Six Pack: You'd be an 'Idiot' not to like Green Day
http://www.daily-journal.com/news/local/six-pack-you-d-be-an-idiot-not-to-like/article_7ee8c495-6a68-56b1-9a0d-d9bbc5bd42fc.html
Full article here since you guys could not open it.
Do you have the time
To listen to me whine
About nothing and everything
All at once"
— Basket Case
In the early 1990s, popular music was evolving and branching out all over the place. In the R&B world clones such as Silk and Shai were big, following the lead of Boyz II Men. Rock thought it had its leader, but that ended April 5, 1994, when Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain tragically took his own life.
Stepping up in February 1994, a band called Green Day released an album called "Dookie," which could have been easily dismissed. After all, the punk crowd didn't want to embrace them because the weren't really punk. The rock crowd, mellowing with the sounds of Hootie and the Blowfish, didn't really accept them because of their "punk" roots.
Fast forward to 2015, and Green Day finds itself in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. It also has had a successful Broadway production of its most famous album, which ended in 2014, and a boatload of Grammy and other music awards, not bad for a most-of-the-time three-piece band out of California.
This week, Six Pack takes a look at the top six Green Day songs of all-time, with, of course, a few mentions of near-misses — "Minority," "Boulevard of Broken Dreams," "Holiday" and "Welcome to Paradise."
6. "Longview" — Did Green Day steal this from Jerry Seinfeld? The song, Green Day's first on the Billboard chart from 1994's "Dookie," is largely about doing nothing all day. It also includes a reference to the subject matter of the famous Seinfeld episode "The Contest." Couldn't be, could it?
5. "American Idiot" — Green Day wasn't exactly floundering at the time, but any talk of any scuffling stopped dead in it tracks in 2004, when this album hit the streets. The title track of the album, which Six Pack says is the best album of the 2000s first decade, accuses mass media of creating paranoia among the masses. Six Pack doesn't know if that is true, but it is fun to talk about at parties and the like.
4. "When I Come Around" — Lead singer/guitarist Billie Joe Armstrong penned this after breaking up with his girlfriend. He would later marry the woman, but where are the great songs based on the marriage? Six Pack has expressed this before and it bears repeating — musicians need more tumultuous relationships and fewer successes. Selfish thinking, but Six Pack likes great songs.
3. "Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)" — A signature song usually sounds similar to the rest of the group's body of work. Not this one. Armstrong wrote this as "Dookie" was being recorded but it wasn't released until 1997's "Nimrod." It didn't fit "Dookie" and it doesn't really fit Green Day, but it a great song lyrically, containing one of Six Pack's all-time favorite lines ("For what it's worth, It was worth all the while.")
2. "Jesus of Suburbia" — Green Day's longest single introduces us to the central character in the "American Idiot" concept album. Taken as a song in itself, this is a fine song. As the basis on a concept album (Pink Floyd's "The Wall" being the most famous), it turns more to work of art. How did Green Day get radio to agree to a nine-minute song as a single? First, they cut it down to about six minutes and change, and then reminded them, "we're Green Day!"
1. "Basket Case" — The group had a No. 1 on its hands with this one, even if it was on the Modern Rock chart. Glancing through the lyrics, Billie Joe, Tre Cool and Mike Dirnt throw us more curves on gender bending than your average 1994 song, but the song's best feature is the sheer joy the listened gets in the 3 minutes. Green Day has more significant songs, but none better.