would be there.”

Performances were loose but impassioned, fueled by Mr. Kirwan’s steely belief in his songs. “We didn’t rehearse the songs, we just did them,” he said. “When a new one wouldn’t go well, I’d just take a swig of my pint.” If there was a point in the band’s history that seemed to signal a chance at fame, it was when Vin Scelsa, host of the influential radio program “Idiot’s Delight,” was given a vinyl copy of Black 47’s “ Funky Ceili .” Mr. Scelsa said he played it “over and over and over” on his program on 92.3 FM. He grew even more enamored after seeing Black 47 at Paddy Reilly’s. “I was just blown away,” Mr. Scelsa said. “And I’d never had Irish cider like that before.”

Back when radio was a force in launching bands, people flocked to Paddy Reilly’s on Mr. Scelsa’s word. That included Pete Ganbarg, then senior director of artists and repertoire at SBK Records. “It was as if Springsteen and Shane MacGowan” — the lead singer of the punk Irish band the Pogues — “had this illegitimate love child,” Mr. Ganbarg said. “This combination of uilleann pipes and bodhran and the stench of Avenue B — it was something I’d never heard before.”

Mr. Ganbarg, now an executive vice president at Atlantic Records, said he was “almost magnetically pulled” to see Black 47 again a few days later. “The more I listened, the more mesmerized I became,” he said.

Neil Young and Brad Pitt and Matt Dillon would turn up, the bar manager, Steve Duggan, said. Mr. Scelsa saw Joe Strummer of the Clash at a Black 47 gig and yelled to him: “The Clash! The only band that matters!” To which Mr. Strummer replied: “Black 47! The only band that matters!”

Black 47 signed with SBK. The album, “Fire of Freedom,” released in March 1993, had Paddy Reilly’s on the cover. Songs included “Living in America,” a duet about the courtship of an Irish demolition worker and a nanny, to the tune of the traditional ballad “The Foggy Dew”; and the infectious “Funky Ceili,” about a troubadour who is exiled to New York by his lover’s father after he gets her pregnant. “Does the baby look like me, Bridie?” wails Mr. Kirwan. “Has he got red hair and glasses?”

Perhaps no song better captured the Black 47 ethos than the title track, a reggae number that rips racism and religion, promises “blood on the streets” to lying politicians, and has a refrain sung in Gaelic. “Funky Ceili” spent a few weeks on Billboard’s Modern Rock Top 30 in early 1993. In April, the band was on “ Late Night With David Letterman .” The word among fans: See Black 47 at Paddy Reilly’s while you still can.

Indeed, there were huge concerts. They played Farm Aid at Iowa State’s 55,000-seat football stadium, and a half-dozen times at Shea Stadium after Mets games on Irish Night. “We played Shea more than the Beatles did,” Mr. Kirwan said with a smile.

A second album, “Home of the Brave,” was released in 1994, featuring a reimagining of “Danny Boy” into a rap about a gay Irishman living in Woodside, Queens, who stands up to bigots and ultimately succumbs to AIDS.

But what followed was a merging of record labels, a new boss and, suddenly, said Mr. Byrne, “They don’t have your poster on the wall anymore.”

Mr. Ganbarg recalled the albums with abundant fondness and some lament. “We just assumed they’d be the biggest band in the world,” he said. “Maybe we had visions that were too grand for the Walmart masses.”

Black 47 played on, finding a new home at a pub in Midtown, Connolly’s, and recording for a string of independent labels. There were dark moments: An off-duty police officer, Christopher Gargan, committed suicide at a St. Patrick’s Day show in 1996. The band’s sound engineer, Johnny Byrne, died in a fall from an apartment window. The Black 47 van rolled over on an icy stretch of I-95; band members were lucky enough to walk to a nearby state police barracks. Chris Byrne, with four young children and his own band, left Black 47 amicably in 2000.

Throughout the difficulties, Mr. Kirwan continued to record New York history. Tracks on the band’s 2007 album, “Iraq,” were inspired by letters from the band’s fans who were fighting overseas. But the city was changing, and gigs were harder to come by. Black 47 went from up to 90 performances a year in the mid-2000s to two dozen last year. The pubs that used to be filled with live music have opted for D.J.s, and sky-high rents have made bar owners risk-averse. The decision to call it quits came following a festival in Buffalo last year. The band had never sounded better, said Mr. Kirwan, who liked the idea of going out on top. His bandmates, for the most part, agreed with the decision. An album, fittingly called “Last Call,” came out in March.

Fans say they figured Black 47 would go on forever. Seamus Keane said his band, the Narrowbacks (which opened for Black 47 last month at Emmett’s Castle), might never have started had its members not grown up with Black 47’s music. He said he was already thinking about St. Patrick’s Day without a Black 47 show. “It’s like the uncle or aunt you see at one holiday each year that passes away,” Mr. Keane said. “You kind of forget they won’t be there the next year.”

