Photos: Flogging Molly, Jon Snodgrass, Scott H Biram @ The Observatory, March 14, 2018

I always mean to post photos the day after a show, but stuff comes up and then I feel like nobody really cares anymore anyway, but real people go out of their way to make it possible for me to be able to shoot, so eventually I acknowledge the photos deserve to see the light of day, even if they're spotty and hazy from my dirty camera. That said, I hadn't intended to go to the Flogging Molly show, and then I realized Jon Snodgrass was opening and though I knew it was sold out, I had to ask anyway, and so I got to be one of the lucky ones in the photo pit. I've been missing the openers at the Observatory a lot lately because they tend to come on at 8 and I always feel bad heading out before Nova's bedtime, but I made an exception for this one.

Scott H Biram opened the show and he's always great to see. He plays the Casbah a few times a year, so I feel like I see him often and I'm fully onboard with the scruffy punk guys doing the twangy outlaw country-tinged singer-songwriter thing. He'll be back at the Casbah on April 7th with JD Wilkes and The Legendary Shack Shakers, where he and Low Volts can have a duel of the best one man band.

Hopefully Jon Snodgrass comes back soon, too He was next onstage and I love his voice so much and he played a few of my favorite Drag The River tunes among his set and made some relatable dad-rock comments throughout the show, too. I've also included an embed (shot with my phone) when O came out to play with him. He has a long history in San Diego and with Cargo Records and gave a nice shout out to Larry Munroe and O and others.

Finally, Flogging Molly hit the stage. It's hard to say anyone is energetic after Gogol Bordello just the week before, but Flogging Molly is certainly up there when it comes to onstage energy. The last time I saw them was at Street Scene what seems like forever ago. I was on the 9th floor of the Clarion watching the street below and a thousand bros in a massive circle pit, and at no fault of the band, having that feeling that Street Scene was over, it had grown too big while downtown open spaces were diminishing. I wasn't wrong, but that's why seeing the band in the contained space of the Observatory felt both nostalgic and hopeful, that all good things come back around. I took hundreds of pictures but have trimmed it down after the jump.

Flogging Molly

Jon Snodgrass

Scott H Biram