"The State of Massachusetts" is a song about the effects of drugs on individuals and their families by the Dropkick Murphys and was released as the first single from the album The Meanest of Times.
"The State of Massachusetts" was one of the 100-most-played songs on U.S. modern rock radio in October 2007. By January 2008, the song had become one of the 60-most-played alternative rock songs in the United States. The song was #83 on Rolling Stone's list of the 100 Best Songs of 2007. It is the theme song to the MTV show Nitro Circus.
Chart Peaks - Billboard Hot 100 - #89 Hot Modern Rock Songs - #4 Hot Mainstream Rock Songs - #39 Billboard Digital - #18
In April 2013, the song reentered the Hot Rock Songs chart at #14, the Heatseekers Songs chart at #9, and the Rock Streaming Songs chart at #3 and #1 on the Bubbling Under Hot 100 Singles following the Boston Marathon bombings.
The music video was filmed on location in the unused and abandoned Curley Auditorium on the Long Island Health Campus in Boston Harbor. The auditorium is located right next to one of the City of Boston's largest emergency homeless shelters, the Long Island Shelter.
Famous quotes containing the words the state and/or state:
“The rulers of the state are the only persons who ought to have the privilege of lying, either at home or abroad; they may be allowed to lie for the good of the state.”
—Plato (c. 427–347 B.C.)
“Today the discredit of words is very great. Most of the time the media transmit lies. In the face of an intolerable world, words appear to change very little. State power has become congenitally deaf, which is why—but the editorialists forget it—terrorists are reduced to bombs and hijacking.”
—John Berger (b. 1926)