Others lament the loss of the rare band that still practices unflinching activism. Younger bands, for the most part, don’t aspire to change the world, said the activist singer-songwriter Billy Bragg. “If you wanted to listen to the voice of your generation, you listened to music,” Mr. Bragg said. “Now you go to Twitter, you go to Facebook. I salute Black 47; I’m sorry to see them go.”

Black 47 leaves behind 14 albums, its songs set in all five boroughs. As Mr. Kirwan sang of the Irishman with AIDS in “Danny Boy,” he has no regrets. “I wasn’t real impressed by the fame thing,” Mr. Kirwan said. “I knew it for what it was. You enjoy it, and it moves on to someone else. It was always about the music for us — music and politics.”

During an extended instrumental break during the show in Pearl River, Mr. Kirwan shuffled offstage to a private barroom. Alone, he held a towel to his face and did not move for half a minute. For the first time all night, he looked his 66 years.

Fans delivered the motions that go with Black 47’s best-known songs. During “James Connolly,” a defiant fist in the air. For “Funky Ceili,” middle fingers for the man who booted the young rover to New York. Turning his phone toward the fans, Fred Parcells, the band’s unofficial archivist, shot video. Brandy Kish, a freckled 38-year-old, step-danced as if gravity did not exist. She first saw Black 47 in 1993, sneaking into Paddy Reilly’s as a teenager. “I fell in love with the band’s energy,” she said. “Seeing them tonight brings back the feeling of friends and family and everything is good.”

Two hours after starting, the boys of Black 47 took a collective bow. The crowd’s chant for more was drowned out by the D. J. cuing up “Sweet Caroline.” The TVs came back on. What was left of the golf people headed out. Back in the private barroom, Mr. Kirwan sat on a stool, yanked off his shoes — “Green Suede Shoes” is the name of both a Black 47 album and the singer’s 2005 memoir — and accepted an envelope from Emmett Woods, the bar’s owner.

Kirwan’s face displayed something between a smile and a grimace. “My voice hurt from the first note,” he said.

Larry Kirwan sums up Black 47's legendary career

Larry kirwan looks back at the ups and downs of black 47's iconic 25-year career that was born out of a late-night saloon conversation..

Larry Kirwan concludes his chronicles "of a band who started out rockin’ Bainbridge Avenue in The Bronx and ended up adding to the universal message of faith, hope, and freedom."

Editor's Note: In previous weeks, Larry Kirwan and IrishCentral looked back album by album on the history of Black 47 and their rise to fame. Below is the nineteenth and final installment of the series. The previous installment in the series, "Larry Kirwan discusses 'Rise Up,' a compilation of Black 47's 'political' songs," can be read here . 

The following was written by Larry Kirwan on August 14th, 2020:

Black 47 began with a late-night saloon conversation between Chris Byrne and myself about music. By the dawn, we’d formed a band, and soon thereafter began playing in the Irish pubs around Bainbridge Avenue in the Bronx. Within a couple of months, we were in the studio recording songs like the somewhat prophetic Too Late To Turn Back, and a year later we were opening for The Pogues at Brixton Academy for their Christmas show.

To say the journey from that initial conversation was dizzying would be an understatement. Over the next 25 years, we did around 2,500 gigs through a tragic shooting, a near-fatal van crash, the death of our soundman/recording engineer Johnny Byrne, and all manner of personal ups and downs. We also appeared on every major TV show, were written up by most media outlets, and recorded 16 CDs; luckily I took notes soon after finishing each CD. Over the last couple of years, I revisited those notes and commented on them in a series of articles for IrishCentral. Some of the notes were prescient, others hilarious and embarrassing in their ambition, but all were written in the flush of the moment and truthful.

Read More: And so it goes…"Last Call" for Black 47

Chris Byrne said to me on Black 47’s final night at BB King’s, “We were the band with no plan.” And he was right – to a large extent. We didn’t have any great notions of “making it” or of even being part of show-business. But through the fog of alcohol in our first conversation, I do remember our intention of being original and political. And with those ambitions, we headed to The Bronx and the reality of playing to pubs full of nannies and construction workers who didn’t give a fiddler’s for any such highfalutin concepts.

What was Black 47’s music like? To this day I still can’t describe it except to say we didn’t sound like anyone else. Part of that was because we didn’t rehearse. New songs were worked out on stage in front of unforgiving audiences. You needed a lot of attitude to pull off something like that and Black 47 was never short of ‘tude. As new members were integrated, they had to figure out their own parts in the arrangements. In the studio, I’d sometimes help polish these parts but onstage it was every man – and occasionally woman – for themselves. Add to this the fact that we never played the same set twice in 2,500 gigs and you’ll get the idea of organized musical abandon, but never chaos.  

