Green Day Saves Punk Rock with Saviors

No other band has done as much with 3 to 5 chords and the slacker/social truth. 

At this point in Green Day’s career is Billie Joe Armstrong a 51-year-old punk or a 51-year-old that plays punk? It’s really not that important a question when their music sounds like it does on Saviors. While Saviors does suffer from corporate rock profit-conscious caution (it is a very carefully curated album of songs) the return of big guitar chords, and, perhaps most importantly, producer Rob Cavallo, makes the album the best release by the band since 2004’s American Idiot (incidentally the last album Cavallo produced for the band). 

With songs like “Look Ma, No Brains!” and “Coma City” it’s easy for the late Gen X crowd to finally come back into the Green Day fold since both songs would be perfectly at home on either Insomniac or Nimrod, the height of said generation’s prime Green Day listening years. I mean, one of the greatest concerts I’ve ever seen was Green Day in Charlotte NC at Tremont Music Hall back in 1997 (for $15 no less) when they were on the NImrod tour. Yes, I was all on board when American Idiot was released, but shortly thereafter, Green Day became synonymous with corporate rock and their releases continued to get further and further away from the glory days of Dookie through American Idiot. Finally crashing and burning (sonically) with Father of All Motherfuckers (while concurrently making the use of the word “fuck” in their songs and titles…quaint), a reboot was in order. 

Again, while Saviors is way safer than Dookie or even American Idiot was, and more specifically curated to reach across generational divides (Billie and the boys are no longer the exclusive property of Gen X), it is also way more rocking, loud, and focused than their recent albums. “The American Dream is Killing Me,” “Look Ma, No Brains!,” and “Living in The 20s” remind listeners that they still give a shit about the state of things, and can blast a 3-chord song better than anyone else. “One Eyed Bastard” is for the early Gen Xers with its Deep Purple riff rip-off (as Justin Hawkins so brilliantly informs us). “Bobby Sox” with its screaming, emo, and gender-blending chorus feels curated to appeal to Gen Z and late Millennials. “1981” is an oddity. It rocks like early Green Day, but the guys were only around 9 years old in 1981 so I’m not sure how much headbanging they did that year. I wonder if the record company made them change the title from “1991” to “1981” to capture the nostalgia of some more of those early Gen Xers much like Bryan Adams’ record company made him change “Summer of ‘79” to “Summer of ‘69” for the Boomers. Nevertheless, Green Day pulls off the near impossible: making a rock record that really can appeal across generations. There’s even “Suzie Chapstick” and “Father to a Son” for the sensitive ears of younger Gen Zs (one of which recently criticized my playing of Foo Fighters in my classroom as being ear-burning “heavy metal”). 

Putting all that aside though, the band actually feels newly inspired. This happens to a lot of bands when they reach this level of fame and length of career. Looking back to where you’ve been, especially at the outset of one’s 50s (I’m almost there myself) often inspires one to revisit one’s golden days, while infusing it with a healthy dose of the type of wisdom that only age and experience can bring. Thank God Green Day decided to do just that. We all really needed a great Green Day album right about now, and we got it.