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American Idiot


iain44s

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I have listened to their last three albums or so' date=' and I really do think that they have nothing interesting or new to offer. Since [i']Dookie, they haven't particularly developed as artists, with the possible exception of "Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)", which turned out to be a one-of-a-kind.

Warning was an absolutely dire albumI remember buying it the day it was released, very excited, with high expectations, only to take home a complete dog of an album.

The whole "concept album" idea smacks of desperation. Green Day are under fire from younger pop-punks, and I think that making a "punk symphony", or whatever else they mis-label it, is an attempt to distance themselves from the young upstarts they created and try to retreat to some pseudo-intellectual high-ground that doesn't interest Blink 182, Sum 41 and their ilk.

Good Riddance is about as standard a Green Day song as you get when you look at the chord structure, it's just that's it played on an accoustic guitar and has violins and shit(on the re-recorded version).

If you listen to the Kerplunk to Insomniac era albums, all the songs are pretty standard three or four chord songs played mostly in the same way. I'm not slagging them off, these are my fave GD albums. But if you then look at Nimrod and Warning, yes they do have the 'signature' Green Day feel to the songs but you can hardly compare most of them to previous work.

You're right, they ARE trying to distance themselves from Sum 41 and the like, rightly so. If Green Day had hashed out two or three more albums along the same vien as Dookie or Insomniac then everyone would be up in arms about them NOT trying something different. You just can't win sometimes.

I'm still not 100% sure if American Idiot(the album) is my cup of tea. I think the single is great, a return to spite filled form, but yeah, still not sure on the whole album myself. I don't think it's fair though to say they're not trying any new or whatnot.

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Who said that the five minute tracks sounded like 5 seperate songs shoved together? Did you actually listen to the track?

This is another peak for Green Day, which seems to happen every couple of albums..Insomniac, Nimrod and American Idiot, would be my top 3. Green Day have always played to the three chord formula, it's who they are and no one can make three chords sound as good ;)

City of the Damned (Track 2 Pt. 2) is one of the best pieces Green Day have ever done (in my ever humble opinion), and it fits beautifully with the "I Don't Care" track which follows.

I love the way that the same small riffs and drum parts are used throughout the album. And the way that parts of "Nobody Likes You" is also included at the start of "Letter Bomb" is great. I don't know what eveyone has against "Extraordinary Girl" since I thought it was lyrically pretty good, and the tribal intro makes it even better. As Tre had said before release it was really a drummers album, which you can hear throughout the whole album.

And as an added bit, "Are We the Waiting" is awsome :)

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  • 2 weeks later...

i must say i'm very disappointed with american idiot, the title track made a great single but the rest of it just went right over my head. i find the record incredibly boring to listen to, it offers nothing new to add to the green day legacy. i just think it lacks decent songs, green day are a band who for me are somewhat limited in their musical ability but have a cracking knack of producing terrific three/four chord power punk/pop songs and when they are on form are excellant songwriters (e.g. 'having a blast' from dookie) and hit the right spot. american idiot just reeks of going through the motions and chucking in a couple of 'concept' tunes in for good measure. it may grow on me, i will listen to it more but the last couple of times i've had it on the CD i've found myself completely bored with it and have gone and listened to something more interesting.

so i've stuck it on again (hey it may cure my insomnia!), the jury is still out here.....

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