Going Out in Style Lyrics

Lyric discussion by torq 

Cover art for Going Out in Style lyrics by Dropkick Murphys

This song is near the beginning of an entire album that loosely follows a retrospective of the life of fictional character Cornelius Larkin, beginning with his wake, but the lyrics of this song mostly read as a future wake for Dropkick Murphys singer Ken Casey (as seen in the official music video for the song). There are a ton of references and inside jokes in this song related to Casey's life in Boston.

Sister Barbara is a nun that taught Casey in grammar school; Chief Wells is the police chief of Milton, Massachusetts; Bobby Orr is a Boston Bruins hockey player; The Flannigans are a family whose stained glass window Casey broke as a child while fighting with their son; Mr. Sluggo is the owner of a couch Casey peed on in his sleep while drunk; Mrs. McAuliffe is a woman whose bedroom Casey had sleepwalked into while drunk at a friend's house; Tom Menino is the current Boston mayor since 1993; Mount Calvary is a cemetery in Boston where many Irish immigrants have been buried; Fenway Park is the famous baseball stadium in downtown Boston; Wolly Beach is in Quincy, Massachusetts (Dropkick's home town); McGreevy's Third Base Saloon is a bar down the street from Fenway owned by Casey; Desi Queally is a friend of the band who has performed gang vocals on previous albums.

There's probably more in there, but basically, this is a dream of a future wake in which the narrator imagines a massive party with all his friends and everyone he needs to apologize to.

Song Meaning