The Boys From County Hell

It's been over 15 years since The Pogues played New York City. It was at the Old Ritz that last time, and it was the kind of show-rollicking, high-octane and drunker than sin-that brought everyone out. It was a hell of a show, too-with the mythically intoxicated Shane MacGowan on his back, waving a jug of wine over his head, being replaced on vocals by Joe Strummer. One of those shows you remember.

Five years prior to that, MacGowan and Spider Stacy were in a London-based punk band called the Millwall Chainsaws. Punk was fast becoming a musical footnote in the UK at the time, replaced with safe, inoffensive electropop. Then one afternoon at a friend's house, according to Stacy, MacGowan picked up a guitar and slammed out a dragstrip version of "Poor Paddy Works on the Railway." That's how it started.

They rounded up a group of fellow Irish musicians like Jem Finer and James Fearnley, and started playing Irish revolutionary songs. More specifically, it was a kind of romantic, traditional Irish revolutionary punk. It's difficult for Americans to understand just how radical The Pogues were back then, but it's analogous to a group of Iraqi Muslims forming a band in the States whose songs celebrated al-Qaeda. (A bad analogy, but you get the idea.)

It wasn't long, though, before people saw past the politics and heard the music. When was the last time anyone had seen a raucous nine-piece band in a punk club, playing a tin whistle, accordion, mandolin, beer tray and fiddle? Add to that Shane McGowan's rasping, slurred brogue, urban poetics and snaggle-toothed, debauched-genius persona-he was part Keith Richards, part Brendan Behan. In truest Irish form, they made you want to weep, drink and start fights all at the same time.

Their history as one of the most storied, respected and perpetually crocked bands of the last 20 years is well documented-a reputation's that's only grown since they broke up in 1995.

In the years after the breakup, the Pogues drifted off to other bands. MacGowan launched a solo career and became a favorite of the tabloids. Spider Stacy formed two new bands of his own-Vendetta and Dogfight-and Morgan and I found ourselves sharing a home bar with him. We didn't talk a whole lot, but he was a very nice fellow who was particularly helpful the night of the blackout. (Long story.)

The very nature of their music made something like a "reunion" almost irrelevant. They weren't struggling in vain to recapture a time, a fashion or a movement. It was more a matter of spirit. They had established themselves not merely as another act from Ireland, like U2 or Enya, but rather as the next step in the evolution of traditional Irish music.

It's a music that's been around (and mutating) for centuries, and has been sung by people of every generation. Hell, I saw the Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem when they were in their seventies, and it didn't matter a whit. And just as "And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda" and "The Irish Rover" sounded no more out of place on a Pogues album than they did when the Clancys or Chieftans sang them 30 years earlier, I wouldn't have blinked an eye to have heard the Clancys or Chieftans doing "Sally MacLennane," "Streams of Whiskey" or "A Pair of Brown Eyes."

Yeah, The Pogues are older now-in their forties and fifties-their hair's getting a little grayer and about half the members have stopped drinking (at least the way they used to). But the spirit hasn't aged a moment, and by all accounts, these recent live shows still generate the kind of rowdy energy they've always had. And Shane, God bless him, has even been staying upright.

By the time I'd thought all that through, of course, all three New York shows had already sold out, as had every other stop on the tour.

March 16-18, Nokia Theater, 1515 Broadway (at W. 44th St.), (212) 930-1959; 8, SOLD OUT.