Track 3, Side 1: The Boys are Back in Town by Thin Lizzy

The room-elevating transcendence of twin guitars and a fistful of attitude

My dad taught me every epic journey deserves a great soundtrack. My PalliMed Mixtape is the story of my Palliative Medicine Fellowship year, told in 15 songs.

(Photo: Wikipedia)

The Boys Are Back In Town on Apple Music

I still miss Mikey’s smile. 

I didn’t see it often as I took care of him on my first week of inpatient palliative consults.  Mikey was just so grumpy; he always frowned.

His smile was exaggerated and awkward when he did dare to show it. He looked like a middle schooler who had never quite learned how to smile right for photos.  You could almost hear his mom pleading with him, “Now smile for real this time, Mikey!”  

He still looked kind of juvenile, even though he was 52 and dying of cancer.  And those teeth.  Maybe that’s why he hid his smile—those wretched gray stubby teeth worn down to nubs, a physical manifestation of the mental illness that had worn him down all along the way.

“Just suck all the oxygen out of my blood and let me die,” he bellowed one morning.  His suffering broke our hearts. He was tired of fighting.  Tired of stomach cancer.  Tired of lousy lungs.  Tired of not being able to care for himself.  Tired of having to make big decisions.  Mostly he just didn’t want to talk about it anymore.

Day after day, as he sat alone in his hospital room, a palpable heaviness hung in the air. A gloom. There had to be something I could do to cheer him up.  I tried humor, shared stories, sought common ground, asked thoughtful questions. Nothing. He just kept frowning.

Maybe Mikey likes music, I thought one afternoon.  Sure.  Why not? This guy looks like an old rocker.  I bet he’ll go for a classic rock song with some muscle.

(Photo: Wikipedia)

“Hey, Mikey.  Do you mind if I play you a song?”  “Yeah I guess,” he grumbled.  I cued up Thin Lizzy’s The Boys Are Back In Town on my phone and let it rip at full volume. 

Guess who just got back today? / Them wild-eyed boys that had been away / Haven’t changed, had much to say / But man, I still think them cats are crazy.

A few bars into the song, as the guitars churned, the bass and drums danced and surged, and lead singer Phil Lynott filled the hospital room with his fist-fighting vocals and take-no-prisoners attitude, for the first time all week, in the midst of his misery, Mikey smiled for real.

The Boys Are Back In Town? You better believe it.

There’s a raucous joy in this song that makes you want to be right there scrapping it up with these boys, whoever they are, however long they’ve been gone. There’s a communal recklessness, a benevolent mischief, a coolness, a dangerous excitement that you don’t want to miss out on. There’s comfort in all that commotion, too. Things are gonna be alright, you see. We’ll be laughing and clowning and messing around, just like we used to. The boys are back!

I don’t know what memories Mikey associated with this song. Some good times he had with his boys back in the day? Some crazy times actually fighting in bars? Maybe just some simple times driving around listening to the rock station in his hometown. Whatever memories he had, they kept him smiling for real all the way through the gloriously harmonized twin-guitar outro that kept echoing in our ears long after the music faded out.

When the song ended it was Mikey’s turn to play dj.  He took over my phone and played me Ace Frehley’s New York Groove, a song he loved that I had never heard. We talked about concerts he’d been to and old friends and happier times. For a few minutes at least, the heaviness had lifted. Mikey kept on smiling, and the gloom was gone.  

That jukebox in the corner blastin’ out my favorite song / The nights are getting warmer, it won’t be long / Won’t be long ‘til summer comes again / Now that the boys are here again

Maybe, just maybe, there could still be some good times ahead.

Tell me, Crash Cart Campfire friends:

• When has a song unexpectedly lifted your spirits?

• What’s on your mixtape?