Songfacts®:

• This is the first single to be released from Signed and Sealed in Blood, the eighth studio album by Celtic punk band The Dropkick Murphys. The band started playing this in June 2012 during their European tour. The album title comes from the lyrics of this song.
• The lyrics are inspired by bassist Ken Casey's own tattoos. "Throughout life - trials, tribulations, dates, times, places, things that are important to you, family, people who have passed away - tattoos on my body document my life and what I've been through, things that have been important to me," he told NPR's Audie Cornish. "You know, they're all a part of the story."
• The rose tattoo referred to in this song appears on Casey's arm and is a memorial to his grandfather who raised him after his father had died. "He taught me most things that make me who I am today," Casey told NPR. "He was a big union guy in Boston. It's in a visible place for me and I look down and I see it a lot. He was such an inspiring man that it inspires me. Oftentimes, I just catch it out of the corner of my eye and it literally changes my mood when I think of him and what a strong individual he was."
• The song was re-recorded in May 2013 with Bruce Springsteen on guest vocals as a charity single to benefit the victims of the Boston Marathon bombing.