I love the Pogues, but I think I’m a little behind. Did they really break up? Did they really break my whiskey soaked heart?
Say it ain’t so…or give it to me straight up.
Great band! I saw them a couple of times at The Coachhouse in San Juan Capistrano, mere feet away.
AFAIK, their last album was Waiting for Herb, but since they gave Shane the boot I haven’t followed them. Shane was The Pogues! I saw them at the Wiltern their first So. Cal. concert w/o Shane. Joe Strummer stood in his stead. There was an article in the L.A. Weekly in which Strummer said, in answer to the question of whether MacGowan was still in the band, “Shane is a Pogue. He’ll always be a Pogue.” But I never heard Shane in the band after that.
Frankly, I’m surprised the guy is still alive. Never saw him sober. But I guess that’s the way with genius/artists.
I think The Pogues have been pretty much defunct for a few years now.
Shane MacGowan left the band in the mid-1990s. He now performs with a new band, the Popes (sic), but they’re not a patch on the Pogues in their heyday.
Jem Finer left the band to set up something called Longplayer, an experimental, 1000-year-long musical composition (have a look at the website).
Spider Stacy and one of the others formed a briefly unsuccessful band called The Wise Men.