Summer 2007
Easter Rising
Mikey Dread walked offstage amid heckles and the fading echoes of Babylon’s walls crashing. The Clash walked him back onstage for an encore, to the ear-splitting cheers of the crowd. It was the same Jamaican beat, but it seemed the crowd could stomach it more from the Clash. Then the Clash’s other friend, Pearl Harbour — of Pearl Harbour & the Explosions — came onstage with a fiddle to sing “Lose This Skin I’m Imprisoned In.” I looked around for Bob to return and tell me this sucked. But he didn’t show up until the Clash took to the stage again. He didn’t look impressed by their appearance either, but from the moment they walked onstage I was starstruck. The days of rock stardom were supposed to be as dead as the Beatles, though. So I kept a lid on the thrill of it all and acted as uninterested as Bob until they broke into the first song, “Clash City Rockers.” From that moment until the final song, “London’s Burning,” nothing else existed in the room. They did their earlier hard guitar songs, but also played rhythm and blues and more reggae rhythms. It was like they weren’t part of any one type of music and were even rebelling against the whole punk thing.
I walked out of the Orpheum soaking wet, on a post-gig high that I was starting to know well. My ears were ringing with Clash songs as I walked all the way home. I could still feel the pounding bass and drums of the rocking reggae songs. I crossed the decrepit Broadway Bridge with its parade of homeless men making their way to the Pine Street Inn. A lot of people won’t get no justice tonight. After passing a fistfight in front of the Quiet Man pub, I took Southie’s back routes through dark alleys, where I wouldn’t bump into the neighbors and friends who used to know me and thought they still did. Coming into Old Colony, I took my new route across the rooftops to avoid Kevin and his gang wheeling and dealing on the corner of Patterson Way. Remember to kick it over. No one will guide you through Armagideon time.
Excerpted from Easter Rising: An Irish American Coming Up from Under by Michael Patrick MacDonald published by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Copyright © 2006 by Michael Patrick MacDonald. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.