There was no dress or conduct code for Black 47, just a requirement that you put 120% into the music from the first song to the last encore. We took our moods onstage and worked them out through the music – no false smiles or phony introductions. The intensity could be sometimes off-putting for the uninitiated, but what did you expect from musicians most of whom had cut their teeth in CBGB ‘s and Max’s Kansas City. And yet we forged an incredible bond with our audience.

Many came for the political songs like James Connolly, Time To Go, Black 47, Bobby Sands MP that tended to be explosive without advocating violence. Others came for the party, for when Black 47 came to town it was a communal celebration with songs like Funky Ceili, Rockin’ The Bronx, Salsa O’Keefe, et al.

Read More:   "One hell of a compilation" - Larry Kirwan's Celtic Invasion

The political songs were there to make people think. There was an understandable folk hatred of Britain in Irish America. The forebears of many in our audience had left during An Gorta Mór. Our songs helped to channel and refine that hatred into political thought and action. In that, we were part of an overall movement that led to the Good Friday Peace Agreement. We also caused a change in social attitudes with songs like Danny Boy that cast the iconic Daniel as a kick-ass Gay Irish construction worker, much to the chagrin of Irish promoters back in 1993 and for many years after. Our influences included Reggae, Funk, Latin-Jazz, and our bass player and road manager for a long time were African-American so there was no doubt where our sympathies lay. One of our popular songs was about Paul Robeson (the greatest American), and his face adorned our stage banner for many years.

Darker days were to come. In 2003, we came out strongly against the invasion of Iraq and began writing songs about the conflict. For the next four years, we were the only band who insisted on singing about the war every night. We lost many gigs and friends through that but what could you do? We were Black 47! To us, it was the height of patriotism to resist your government when you know it’s wrong – not just toe the line like Rock ‘n’ Roll puppets. Eventually, the country came around to our point of view and audiences began dancing to Downtown Baghdad Blues, not walking out during its first notes.

The highlights – there were so many – meeting Johnny Cash, Joe Strummer championing us and declaring “Black 47 is the only band that matters,” co-producing Fire of Freedom with Rick Ocasek and learning so much from his artistry, but mostly being privileged to play with band members like Chris Byrne, Thomas Hamlin, Geoffrey Blythe, Fred Parcells, David Conrad, Kevin Jenkins, Andrew Goodsight, Joseph Mulvanerty, Joseph “Bearclaw Burcaw,” and Andrew Sharp. I often trumpet our improvisational chops but take a listen to the musical sophistication of Big Fellah (Michael Collins), a song that incorporates influences from The Lament of Art O’Leary through opera, punk, classical, jazz, you name it. Oddly enough this song was featured for three minutes in the FX show Sons of Anarchy. You never know where you end up when you’re original.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the ladies of Black 47 who graced us with their friendship, laughter, and the luster of their talents, Mary Courtney, I Two Deborah Berg & Sherryl Marshall, Mary Martello, Claudette Sierra, Rosanne Cash, Christine Ohlman, Suzzy Roche, Nora Shanahan, Rozz Moorehead,  Ashley Davis, Kathleen Vesey Fee, Screaming Orphans, Oona Roche, Terry Donnelly, Eileen Ivers, and Joanie Madden.

So many musicians added to our sound including Mike Fazio, Ric Ocasek, Jerry Harrison, David Johansen, Tony DeMarco, Seamus Egan, Mick Moloney, Malachy McCourt, Copernicus, and Rev. Ian Paisley.

And how can you forget the road managers and technical crew who shared everything with us - Johnny Byrne, Tom Gartland, Nico Wormworth, Jon Carter, John Murray, P2, Joey “Knobs” Juntunen, Cathal Moore, and George Kornienko. And but a small collection of those who stuck with us through thick and thin - Tom Schneider, Monsignor Steve Duggan, Pete Ganbarg, Vin Scelsa, Elliot Roberts, Brian McCabe, Paul Hill, Staten Island Tom Marlow, and our dear Phyllis Kronhaus.

But most of all, thanks to the legion of fans and friends from all over the world who supported us on our unlikely journey. And finally, a thank you to Fran Mulraney and Kerry O’Shea who encouraged me to tell this story of a band who started out rockin’ Bainbridge Avenue in The Bronx and ended up adding to the universal message of faith, hope, and freedom.

Read More: Drive on and Rock on with Black 47's "A Funky Céilí"

Larry Kirwan was the leader of Black 47 for 25 years. He is also a playwright, novelist, and a columnist for The Irish Echo. He is the host of Celtic Crush on SiriusXM Satellite Radio and was President of Irish American Writers & Artists for five years. He can be reached at [email protected] and Black 47's website .

