Editor, Daily Nexus,

As a hopeful candidate of spending the next academic year in Dublin, I was intrigued by the title of Scott Dicke’s Tuesday column (“History of Irish Car Bombs Isn’t Something to Drink To,” Daily Nexus, March 6). However, I was unpleasantly surprised by the negative representation of the band Flogging Molly. If Dicke were a true Flogging Molly fan, then he would know the etymology of the band’s name. Incidentally, it is a nod to the band’s humble beginnings. “Molly Malone” is an anthem of sorts for the city of Dublin, Ireland. It also happens to be the name of an Irish pub – Molly Malone’s Irish Pub – in Los Angeles where the band used to play on a weekly basis. The band’s Dublin-born lead singer Dave King has been quoted as saying that they played there so regularly it felt like they were flogging the venue to death. Since I have not been to the region, I cannot vouch for the assertion that the band’s music garners a negative opinion of the Irish people, however the sincerity of King’s lyrical tributes to his native soil are undeniably present in the band’s voluminous body of work which spans the course of ten years and four albums.

“Tobacco Island” tells a narrative of the Irish forced exodus after Oliver Cromwell invaded and destroyed the land. The list of references to Ireland goes on as such, but you get the idea. Though the band’s work may not be received by some as conventionally Irish, their sound is a product of a strategic stylistic synthesis of Irish folk and punk, which delivers messages of Irish culture and tradition with unique results. Though Dicke may have connections to Ireland vis-ˆ-vis his time abroad, it would be wise for him to better study his evidence of American misrepresentations of Irish culture before he dismisses Flogging Molly’s appeal as a failed anachronistic attempt to claim cultural identity. The band’s method of claiming cultural identity is a brilliant adaptation of musical style coupled with genuine sentiments of a nation.