Review Summary: You're old. Stop making this music.
Since their inception, Green Day has existed as a kind of pop regurgitation machine. Their albums are merely reflections of whatever point of 70’s pop history they happen to be listening to at the time, with varying levels of bite and catchiness. Green Day’s latest trilogy of albums keep up this pattern, though as pop musicians frequently do their attitude has receded over the years. And as I watch this now toothless old man doggedly nom on the same stale old piece of bubblegum he’s been chewing for years the only question that I can find myself asking is “why”?
This whole affair is frankly a big waste of time. Green Day can’t even be bothered to write middle-left anthems with all the conviction of an upper middle class soccer mom’s bumper sticker anymore. Instead we have Billie Joe sloganeering about a whole lot of nothing.
I lied, there is a middle-left fist-waver, “99 Revolutions”. Chalk it up with Jefferson Starships “We Built This City” among examples of rebel-posturing cheese. And then we go into the recycled and recycled and recycled piano ballad of “The Forgotten”. Why am I still here?
This is the lamest paint-by-numbers-pop album Green Day have offered yet. I hear the sound of the last American arena-rock band going the way of their forebears and fading into utter irrelevance. Await the reunion jukebox tours and maybe an album in a decade if you want to hear them actually try.
Did I mention they’re old?
