![]() It’s a tender song where Armstrong tempers his fondness of cliche – “Tomorrow is the first day of the rest of our lives,” “I solemnly swear to tell the whole truth” – with gentle affection. Warning was the album where Billie Joe grew up, and nowhere is that incremental maturity more evident than on “Church on Sunday,” an upbeat, jangly ode to marital compromises and the little trade-offs every couple acquiesces to in order to stay together. The Armstrongest Lyric: “The scars on my hands/ And the means to an end/ Is all that I have to show” 18. This dramatic and occasionally flowery “fuck the man” anthem is a journey in itself, its stately first half giving way to a blood-pumping scramble away from the “bastards of 1969” towards a majestic, arm-waving conclusion. 21st Century Breakdown never detonated with the impact of American Idiot, but it did serve up some thumping tunes, like the album’s title track. “21st Century Breakdown” – 21st Century Breakdown (2009)īless Green Day for following up a political rock opera with … another political rock opera. The Armstrongest Lyric: “Summer has come and passed/ The innocent can never last/ Wake me up when September ends” 19. Its release as a single just ahead of Hurricane Katrina (which reached land during the final days of August 2005) only added to the song’s legend, giving it an extra bit of significance to the people of a devastated New Orleans. At the time of its release, it provided an emotional gut-punch on Green Day’s most ambitious album to that point, American Idiot.Īnd while the song holds the unfortunate distinction of ending Green Day’s three-song streak of number-one songs on alternative radio (it peaked at number two, fended off by Gorillaz’s “Feel Good Inc.”), it was also notable for its success on the pop charts, hitting number six on the Billboard 200. And isn’t that one measure of a successful song? That it can be effectively memed a dozen years after its initial release? But “Wake Me Up When September Ends” is more than just a yearly punchline. Pretty much every fall, Twitter becomes awash with jokes about Billie Joe Armstrong’s sleep habits. “Wake Me Up When September Ends” – American Idiot (2004) Green Day is a formative band for many of us, whether you were there when they were still called Sweet Children or whether you were captivated by their grand middle finger to George W. The breadth of their catalog aside, this ranking was difficult because the line between “best song” and “favorite song” quickly blurs when it comes to this band. I think I speak for everyone who pitched in on this list when I say narrowing down their best songs was nearly as painful as (ahem) pulling teeth. They’ve scaled not one but two commercial peaks in a storied, 13-album career that’s experimented with form (rock operas, album trilogies, Broadway musicals) and subject (love, politics, masturbation). Also, check out the new “Punk Is Dead, Long Live Punk!” T-shirt at the Consequence Shop.īillie Joe Armstrong and Mike Dirnt formed Green Day in 1986 - that’s over 35 solid fucking years of punk, pop punk, punk rock, rock, pop rock, and all the strange detours in between. Top Songs is a feature in which we definitively handpick the very best songs in an artist or band’s catalog. This article originally ran in 2016, but we’re dusting it off in celebration of Billie Joe Armstrong’s birthday on February 17th.
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