This article was submitted to the IrishCentral contributors network by a member of the global Irish community. To become an IrishCentral contributor click here .

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New Musical Desert Rose , From Black 47 Rocker Larry Kirwan, Aims for Broadway

Larry Kirwan, the lead singer of the rock band Black 47, is taking his talents to the theatrical stage. He is writing the book, music and lyrics for  Desert Rose , a new rock musical romance set during the Iraq War, which is aiming to bow on Broadway during the 2021-2022 season.

Inspired by the 2006 Black 47 album Iraq , the events of Desert Rose are set in motion when a former soldier running for Congress in 2016 finds the unsolved death of his hometown friend during their time in Iraq under a microscope. Fueled by the rock and hip-hop songs that were popular for Iraq War soldiers, Desert Rose is described as an “uplifting, rock musical exploring war, international conflict, heroism, love (unconditional and unrequited), sacrifice, betrayal and eventual redemption.” Former Broadway advertising executive Peter LeDonne will produce the new show.

Apart from his groundbreaking work with Black 47, who spearheaded the Celtic Rock movement, Kirwan also hosts Celtic Crush on SiriusXM, writes a bi-weekly column for the Irish Echo , and is president of Irish-American Writers & Artists. He was born in Wexford, Ireland and emigrated to New York City. With the new wave band Major Thinkers, he recorded for Epic Records and toured extensively with Cyndi Lauper among others. In 1989, he formed Black 47, known for kinetic live shows and unique hybrid of political and street savvy songs; it was named the Best Irish American Band of the Decade by The Irish Central Music Poll. Fueled by their MTV hit “Funky Céilí,” the band launched a 25-year career of 2500 live shows, 15 albums and popular late night talk show TV appearances. Kirwan has also released two solo albums, Kilroy Was Here and Keltic Kids . A writer since 1985, he has also written plays, including Liverpool Fantasy , the novel Rockin’ The Bronx , a memoir entitled Green Suede Shoes and more. Kirwan is the subject of an upcoming documentary film, also titled Green Suede Shoes , that is produced by LeDonne and directed by Chuck Braverman.

Kirwan will premiere songs from Desert Rose in the online event From Wexford to Broadway , premiering on YouTube, Vimeo, Instagram and Facebook on Wednesday, October 14 at 7PM ET. Also featuring clips from the Green Suede Shoes film, the event will be moderated by Peter Chiovarou, Director of Community Programming and College Events at the Zlock Performing Arts Center on the campus of Bucks County Community College.

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• discography

ASK THE BAND

Q. What is the origin of the band's name? A. Black 47 is named after the worst year of the Irish Potato Famine 1845-47.

Q. Do I need the band's permission to record a live show? A. Black 47 encourages fans to record (audio and video) its performances. Each gig is different. The band has never done the same set twice. So tape away to your heart's content and feel free to pass the results along to others - just don't sell them.

Q. What is translation of "tiocfaidh ár lá" ? A. Our day will come.

Q. What is the translation of "tabhair dom do lámh" ? A. "Give me your hand ", or " Let's be friends".

Q. What is the translation of " Oró, sé do bheatha abhaile Anois ar theacht an tsamhraidh" A. roughly means Welcome home now that summer is coming. It's from a song written in 1914 by Padraig Pearse welcoming back all the Irish from overseas (with emphasis on those serving in the British Army) to fight for the freedom of their country.

Q. What's the translation of "Faugh a ballaugh "? A. This is anglicized Gaelic meaning "Clear the road " or " Get out of the way". It's on the new Black 47 sticker and on the back of one of our t-shirts. It's also the battle cry of the Fighting Irish 69th Regiment made famous in the American Civil War.

Q. What's the connection with Shea Stadium, Black 47 and the Beatles? A. Black 47's first appearance at Shea was on August 15, 1995, thirty years after the Beatles historical concert at the same venue. Black 47 has played Shea Stadium more times than the Beatles, plus that band from Liverpool never had the almighty Mets open for them. For more information read Larry Kirwan's Liverpool Fantasy for an update on how that band from Liverpool is doing now.

Q. Did the police shut down the city of Hoboken, New Jersey as a result of a Black 47 concert? A. Black 47 did cause the bars of Hoboken to be closed down for an evening with the result that thousands of their fans were sent packing from the town. For more details, listen to the story in the song Green Suede Shoes or read all about it in the book of the same name.

Q. When did the band start? A. Black 47 played its first gig in October, 1989. If you saw the band before then, you were hallucinating or in some form of prophetic trance.

Q. Wasn't there a cop in the band? A. Yes, Chris Byrne, a founding member of Black 47, was a member of the NYPD. He now fronts the band, Seanchaí and the Unity Squad. They can be seen most Fridays and Saturdays at Rocky Sullivan's on 34 Van Dyke Street Brooklyn, NY 11231.

