It goes without say that Green Day have been around for a fair bit, forming in 1989 – the year before my birth - they’ve aged well, going from underground heroes to “sellouts” in the space of 2 albums ( Kerplunk! and Dookie) the becoming the new voice of Punk. A lot happened between the release of Dookie, and this, which contained all their singles pre- American Idiot. Warning had been released; Billie-Joe thought he couldn’t share his ideas with the band; an idea dispelled when he wrote “Good Riddance”, and they had been on the verge of breaking up.
I’ll say one thing before I get into the review proper though. If you have the rest of Green Day’s albums, don’t buy this, you’ll get 3 new tracks and that’s it
To start with, bar the 2 new songs at the beginning of the compilation, the songs are arranged in chronological order, so if you fancy listening to Dookie-era Green Day, you don’t have to spend half an hour finding all of the songs from that time. Now that’s good, because if you want to listen to Green Day without listening to the songs in release order, you can just push the “Random” button on you’re CD player.
The songs themselves you’ve more than likely heard already (with the exception of Maria, Poprocks & coke, and J.A.R) all the hits are there, be it the acoustic guitar and strings driven, Nimrod ballad
Good Riddance (Time of you’re life), the energetic, brilliant, fast-paced pop-punk classic that is
Basket Case or the anarchic, [url=http://sputnikmusic.com/band/The+Pogues]Pogues[/url] influenced anthem
Minority; even the most casual Green Day fan will recognize these. With that said however, there are a few songs that the casual Green Day fan might not recognise. A good example of this, is the single which closes the compilation
Macy’s Day Parade; which is a ballad similar to
Good Riddance in that it is driven by Billie-Joe’s acoustic guitar while he tells a tale of his childhood. Or perhaps
Nice Guys Finish Last will jump out at you with it’s tale of a person who gives in to people to easily, that, and it’s simple yet effective structure.
The 3 non-album tracks (Maria, Poprocks & coke, and J.A.R) could possibly be said to be this compilation’s main selling point,
Maria could be said to be one of the 21st century’s political pop-punk songs, and while it doesn’t make it’s point as bluntly as
American Idiot it manages to make you think.
Poprocks & Coke could be looked at in two ways; an instrumentally dull, romantic song, or an instrumentally, creepy song. Billie-Joe manages to take the old 3 chord idea and shrink it, using only 2 chords throughout the entire song, and while this would be ok if Mike and Tre were playing like the did at the time of Dookie, Mike plays exactly what Billie-Joe does, which is dull enough, and Tre, who, lest we forget, can be an amazing drummer, contents himself with a lazy, simple drumbeat. And as for the lyrics, creepy and stalkerish don’t even begin to touch it.
What really makes this shine, is
J.A.R. from the 1995 film “Angus”. While most songs Mike ends up writing crash, burn and disintegrate into a million tiny pieces, (Eminius Sleepus anyone?)
J.A.R. is one of Green Day’s best songs. Because Mike’s written this, he’s been able to put together what is, quite frankly, an amazing bassline, without neglecting Billie’s role. Tre gets a lot to do as well; this is a song that wouldn’t seem out of place on Dookie or Insomniac. Mike’s backing vocals add a lot to the song as well, you can actually hear him, with the song’s outro consisting of Billie and Mike singing in harmony in front of the bassline that provides the intro for the song
So, as compilations go, how does this fare? Well, it would have been better if
Poprocks and coke had been tied to a big rock and thrown in a river, but apart from that, it’s a solid compilation, the addition of
J.A.R. is, in no uncertain terms, genius, and while this wouldn’t appeal to the people who have every Green Day album already, it’s perfect for someone who just wants to hear more instead of
Basket Case and
Good Riddance
Rating: 4/5
