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The Night The Music Lived: Black 47 Brings 25 Year Career Full-Circle in NYC With The Last, Last Call

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YOU ARE HERE: HOME / DOWNSTATE / THE NIGHT THE MUSIC LIVED: BLACK 47 BRINGS 25 YEAR CAREER FULL-CIRCLEIN NYC WITH THE LAST, LAST CALL

The Night The Music Lived: Black 47Brings 25 Year Career Full-Circle inNYC With The Last, Last CallNOVEMBER 24, 2014 BY STEVE MALINSKI

The hustle and bustle of Times Square was weaving in and around 42 and 8 as usual for aSaturday night as The Bronx invaded Midtown at one floor below street level for a night filledwith the heartiest crock of Irish rock around. New York City’s Black 47 pulled out all the stopsat B.B. King’s Blues Club & Grill on November 15 for their final performance ever, markingover 2,400 shows for the band’s 25-year career (that’s more shows than the Grateful Dead

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played in 30 years). The band wouldn’t let the last guitar chord ring without first thanking theirfans with a performance that would help bring proper closure to what has meant a lot to manyof them over the years.

In one way, the night was like any other Black 47 show – good friends, intimate venue, pintsflowing, and plenty of happy dancing feet. Surely the band could have sold out a larger venuebut that would have taken away from the experience of a Black 47 show (and for the record,this show sold out early in September, more than two months beforehand). As frontman LarryKirwan told UpstateLIVE early in the fall, he sees the band’s legacy as being known for doingwhat they want and as a band for the moment. They kept true to their style and flow by havinga fantastic music club bursting at the seams with friends and memories rather than a concerthall where people wouldn’t be as connected with each other.

Larry Kirwan

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Speaking of friends, many of Black 47’s guest musicians from over the years and past bandmembers joined them on stage throughout the evening. Mary Courtney, a traditional Irishsinger and musician, appeared early in the evening. Joining the band later was Bronx-basedmusician and long-time member of the Saturday Night Live band Christine “The BeehiveQueen” Ohlman (who, after singing on “Blood Wedding,” had to beeline back to the SNL setfor the show’s taping). To much applause Larry Kirwan’s partner in crime in the founding ofBlack 47, Chris Byrne (who left the band in 2000 to focus on other music projects) came backto the stage twice to sing with the band. Also joining the band on stage throughout the nightwere Rory Kirwan (Larry’s son), Irish dancer Jake James, substitute piper Andrew Sharp (whofilled in for Mulvanerty on some weeknight gigs), Rob “The Ginz” Graziano, good friend andoccasional fill-in bass player. Even two of the band’s dedicated behind-the-scenes guys“Staten Island” Tom Marlow and P2 joined the band on stage for a few choruses of “Gloria”during the encore – more on that shortly.

It seems that after 25 years it must be one heck of a mind-bender to plan the final, ultimate setlist. Regardless of whatever roshambo and coin-tossing that may have gone on to cut songs orleave songs on the set list (even right up until the show with last-minute changes), the finalselection was solid and well-suited for the over two-hour sendoff and captured a bit of every

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flavor of the band’s catalog.

For those familiar with Black 47, they know that the live experience with the band is hard totop, especially with the musicianship on stage. This shone strong through the entire set as theband flaunted its talent even more so than usual for this final show; the guys took theopportunity to stretch their arms as a group one last time. The core of the band was solid asalways and the horns/pipes were as on top of their game as they could be. While there is a lotmore that can be said about this, two particular crowd-invoking moments came from GeoffBlythe’s soaring notes on the ballads “Fanatic Heart” and “Mychal,” a song honoring FDNYchaplain Mychal Judge who lost his life in the 9/11 attacks.

Then there were moments that were just plain fun. A lot of dancing was had throughout thenight, particularly during a set of reels early on (something the band does live and only hasrecorded on their Live In New York City album, bootlegs aside.) During “Rockin’ the Bronx” Joe“Bearclaw” Burcaw turned his bass amp up a little to pound out some licks rivaling that ofStanley Clarke as Fred Parcells (trombone), Geoffrey Blythe (sax), Joseph Mulvanerty (uilleannpipes) and Tom Hamlin (drums) joined in for a free-form jam before Kirwan returned to thestage to get the audience singing along with one more chorus on the song. Like a midnightshowing of Rocky Horror Picture Show with rice thrown during the wedding scene, cigarettesrained on the stage during the opening of “40 Shades of Blue” at the line of selling a soul for acigarette outside of CBGB. Not to mention the band’s sense of humor between songs whichkept spirits high.