Q. Do you guys know my father/bookie/friend/landlord/parole officer....? A. Yes, we do know your "uncle from the Bronx" and probably did "get drunk with him". Some of us may have even known your Aunt, but that's a different kettle of fish.

Q. Didn't I see the band on television? A. Yes, Black 47 has played many major television appearances including The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, Late Show with David Letterman, Late Night with Conan O'Brien and not to forget Gay Byrne's Late Late Show in Ireland.

Q. How did David Letterman describe the uilleann pipes? A. "A sofa cushion hooked up to a stick"

Q. Does the band still have a residency in New York City? A. Black 47 plays Connolly's on West 45th St. on an occasional Saturday. But always check our tour schedule to confirm.

Q. Was your sax player in Dexy's Midnight Runners? A. Yes, Geoffrey Blythe was a founding member of Dexy's Midnight Runners but had split with most other members to form The Bureau before C'mon Eileen was recorded; be careful introducing this subject. Onstage with Black 47 he plays soprano and tenor Saxophones. He does not play the clarinet onstage but does occasionally on recordings, along with the baritone saxophone.

Q. Do you have a bugle player? A. Fred Parcells does not play the "bugle." His main instrument is the slide trombone. He also plays various tin whistles. He is not a plumber or a hit man although his trombone case might suggest otherwise.

Q. Your piper doesn't breathe into his instrument. Are they electronic bagpipes? A. These are the bagpipes native to Ireland, known as uilleann pipes or union pipes. It's just old school 18th century technology.

Q. I heard Larry Kirwan's guitars were obtained from some famous players. A. Yes, his brown Fender Strat was originally owned by Buddy Holly; his blue Strat was the one used by Hendrix on Purple Haze. He also owns a bridge in Brooklyn that he's considering putting on the market soon.

Q. Is the song "Funky Ceili" based on a true story? A. Mr. Kirwan was uncharacteristically silent when asked about the veracity of the Funky Ceili/Bridie and the baby story. After lowering some pints of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, however, he was heard to mutter: "all truth is relative." And while on delicate matters, he rarely visits Bensonhurst, Brooklyn since a painful encounter with her brothers at Maria's Wedding.

Q. Is the song "Czechoslovakia" based on a true story? A. The song Czechoslovakia is not only true, but the actual story is even stranger and too complicated to fit into a four-minute song.

Q. Why do you run down Michael Collins in your song "Big Fellah"? A. Big Fellah does not "run down" Michael Collins. It merely looks at a great man through the eyes of some admirers who fought on the Republican side in the Irish Civil War. The death of Collins was one of Ireland's greatest tragedies. What a different country it would have been had Collins lived.

Q. After hearing the song "Born to be Free," I couldn't find any references to Paul Robeson in Irish history. How can I learn more about him? A. Paul Robeson is not - as certain reviewers felt - one of Ireland's greatest heroes. In fact, he may well be the greatest American.

Q. Tea of coffee? A. Our sound engineer, John Murray, does enjoy a cup of tea, Bewley's if you please.

Q. Why does Black 47 forbid all mention of Marc Bolan’s T-Rex when driving? A. Because band members were in deep discussion of T-Rex and Marc’s untimely demise in a motor accident when they hit black ice on Route 95 in Feb. 1996 and overturned.

Steven Tyler, Aerosmith announce rescheduled farewell concert tour: New dates and ticket info

Aerosmith will be back in the saddle again this fall.

The veteran rockers, who postponed their Peace Out farewell tour after only a few shows in September, will return for a 40-date run starting Sept. 20 in Pittsburgh. The tour wraps Feb. 26, 2025 in Buffalo, NY.

The bulk of the dates are rescheduled, but the band added three cities: Pittsburgh, Orlando and Philadelphia, where their goodbye run kicked off last September.

All previously purchased tickets will be honored for the new dates, while tickets for the new shows will go on sale at 10 a.m. local time April 12 via ticketmaster.com . For those who previously purchased tickets and cannot attend the rescheduled concerts, refunds will be available at point of purchase. A series of VIP packages are also available at aerosmith.com/VIP.

As with the original dates, The Black Crowes will open for Aerosmith.

More: Aerosmith Peace Out: See the setlist for the iconic band's farewell tour

Why did Aerosmith postpone their farewell tour?

After playing only a handful of concerts in September, the “Walk This Way” heroes had to hit pause after singer Steven Tyler damaged his vocal cords. He also fractured his larynx and was given doctor’s orders not to sing for 30 days.

But Aerosmith opted to give Tyler ample time to recuperate and scuttle all of their shows until 2024.

