Album Review: Green Day - American Idiot (4 out of 5 pimp slaps)

The concept album...it’s a nice concept, but few artists attempt it, let alone pull it off successfully.

Green Day gives it a shot with American Idiot, their commentary on life as a member of Generation X in the Bush Administration.

The title track opens the album and is basically a nice, short, and sweet fuck you to Fox News, MTV, and any other media outlet trying to get control of our minds and wallets. Ironically, it’s the song that you’ve probably heard a ton on MTV, the lead single.

The next track Jesus of Suburbia is actually about 5 songs in one. A made for concert medley. If you are decent at reading between the lines in song titles, you pretty much get the point of this song. Teen angst is the order of the day, with every little subpart of this song being a shout out to teens from broken homes, with “moms and brads”, and no faith in anything; letting them know that someone out there feels their pain.

Holiday is a new age protest song. It’s kind of a coming of age for young republicans who realize that maybe they aren’t republican after all. Boulevard of Broken Dreams talks about the alienation that the above mentioned kind of realization leads to.

Musically, Are We Waiting changes things up a bit. The aforementioned songs were all hard driving songs with lots of heavy guitar and drums. Are We Waiting slows it up a bit, but the message generally stays the same, a nation of young people waiting on their purpose.

And then along comes St. Jimmy, who’s here to save those that need to be saved.

I'm the patron saint of denial with an angel face.
And a taste for suicidal
Cigarettes and ramen and a little bag of dope.

I am the son of a bitch and Edgar Allan Poe.
Raised in the city under a halo of lights.
The product of war and fear that we've been victimized…

…Welcome to the club and give me some blood.
I'm the resident leader of the lost and found
It's comedy and tragedy.
It's St. Jimmy AND THAT'S MY NAME DON'T WEAR IT OUT.

Give Me Novacaine is the response to St. Jimmy, asking Jimmy for just that, some relief from the reality of today. Of course in the struggle you need a woman by your side, and She’s A Rebel introduces her. Extraordinary Girl extols her patience at dealing with the purposeless guys of today, willing to stand by his side in spite of his immaturity and the fact that she’s “sick of crying”.

Letterbomb probably would have fit better in my opinion earlier in the album, it’s more of the same anarchist leaning. Nothing to care for, nothing to take with you, no purpose; it all just seems a bit out of place.

Wake Me Up When September Ends is probably the best song on the album. With September being a metaphor for a period of time that just plain out sucks and doesn’t seem to want to end, the song itself plays out like a rock ballad.

The album ends like it started, with another medley of songs, this time entitled Homecoming. It starts with the suicide of St. Jimmy, leaving us back where we started. And guess what? No one cares! And they are still alienated. And the album comes full circle as they come home again.

And in the last song, Whatsername, even the girl is forgotten, or at least vaguely remembered. It’s like a wistful look back at a past full of angst and anger with a sort of “whatever” nonchalance.

All in all, the album does a good job as a journey into the psyche of today’s (still) confused Gen-Xers and the youth that have taken a crash course in the ways of Gen-Xers, living in Bush’s America. The concept is well done. A few of the songs “sound the same”, but with this album it’s more about the message than anything else. If you are a fan of Alternative Rock or just like to diversify your musical selections, it’s a good purchase. It’s a pretty good introduction to Green Day. (4 pimp slaps out of 5)