“Hitchin' a Riot”: the Development of Green Day's Lyrics from Their Early
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“Hitchin’ a riot”: The development of Green Day’s lyrics from their early years until the present Diplomarbeit zur Erlangung des akademischen Grades einer Magistra der Philosophie an der Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz vorgelegt von Marion OBEREGGER am Institut für Anglistik Begutachter: Ao.Univ.-Prof. Mag. Dr.phil. Hugo Keiper Graz, 2011 “Rock ’n’ roll is supposed to be about rebellion. It’s supposed to be dangerous. So that’s the side that we choose. We’re not looking to makmakee everybody happy, you know.”know.” --- Billie Joe Armstrong --- 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. Introduction .....................................................................................................3 2. Kings – not only for a day...............................................................................5 2.1 “Silence is the enemy” ..................................................................................................... 6 2.2 A punk rock way of life.................................................................................................. 14 3. 80 and the early years ...................................................................................24 3.1 “Some call it slums, some call it nice”........................................................................... 24 3.2 Love, pain and rebel girls............................................................................................... 30 3.3 “I never wanted to be famous …”.................................................................................. 39 4. Pledging allegiance to the underworld – Green Day’s first political statement ........................................................................................................46 4.1 Starting to live (and write songs) without warning ........................................................ 46 4.2 “Down with the moral majority …”............................................................................... 49 5. The sons of rage and love..............................................................................54 5.1 American Idiot – the big oxymoron ............................................................................... 55 5.2 From the center of the earth to the end of the world ...................................................... 64 6. Experiencing the 21 st century breakdown ..................................................70 6.1 “And where will we all go when it’s too late?” ............................................................. 70 6.2 A matter of faith ............................................................................................................. 73 7. Conclusion......................................................................................................77 8. Bibliography...................................................................................................79 2 1. Introduction “Punk rock for me was always the way I wanted to be, it expressed something the way I thought it should be expressed.” (Mike Dirnt, in Myers 2006: 23) Green Day are the lead singer, guitarist and primary songwriter Billie Joe Armstrong, the bassist and supporting vocalist Mike Dirnt and the drummer and percussionist Tré Cool. Virtually all over the world, the trio is very well known for its memorable and catchy tunes as well as its (thought-)provoking, tough-minded punk rock lyrics. Due to the band’s characteristic guitar sound and Billie Joe Armstrong’s unmistakable voice, the average listener might pay more attention to the music than to the lyrics themselves. It is, however, the combination of both that makes Green Day’s development over the years best perceivable and understandable. The band has obviously changed, and did so without losing, but rather by enhancing its representative sound of sharp drum beats, melodic acoustic guitars, clanging electric guitars and droning bass lines. On their most recent album, amazingly soft piano sequences are added to this already impressive sound repertoire, harmonizing perfectly with the lead vocalist’s distinctive voice and the message of the corresponding songs. Step by step, the Bay area trio has evolved by discovering and solidifying their convictions and ethics concerning punk rock as their music, and their way of expressing and sharing their beliefs with their audience by the powerful means of their lyrics. In an issue of Guitar Player Billie Joe Armstrong was asked how he finds “the balance between evolving Green Day’s sound and giving [their] hardcore fans what they want” (Thompson 2009: 66). The answer was the following: Ultimately we want to connect to people, whether it’s to a young kid listening on headphones in his room or to an entire arena. In order to do that you just have to be as honest with yourself as you possibly can. You have to challenge yourself to test your own vulnerabilities as a songwriter, and not get tempted into doing whatever is popular at the moment. Success is like a drug, and what people often don’t understand when they first get it is that they’re just being themselves. And by success I mean making great albums. A lot of people feel connected to and even represented by Green Day’s music, but what really makes the audience identify with the band are the lyrics. I have known Green Day since I was a teenager. When I first listened to “Minority”, I immediately fell in love with this audacious tune and its encouraging lyrics. The courage and comfort of Green Day’s words have 3 accompanied and fascinated me ever since and were therefore the inspiration to focus on the band’s lyrical work in this paper. In my thesis, I will systematically investigate the development and progressiveness of Green Day’s lyrics. I will start by providing an overview of the most basic concerns in the lyrics together with an outline of where the band members came from, what punk rock means to them, and how they became who they are now as a band. In addition, I will demonstrate the way Green Day’s words often reflect the band members’ lives and experiences. Moreover, I will take a closer look at the importance of lyrics of love (already in the band’s early years) and describe to which extent the trio’s songs are influenced and inspired by women. What many people do not know is that the band had a hard time coping with their early success, because of which I will also put a special focus on darker songs that stem from the post- Dookie period so to speak. Of course, it will be indispensible to examine Green Day’s first overtly political statement as well as the band’s immense, and (paradoxically) widely unexpected, progression since then. My lyrical analysis will be loosely based on the band’s chronological development and discography in order to provide a meaningful background for my investigation. The overall purpose of this paper is to illustrate the increasing literary potential of Green Day’s song lyrics as well as the band’s remarkable versatility in this respect, both of which the three suburban punks from California have brought to perfection over the years – a fact that is as self-evident as it is undeniable. 4 2. Kings – not only for a day “Green Day […] have rewritten the rules of rock at least twice in a single decade. When they first exploded onto the scene, they rewrote the rule that said punk was dead. And when they made their monumental comeback with the rallying cry ‘American Idiot’, they rewrote the rule that said Green Day was dead.” (Spitz 2006: back cover) Marc Spitz, music journalist (e.g. at Spin magazine) and author of the spellbinding Green Day biography Nobody Likes You. Inside the turbulent life, times, and music of Green Day , was far sighted and visionary enough in his book never to rule out the possibility of the band rewriting the rules and the history of punk rock yet again, even after American Idiot . Given the remarkable success of Green Day’s most recent studio album 21 st Century Breakdown , his vision has proved right. Contrary to the title of one of their songs, “King for a Day”, Green Day are certainly kings; just not only for a day. At a time when bands seem to have the average lifespan of – literally – a dayfly, Billie Joe Armstrong, Mike Dirnt and Tré Cool look back at a career of over 20 years, choosing to be anything but silent. Instead of settling for the incredible success they have already gained, Green Day keep coming back to the scene louder, stronger and insanely ambitious. After many years of ups and downs, hard work and imperturbable commitment to their music, the band now more than ever holds the “position as the undisputed kings of punk…” (Kelham 2009: 55). Especially with the release of their last two albums, American Idiot (2004) and 21 st Century Breakdown (2009), Green Day have shown admirable confidence in themselves and in their political as well as musical statements. However, there is proof that this has not always been the case. Doubtlessly, the band consists of three enormously talented musicians who have experienced rough times (be it concerning their families or their lives as band members) and still – or therefore – have never lost their conviction and strength to keep going. But even in their case, having always been dedicated punk rockers and libertines, it has not always been easy to actually define what punk rock means for them. In this regard, Spitz (2006: xiv-xv) writes: 5 Eight years ago [1998], a reporter […] asked Billie Joe Armstrong […] what punk rock was. Armstrong compared the act of describing punk rock with the act of “describing a smell.”