The wiry frontman known for his searing rock yowls, said at the time that the injury occurred at a Sept. 10 show in New York and that the vocal cord damage “led to subsequent bleeding.”

What songs can fans expect to hear at Aerosmith’s farewell shows?

USA TODAY was there for opening night of the Peace Out tour Sept. 3 in Philadelphia. As the tour is also a celebration of the band’s 50 years in the music industry, the setlist reflected their vast catalog.

The band – Tyler, guitarist Joe Perry, bassist Tom Hamilton and guitarist Brad Whitford, along with drummer John Douglas filling in for Joey Kramer – sounded in peak form for their deserved victory lap.

Songs ranged from singalong rock smashes “Livin’ on the Edge,” “Sweet Emotion” and “Rag Doll” to the rarely played album track “Adam’s Apple” and a dip into Aerosmith’s blues roots with “Hangman Jury.”

More: The Black Keys ditch insecurities and enlist Beck, Noel Gallagher, hip-hop on new album

AEROSMITH PEACE OUT 2024 TOUR DATES: 

Sept. 20 – Pittsburgh – PPG Paints Arena (NEW SHOW)*

Sept. 23 – Philadelphia  – Wells Fargo Center (NEW SHOW)

Sept. 26 – Louisville, KY – KFC Yum! Center    

Sept. 29 – Cleveland  – Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse 

Oct. 2 – Charlotte, NC – Spectrum Center

Oct. 5 – Knoxville, TN – Thompson-Boling Arena 

Oct. 8 – Washington – Capital One Arena

Oct. 11 – Atlanta – State Farm Arena

Oct. 14 – St Louis – Enterprise Center

Oct. 17 – Cincinnati  – Heritage Bank Arena

Oct. 20 – Nashville, TN  – Bridgestone Arena

Oct. 31 – Phoenix  – Footprint Center

Nov. 3 – San Antonio - Frost Bank Center

Nov. 6 – Austin, TX – Moody Center

Nov. 9 – Dallas– American Airlines Center

Nov. 12 – Tulsa, OK – BOK Center

Nov. 15 – Omaha, NE – CHI Health Center

Nov. 18 – Denver– Ball Arena    

Nov. 21 – Portland, OR – Moda Center 

Nov. 24 – Seattle – Climate Pledge Arena

Nov. 27 – Salt Lake City– Vivint Arena

Nov. 30 – San Francisco– Chase Center

Dec. 4 – San Jose, CA – SAP Center               

Dec. 7 – Los Angeles– The Kia Forum

Dec. 28 – Newark, NJ - Prudential Center 

Dec. 31 – Boston – TD Garden

Jan. 4 – Detroit - Little Caesars Arena       

Jan. 7 – Toronto – Scotiabank Arena 

Jan. 10 – Montreal – Bell Centre

Jan. 13 – Columbus, OH – Schottenstein Center  

Jan. 16 – Indianapolis – Gainbridge Fieldhouse 

Jan. 19 – Chicago – United Center

Jan. 22 – St Paul, MN – Xcel Energy Center

Jan. 25 – Kansas City, MO – T-Mobile Center

Feb. 11 – Orlando, FL – Kia Center (NEW SHOW)

Feb. 14 – Tampa, FL – Amalie Arena

Feb. 17 – Sunrise, FL – Amerant Bank Arena

Feb. 20 – Raleigh, NC – PNC Arena 

Feb. 23 – New York – Madison Square Garden

Feb. 26 – Buffalo, NY – KeyBank Center  

* Teddy Swims Joining as Special Guest, The Black Crowes not appearing

Aerosmith, The Black Crowes announce new tour dates. Get tickets to Indianapolis concert

The long-anticipated Aerosmith "Peace Out: Farewell Tour" is back after a postponement due to a vocal injury to Steven Tyler, the lead singer.

Aerosmith announced new tour dates on April 10, and the "Peace Out" tour, featuring The Black Crowes, will rock the Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis on Jan. 16, 2025, towards the end of tour dates. The tour begins on Sept. 20 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and concludes on Feb. 26, 2025, in Buffalo, New York.

The tour, which kicked off in September 2023, was postponed due to a vocal injury experienced by lead singer. The band posted on Instagram on Sept. 29, 2023, telling fans shows wouldn't continue until 2024.

"To our fans: Unfortunately, Steven’s vocal injury is more serious than initially thought. His doctor has confirmed that in addition to the damage to his vocal cords, he fractured his larynx which requires ongoing care. He is receiving the best medical treatment available to ensure his recovery is swift, but given the nature of a fracture, he is being told patience is essential," according to the caption.

Indianapolis concerts: Maroon 5 and Maren Morris will return to the Indy area this summer. How to get tickets

The band posted again on April 10 revealing new tour dates.  "All previously purchased tickets will be honored for the rescheduled shows – you’ll receive more info via email. Tickets for the rescheduled dates & newly added shows go on sale Fri 4/12 @ 10AM local at aerosmith.com," according to the caption.

