Green Day: 21st Century Breakdown Review

Green Day:
21st Century Breakdown
Album Review

Green Day first leapt into the punk/rock scene in 1989 as fresh faced, weed-smoking brats. Now in 2009, the Californian trio have strung together another rock opera to compliment 2004’s American Idiot, which was a machine, fuelled on politics and fed on rage. 21st Century Breakdown is an even more ambitious record describing the aftermath of George Bush’s uninspiring regime as president of the most powerful nation. It talks of Christian and Gloria, two young guns, straddling, through an America, which has been warped and brutalized. Billie Joe Armstrong writes with ultimate sneers for the Country he was born into, he is not frightened at bellowing is brewing thoughts.

The newly threaded album starts with a pounding as 21st Century Breakdown rallies home the message, the message on everyone’s lips. The drums settle in until there staved off by the guitars, grinding and grinding before Armstrong opens his vocals. The track is similar to Jesus Of Suburbia, which is on American Idiot, and is one of Green Day’s greatest songs to date. Know Your Enemy comes second with another heavy drumming input from Cool, it grows into a full frontal guitar explosion and Armstrong’s sneers become evident once more. We expect contributions like this nowadays from the band that brought us Punk’y headfasts like ‘’Basket Case’’ and ‘’Welcome To Paradise’’ modern times have eradicated Green Day’s venture to create such energetic 3 chord wonders, but the band have crated a newly inspired mould.

21st Century Breakdown has opened a new inventory for Green Day to showcase. Armstrong has become more literate with lyrics. He is not scared to push his finger into the system that runs his country. These written protests gleam through more so on ‘’Horseshoes and Hand Grenades and American Eulogy. These songs highlight both Armstrong’s anger and feelings, he wants to be heard and respected. 21st Century Breakdown does have some softer, more refined
melodies like ‘’Last Night OnEarth’’ and ‘’See The Light’’


Overall 21st Century Breakdown strikes a chord by revisiting the whole concept of a Country disarming from a leadership that was destined to bring the mania of war. It describes the hardships that people must face, picking up the pieces and going on gracefully. Green Day is a different beast nowadays its claws are sharper and their personalities as a band and as human beings have changed. The bratty old school delinquents have grown into fully-fledged protesters and hard-nosed rock stars with many beliefs and words to say, and those beliefs shine through pristinely on 21st Century Breakdown.

Mark McConville

Posted on November 16th, 2010 at 10:50am

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