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A lot of Black 47’s music has carried at least some sort of wide range of emotions with it.Perhaps the most profound moment was during the band’s powerful political song “JamesConnolly,” a repertoire-defining song about the great Irish labor organizer. The passionatecrowd raised fists of solidarity in the air as a banner of Connolly unfurled on stage next to aStarry Plough flag. A few people in the audience were so eager to raise a flag of their own thatthey passed it up on stage to be held up. Other moments commanded respect during thesongs, such as “Mychal,” as the room fell near dead silent – a scene that seems to bewitnessed less and less frequently at shows these days.

Before it was all over, the set was closed with “Funky Céili,” the band’s song that got extendedMTV airplay in 1993 and opened the encore with “Maria’s Wedding,” the song Black 47 playedon their first network TV appearance with David Letterman in the same year. Finally, the floodgates opened for an all-out jam on “Gloria” leading into a chorus of “I Fought The Law” with justabout everyone in the place singing along. All of the guests who could stick around to the endof the gig came back out for one more old-fashioned rock ‘n roll jam. Thought they did not endthe show with their own material, it was certainly a positive, high energy rock ‘n roll way to wrapup 25 years.

As a last tip of the hat to the crowd, Bearclaw, Mulvanerty, and Graziano sang an a capella“Happy Trails” while friends in the audience shared one last hug over Black 47 some othersquickly flocked to a line to say hello to Kirwan after the show. It was a bittersweet moment asthe stage went silent and the din of the crowd was all that remained.

Many fans have taken to the “25 Years of Black 47” fan-run group on Facebook sharingmemories about their first Black 47 shows and have been sharing numerous photos andvideos from their final few shows.

The gigs may be over, but the music lives on. Long live Black 47!

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Geoffrey Blythe, Jake James

Setlist: Green Suede Shoes, The Big Fellah, Livin’ In America (with Mary Courtney, vocals,and Jake James), The Reels (with Jake James), Three Little Birds / Desperate, DannyBoy, Culchie Prince, Fanatic Heart, Rockin’ the Bronx, Five Points (with Andrew Sharp, flute,and Jake James), Fire of Freedom (with Rory Kirwan, vocals), Mychal, Walk All The Days (withChris Byrne, vocals), Blood Wedding (with Christine Ohlmann, vocals), James Connolly (withJake James, bodhrán), 40 Shades of Blue, Funky Céili

Encore: Maria’s Wedding, Gloria / I Fought The Law

*links are to full-length video from the show

Be sure to follow Black 47’s YouTube page for more full-length videos from their finalperformances as they are posted.

(Video Credits: Lee Harwig for “Gloria” and Rory’s rap during “Fire of Freedom”; Mike O’Connorfor “Funky Céili” and “40 Shades of Blue;” and Joey “Knobs” Juntunen/Dan “Bojo” Boujoulianfor “Livin’ In America,” “Fire of Freedom,” and “Walk All The Days.” )

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Thomas Hamlin Larry Kirwan Andrew Sharp

Fred Parcells Christine Ohlman

Chris Bynre Joe “Bearclaw” Burcaw, JosephMulvanerty

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Joey Juntunen The silent stage

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FILED UNDER: DOWNSTATE, FEATURES, GENRES, NEW YORK CITY, ROCK, SHOW REVIEWSTAGGED WITH: BB KINGS, BLACK 47, LAST CALL

About Steve MalinskiSteve is an engineer by day formerly from the Capitol District, now from the lowerHudson Valley. He has a Bachelor of Science from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

and a Master of Engineering from Cornell University in Civil Engineering. Aside from analyzing andsolving technical problems over several cups of coffee, Steve has a profound interest in music. Hehas been an active DJ since 2004 and (more recently) the local music director on WRPI in Troy andhosts a weekly Grateful Dead program on WVBR-FM in Ithaca.

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