Aerosmith and The Black Crowes is scheduled for 7 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 16, 2025, at the Gainbridge Fieldhouse, located at 125 S Pennsylvania St. in Indianapolis. Tickets go on sale on Friday at 10 a.m. Click here to learn more.

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Entertainment, rock trailblazer heart reunites for a world tour and a new song.

Mark Kennedy

Associated Press

FILE - Nancy Wilson, left, and Ann Wilson, right, of the band Heart perform as Heart is inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame during the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony at the Nokia Theatre on Thursday, April 18, 2013 in Los Angeles. Heart the pioneering band that melds Nancy Wilsons shredding guitar with her sister Anns powerhouse vocals is hitting the road this spring for a world tour that Nancy Wilson describes as the full-on rocker size. (Photo by Danny Moloshok/Invision/AP, File)

NEW YORK – Heart — the pioneering band that melds Nancy Wilson’s shredding guitar with her sister Ann’s powerhouse vocals — is hitting the road this spring and fall for a world tour that Nancy Wilson describes as “the full-on rocker size.”

“I’ve been strengthening. I’ve got my trainer,” she says. “You go one day at a time and you strengthen one workout session at a time. It’s a lot of work, but it’s the only job I know how to do.”

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The Rock & Roll Hall of Famers who gave us classic tracks like “Magic Man,” “Crazy on You” and “Alone” will be playing all the hits, some tracks from of their solo albums — like Ann Wilson's “Miss One and Only” and Nancy Wilson's “Love Mistake” — and a new song called “Roll the Dice.”

“I like to say we have really good problems because the problem we have is to choose between a bunch of different, really cool songs that people love already,” says Nancy Wilson.

Like “Barracuda,” a sonic burst which first appeared on the band’s second album, “Little Queen” and is one of the band’s most memorable songs.

“You can’t mess with ‘Barracuda.’ It’s just the way it is. It is great. You get on the horse and you ride. It’s a galloping steed of a ride to go on. And for everybody, including the band."

The tour kicks off Saturday at the Bon Secours Wellness Arena in Greenville, South Carolina, and will hit cities including Atlanta, Boston, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Milwaukee, Cleveland, Detroit, as well as the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival and Red Rocks Amphitheater in Morrison, Colorado. International dates include stops in London, Oslo, Berlin, Stockholm, Montreal and Glasgow.

The band's Royal Flush Tour will have Cheap Trick as the opening act for many stops, but Def Leppard and Journey will join for three stadium dates in Cleveland, Toronto and Boston this summer.

Ann and Nancy Wilson will be filled out by Ryan Wariner (lead and rhythm guitar), Ryan Waters (guitars), Paul Moak (guitars, keyboards and backing vocals), Tony Lucido (bass and backing vocals) and Sean T. Lane (drums).

The tour is the first in several years for Heart, which was rocked by a body blow in 2016 when Ann Wilson’s husband was arrested for assaulting Nancy’s 16-year-old twin sons. Nancy Wilson says that's all in the past.

“We can take any kind of turbulence, me and Ann, and we’ve always been OK together,” she says. “We’re still steering the ship and happy to do it together. So we’re tight.”

The new tour will take them to Canada, which was warm to the band when they were starting out as what Nancy Wilson calls “a couple of chicks from Seattle.” She recalls Vancouver embracing Heart, and touring in one van across Canada in the dead of winter on two lane highways.

The Wilson sisters broke rock's glass ceiling in the '70s and Nancy Wilson says they only had male influences to look to, like Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones and the Moody Blues.

Now she says she looks out and loves seeing generations of female rockers. “You have boygenius and you have Billie Eilish and you have Olivia Rodrigo and so many amazing women — Maggie Rogers and Sheryl Crow, who calls us her big influence. And then Billie Eilish might have Sheryl Crow as her influence. So it’s a really nice legacy to pass along. I like to say we’re the OG — the original gangsters — of women and rock.”

Heart has made it into the Rock Hall, won Grammys, sold millions of albums and rocked hundreds of thousands of fans but Nancy Wilson has one place she'd still like to shine.

Next year will mark the 50th anniversary of their debut album, “Dreamboat Annie,” which was the same year that “Saturday Night Live” started. “So we’re actually kind of putting it out there — Heart never played on ‘Saturday Night Live.’ But what about the 50th birthday party with Heart?”

Mark Kennedy is at http://twitter.com/KennedyTwits

Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

Hawthorne Heights Announce Huge US Tour in 2024

I t’s been 20 years since alternative emo/pop punk band Hawthorne Heights released their debut album The Silence In Black And White , and the band is going to celebrate with an extensive US tour complete with multiple co-headliners! 

