‘Tis the season of giving, and Green Day’s latest gift arrived just in time for the holidays. Billie Joe Armstrong, Mike Dirnt and Tré Cool were blessed with the ability to take all of society’s woes and roll them into three minutes of storytelling, coupled with a bratty sense of malcontent that etched their names in punk history forever.
Now, the Idiot Nation can relive Green Day’s best and brightest with “Greatest Hits: God’s Favorite Band,” named for a gig last March on Stephen Colbert’s Late Show when the Lord came down to introduce His beloved punk rockers.
The concept might go back as early as 2005, though. On the “Bullet in a Bible” live DVD, Mike can be heard backstage asking, “Why are there no clouds in the sky?” Tré quips, “Cause God wants to watch his favorite band again.”
This latest and greatest compilation has it all: the snotty glory days of “Longview” and “Basket Case,” the soul-searching campfire classic “Good Riddance (Time of Your Life),” blistering political condemnations like “Holiday” and “Know Your Enemy” and the flame-spitting new singles “Bang Bang” and “Still Breathing.” Steeped in thirty years of experience and twelve frenetic studio albums, it’s the ultimate Green Day sampler. And the prayer candles are pretty cool, too.
For a special holiday treat, Green Day mixed in some new stuff with the old. Billie pairs up with country superstar Miranda Lambert for a tender rendition of “Ordinary World.” An odd combination, but it works, full of yearning for days long gone and hope for what the future might hold.
The lone original, “Back in the USA,” is an anti-war number in the bitterest sense. “Let freedom ring with all the crazies on parade,” Billie shouts. The message is short and less than sweet: Ignorance kills, but blind patriotism hurts almost as badly.
The song is haunting enough, but then there’s the music video; the guys play a trio of 1950’s suburbanites living the black-and-white “American Dream.” When Billie gets ahold of some special glasses that reveal the ugly truth of corporate America, they hatch a plot to lift the veil from everyone’s eyes, and that means exposing the President (who bears a striking resemblance to our tweeter-in-chief) for the lying zombie-monster that he really is.
Green Day’s last greatest hits collection came in 2001 with “International Superhits.” Much has changed for the Berkeley trio in the sixteen years since. They’ve released two larger-than-life rock operas, loosed three LP’s in a span of three months, joined the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and returned with new fire on last year’s “Revolution Radio.”
In recent years, the California natives have proven they can transcend all kinds of entertainment. Billie showed off his acting chops in the movie “Ordinary World,” where he plays a has-been punk rocker facing the dreaded mid-life crisis. The “American Idiot” musical has been eating up theaters for over seven years, and the release of the HBO-produced “American Idiot” film can’t be far off.
Billie, Mike and Tré will be heading home for the holidays after closing out their “Revolution Radio” World Tour on Nov. 19 with a marathon set in Mexico City. As headliners for Corona Capital 2017, they ripped through most of the gems on “God’s Favorite Band” and more than a dozen other tracks to cap off their tremendous year-long, 120-show outing.
Times change, but “God’s Favorite Band” reminds us that Green Day’s power is undimmed and omnipresent. Now bow your heads for the blessing.