Dropkick Murphys feel buzz from The Departed!
The Departed catapults Dropkick Murphys soundscan sales: Revered Boston Band’s “Angry Bagpipe Punk Adds To Film’s Boiling Ambience”
Boston’s beloved Dropkick Murphys are currently featured in Martin Scorsese’s #1 film The Departed. As a result of increased exposure for their song, “I’m Shipping Up To Boston,” sales for its parent album, The Warrior’s Code and its entire Hellcat Records back catalog tripled this past week according to Soundscan.
The song plays prominently through the opening credits and recurs throughout the entire introduction of the film as the backstory of the characters in The Departed are revealed. The use of “I’m Shipping Up To Boston,” is the latest example of Scorsese’s willingness to prominently feature music in his films.
“The Departed is one of the best films we have seen in a long time,” says Dropkick Murphys co-founder Ken Casey of the Leonardo DiCaprio, Jack Nicholson and Mark Wahlberg-starring movie. “We were fortunate enough and feel honored to have one of our tracks used in the film.”
Lending credibility and authenticity to the project – which was adapted from the Hong Kong thriller Infernal Affairs and released on October 6th – the Dropkick Murphys’ inclusion has reaped praise from The Village Voice. “It's weirdly thrilling to know that a legendary 63-year-old film director thought to include a song from these guys on the soundtrack of a movie that so perfectly reflects the corner of the world they represent,” critic Tom Breihan writes. “And the movie wouldn't really suffer if the song played over every single scene, sort of like "Scarborough Fair" in The Graduate.” Breihan adds, “Since seeing the movie last weekend, I've listened to "I'm Shipping Up to Boston" about a hundred times, and I'm not even close to being sick of it… It can be easy to forget just how great the Dropkick Murphys are. If it takes a movie like The Departed to remind us of something great that's been under our noses all this time, that's a shame, but I'm glad somebody's doing it.”
And in its four star review of the film, L.A. Daily News wrote, “Scorsese's brilliance at marrying mood and music continues,” adding “South Boston's hard-core punkers the Dropkick Murphys' "I'm Shipping Out to Boston