I recently read a blog post on the NME’s website (’21st Century Breakdown’ Proves Green Day Have Become Everything They Used To Hate 12/05/09 by Ben Patashnik) pointing out that the newest album by Berkeley punk rockers Green Day is an epitaph to the convictions the band, in less successful times, held dear and true. I found the assessment a little irksome to say the least and I’ve decided to see if really there is any truth in what Patashnik is saying. Now it might seem a peculiar way of beginning an article hoping to debunk one theory by saying that I agree with the Patashnik’s statement but, and that’s an important but, only partially. Though it might be upsetting for die-hard punk followers of the band to see their heroes become a bona-fide stadium outfit, after all Billie Joe had once expressed dislike for the stadium rock bands which dominated popular music of the eighties and he was even critical of Seattle’s Pearl Jam (themselves part of a scene which moved against the poodle perm aesthetics and the ‘Girls, Girls, Girls’ lyrical indulgence) by accusing them of being stadium rock bands but with greasier hair. It is easy to see why many might consider this a shift in principles but let’s not forget that Green Day have been playing to massive crowds since 1994 when Dookie exploded on to the scene and that also Billie Joe has been regularly evoking the spirit of Freddie Mercury in his shows, not only imitating the crowd sing along schtick but also donning a crown and ceremonial cloak. The point is that Green Day’s live shows have for a long time now been as big as you can get, hell they even had branded confetti at one show which I attended (the same one when Billie Joe confessed a liking for David Bowie but thought his music was a little bit quiet, BJ wants rock to be played loudly as a ‘Fuck you’ statement to The Man). Given these concessions however it is undeniable that there have been changes at camp GD in recent years after they made their second major foray over the trenches and into the mainstream arena with American Idiot (2004).
So rather than rushing with a head of raw nerves adhering to punk protocols and looking to disown the ‘sell-out’ dissenters, can we instead take an objective stance on the alleged changes and work out if they do alter our appreciation for this band, or if the spirit of punk is still strong with the Californian trio.
I must cite that although it is a great thing to have a band you can believe in, the truth is very few bands are worth putting your faith in these days, if for the simple truth that the commercial and entertainment aspects of music are a much bigger priority than art and statements, actually the four are very much the same thing, art is entertainment and statements always serve a commercial purpose, thus obeying the tenant that all punk eventually turns to fashion. What makes it difficult for people to believe in bands is the media, and I don’t mean misrepresentation or anything like that, just that these everything they say is recorded, written down or televised somewhere. As human beings we don’t always give the most intelligent or considered response and we quite often change our minds,this is normal, but bands are not given such rights, if it is engraved in the pages of the music press than it is meant to last forever. Fans don’t like it when bands change, some obviously deal with change because they are reasonable, sane people, the more ‘committed’ see every shift of the band away from that first glimpse of perfection that they caught as a personal betrayal. This is something of a cliche and is more than a little self-indulgent.
This applies to some bands more than others,and it isn’t a specific problem for Green Day, though they have pissed off a great deal of their supposed fans by just growing up and making more music. Every band should reserve the right to a contradiction clause because at some stage in their career there is going to be a rethink of something which the fans consider a defining characteristic, giving themselves the right to be a walking contradiction just absolves the band from any backlash against fans who think that they own the band. This kind of reaction often spurts from wounded fans who have discovered that, as is the case with most bands, they operate on a vague set of liberal values.This is the use of “broad strokes” rather than precision politics. Even Green Day with all the political jargon loaded in their lyrics don’t have very well defined stances on specific issues, they obviously spurn and support certain causes and have opinions on subjects but little of this is reflected in detail in their music, ultimately it’s just a badge. But isn’t that pretty much the core of punk rebellion? As a voice of political dissension Punk favours grand statements but has little in the way of articulated attacks on specific policies.