The 20 Years of Tears Tour will follow the band’s current Behind The Tears Tour and hit US cities from June to September. The bands supporting this massive tour will include I See Stars, Anberlin, Armor For Sleep, Emery, This Wild Life, Stick To Your Guns, Thursday, Cartel, and Saosin on alternating dates.

The Hawthorne Heights 2024 Tour will begin on June 22 at Stateline, Nevada at Lake Tahoe Is For Lovers Fest without any supporting acts. The tour will end on September 15 in Worcester, Massachusets at The Palladium with support from Anberlin, Cartel, Stick to Your Guns, Emery, and This Wild Life.

Tickets to the 20 Years Of Tears Tour will be available through the band’s website . Many of the new tour dates are available for presale over at Ticketmaster right now, and fans can choose between artist, Ticketmaster, Spotify, or other presale events.

Tickets will go on sale to the general public on April 19 at 10:00 am local. If you don’t want to deal with the presale events, check out Stubhub for general on-sale tickets. Stubhub is an excellent little resource for finding last-minute tickets.

This is going to be a stellar anniversary tour for pop-punk fans, so get your tickets quickly before they sell out!

Hawthorne Heights 2024 Tour Dates

June 22 – Stateline, NV – Lake Tahoe Is For Lovers

June 23 – Salt Lake City, UT – Granary Live 

June 24 – Denver, CO – Ogden Theatre 

June 27 – Milwaukee, WI – Milwaukee Summerfest 

June 28 – Chicago, IL – The Salt Shed 

June 29 – Grand Rapids, MI – Intersection Outdoors 

June 30 – Cleveland Heights, OH – Cain Park 

July 1 – Detroit, MI – The Fillmore 

July 3 – Charleston, SC – The Refinery 

July 6 – Clearwater, FL – The BayCare Sound 

July 7 – Pompano Beach, FL – Pompano Beach Amphitheater 

July 9 – Atlanta, GA – The Eastern 

July 10 – Greenville, SC – The Foundry 

July 11 – Asheville, NC – Salvage Station 

July 13 – Charleston, WV – West Virginia Is For Lovers

July 14 – Pittsburgh, PA – Stage AE 

July 16 – Silver Spring, MD – The Fillmore 

July 17 – Wallingford, CT – The Dome at Oakdale 

July 20 – Manteo, NC – OBX Is For Lovers

July 21 – Charlotte, NC – The Fillmore 

July 23 – Knoxville, TN – The Back Alley at Creekside 

July 24 – Nashville, TN – Skydeck 

July 25 – Fort Wayne, IN – The Clyde Theatre 

July 27 – Sauget, IL – Pop’s Is For Lovers

July 28 – Rogers, AR – The Walmart Amphitheater 

August 3 – Hot Springs, AR – Magic Springs Theme Park

August 8 – St. Augustine, FL – The St. Augustine Amphitheatre

August 9 – Orlando, FL – House of Blues

August 10 – Pensacola, FL – The Handlebar Outdoors 

August 12 – New Orleans, LA – The Fillmore 

August 13 – Katy, TX – Home Run Dugout 

August 14 – Austin, TX – Stubb’s Waller Creek Amphitheater 

August 16 – Kansas City, MO – Uptown Theater 

August 17 – Eau Claire, WI – Reverb Music Festival

August 18 – Superior, WI – Earth Rider Fest Grounds 

August 19 – Fargo, ND – Outdoors at Fargo Brewing 

August 21 – Green Bay, WI – Epic Event Center 

August 22 – Cedar Rapids, IA – McGrath Amphitheatre 

August 24 – Council Bluffs, IA – Iowa Is For Lovers

August 26 – Dallas, TX – Toyota Music Factory 

August 27 – San Antonio, TX – Sunken Garden Theater 

August 28 – Lubbock, TX – Lonestar Events Center 

August 31 – Los Angeles, CA – California Is For Lovers

September 1 – Phoenix, AZ – The Van Buren 

September 2 – Albuquerque, NM – Revel 

September 5 – Memphis, TN – Minglewood Hall 

September 7 – Cincinnati, OH – Ohio Is For Lovers

September 8 – Pickering, OH – Pickering Casino Resort 

September 10 – Bangor, ME – Cross Insurance Center 

September 11 – Sayreville, NJ – Starland Ballroom 

September 12 – New York, NY – Palladium Times Square 

September 13 – Harrisburg, PA – XL Live Southside Stage 

September 14 – Wayland, NY – FOrX Summer Stage 

September 15 – Worcester, MA – The Palladium 

Photo courtesy of Hawthorne Heights’ official Facebook page

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The post Hawthorne Heights Announce Huge US Tour in 2024 appeared first on American Songwriter .

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