Onward to 2004!
Green Day's American Idiot is an album that almost perfectly captures the mood of its time. It came out in September 2004, at the height of the Iraq war and just before GWB's re-election, and plays like an encapsulation of what was happening in the world at that time.
The narrative gets kind of confusing (seeing American Idiot, the musical last month helped clarify some of it for me) but the songs make it fit together. I wasn't much of a Green Day fan before American Idiot, and am having trouble getting into its followup 21st Century Breakdown (70 minute albums don't work for me anymore!) so I think AI might be the one time I "got" what Green Day was trying to do.
The live CD/DVD Bullet In A Bible (the whole album performed live) is also worth checking out. I don't know if I'd ever make the effort ($$) to see Green Day live, but they're the closest thing to a stadium/arena juggernaut that we have in this century.
No comments:
Post a Comment