Obviously it is worth pointing out that there are bands which do exactly that but how much can they be accredited with influencing the larger popular consciousness? The fact is that to get at the ears of the masses and present a statement of political intent, you need a platform from which to preach and that the simpler the message is to digest the better it will work. So might we postulate that a band such as The Sex Pistols did more to interest a young generation in politics than someone like Billy Bragg possibly ever could? I would say a resounding yes. The Pistols brand of anarchist idealism is a statement of intent which many found, and continue to find, attractive. Some people join in because they love being a part of the chaos and will not be motivated to explore the context any further, others however will and could go on to develop considered opinions on many political issues by seeking out what influenced their influences and so on, there is nothing like some wishy-washy anti-establishment garbage banging down your ear ‘ole to make you aware of your position within a democratic system and get you thinking!
Now I am not trying to compare Green Day with the Sex Pistols (that is a whole other kettle of fish which I’m not prepared to weigh in on) but isn’t it plausible to see a continuation of the slogan wielding rally cry to arms in Green Day’s music? And isn’t the stadium the most brillaint place to shout it out from? We are perhaps to blaisse about the subversive quality of a band which spouts anti establishment sentiment in our own sitting rooms; children and parents alike actually enjoying listening to it. Now as I’ve already stated Green Day are selling a slightly sugar coated, political idealism, but isn’t that just what they should be selling, I doubt many young people would get fired up to a punk rock treatise on MP’s expenses claims now would they? Green Day haven’t sold out on their old school principles they have simply ascended them, modified the criteria as they have matured and accepted their new found place in that great rock tradition (along with the likes of Springsteen and U2) of political posturing, reminded everyone that it is still OK to say “fuck you” to The Man. As a long term Green Day fan I don’t feel betrayed by this evolution, but positively charged, it’s great to see a band you love finally being able to enjoy the success they deserve. The kinds of people who think that they own the band and don’t like it when, to put it in terms once used by Kirk Hammet about Metallica’s soar in popualrity, the band gets too big to fit in their back pocket anymore, I feel sorry for because they’ll be mourning a ghost that doesn’t even exist yet, which is kinda sad.
Of course everything I’ve just said up there would be utterly meaningless if 21st Century Breakdown turns out to be not very good musically, thankfully this is not the case! Comparisons with their last studio album American Idiot (2004) are inevitable and justified, 21st Century Breakdown does play like American Idiot ‘part deux’, the problem is people are treating this like a it’s a bad thing. Are they forgetting that American Idiot is a fantastic album, and of course this is the same band so it should be OK for them to sound like themselves right? The comparisons with AI are fine but this album also brings back memories of Nimrod (1997) and Warning (2000) (my personal faves) as there is evidence of experimenting with different styles and infusing them into the pounding signature GD sound, also their is a more earnest songwriting demonstrated than was offered in the last record. Overall the finished product does resemble its forebearer, you can’t get away from that, but there are enough new and original ideas to justify its existence as more than a facsimile of previous successes. My only criticism would be that the album does tend to follow a pattern of rock song, rock song, ballad, rock song, rock song, ballad which does feel a little contrived and lacking in the more natural progression of American Idiot and even Nimrod, but I’d have to be pretty poe-faced to make that a serious concern though.
Patasnik’s claim that Green Day are now, “a band who believes their own hype” and that, “Billie Joe seems to think that after writing a couple of socio-political couplets he’s now qualified to pass judgment on an entire generation.” are certainly lucid conclusions to draw if who believe that what Green Day are now doing is launching an assualt on just about everybody, but they’re really not. Many writers have commented that the semantics employed by the band are now out dated in the post-Bush era, the trouble is that despite claims made by the band during the promotion of American Idiot, which were made perhaps naively, to try to draw in the failings of the Bush administration as a nexus to hinge all the albums concepts on, the album doesn’t directly address that subject matter. Most certainly the aggravation caused to the American people by their last president was a catalyst for the album, but the real message is something less hinged on facts but more centering in on a brand of idealism, a myth of sentimentality, a macrocosmic evaluation rather than a precisely targeted one. In this sense American Idiot doesn’t fail to be valid because we are in the era of Obama, and neither does it nullify the messages in the new record. The White House is under new management but aspects of every day life, at home, school and work will still find their relative points in the coded slogans and jargon, and for so many reasons which I’m hoping are painfully obvious to anyone reading this that I don’t need to explain them, that makes these albums the more worthwhile.
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