A marathon effort

You know that when a band comes on at eight o clock that its going to be a long show. Most of the punters seemed to know this and there was no milling about outside, everyone seemed to be in their place when the familiar roadie in a rabbit suit came on and treated us to a run through of YMCA, warming us up for the main event. When the lights dipped the stage set sprang into life, and what had looked like a pretty dull layout was transformed by a huge video backdrop of a city skyline. And there suddenly standing amongst it were the band.Green Day of course have had a major comeback in recent years, thanks mainly to the incredible success of American Idiot, one of the biggest selling concept albums of all time. It is a formula they have stayed loyal to on current record, 21st Century Breakdown, which tells the story of two kids trying to make their way in complex American society post Bush. This in truth gives a pretty broad canvas from which to choose song topics and the album treats us to love, death, war, poverty, and temptation amongst other things. When you take the album on its own, and by that I mean not comparing it to its predecessor, it is a startling and ambitious piece of work clocking in at almost an hour and a half. This show starts pretty much like the record with the first three songs  played in order. By the end of third tune ‘Know your Enemy’ main man Billie Joe Armstrong has been off stage, down one of the aisles and picking someone from the crowd to join him onstage for the religious overtones of ‘East Jesus Nowhere’ during which the audience member has her soul cleansed and then vanishes in a puff of smoke. If only he could have picked Simon Cowell.

The show is divided into three main parts of which the first hour or so features a run through the best of the new album with a smattering of American Idiot tunes, the mass singalong of ‘We are the Waiting’ and the epic ‘St Jimmy’. To go along with this we get a plethora of side attractions, the band firing tee shirts into the crowd, a mass battle with water pistols and hosepipes, some seriously good video effects ‘The Static Age’ from You Tube and very loud pyrotechnics. At this point I must say the whole band were on top form as well and were really tight throughout the set. The Green Day trio are supplemented by an extra guitarist and keyboard player for the live work, this of course gives Billie Joe more freedom to roam around. And roam he does, very rarely standing still, running all over the stage and beyond. I feel tired watching him. The middle of the set features all the old punk classics from the first three records, ‘Brain Stew’, ‘Welcome to Paradise’ and of course ‘Basket Case’ amongst them. This section goes down well with the older members of the crowd, there was an amazing age range at the gig highlighting the all round appeal of the band. Lots of dads and lads were present and it was fun watching some of the kids taking great pleasure in Billie Joe’s liberal use of ‘fuck’. Another punter is pulled out to sing ‘Jaded’ and gets a bit of his hair cut off for his trouble. He makes a great job of the tune but I suspect he may be a ‘Plant’ in the audience.

By this stage we are 2 hours or so into the set but they show no signs of letting up. The marathon continues with the ‘King for a Day’ segment which is the band visiting their gay side as they don very dodgy headgear and mince their way through what has never really been one of my favourite tunes by them. They do make up for this with a medley featuring the Stones, Who, Lulu, and a nod to local acts in Def Leppards ‘Rock of Ages’ riff. In a supreme comedy moment they also trot out some Duran Duran, possibly mixing up the Brummies with the more local Human League. Birmingham probably got ‘Don’t you want Me’. They get back on the straight (pun intended) with more from the current album, ‘American Eulogy’ ending the main set with its mass hysteria chant proving apt for this crowd.

Of course there’s more to follow, the 3 chord thrash of ‘American Idiot’ giving way to a mammoth ‘Jesus of Suburbia’ the highlight for me on the night, miles better than it comes across on record. The pace is pushed to the max with ‘Minority’, the only track tonight from the patchy Warning album but by far the best. Billie Joe is accompanied for this by a junior band member about six years old, complete with toy guitar. Then in complete contrast the show is brought to a close with a gentle acoustic run through ‘When September ends’ and ‘Good Riddance’ with simple blue and red lights providing the only effects. So a mighty fine show, almost nothing to criticise about it, certainly nothing significant was missed out during the 2 hours 50 minutes on stage. There’s certainly more to come from Green Day next year, with stadium shows almost definite. That’s if they have any energy left.

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