21st Century Breakdown

It's too long of a wait for a Green Day fan. It's being almost 5 years since Green Day released their epic mega-platinum album, American Idiot. The magnitude of the success of American Idiot meant that the task that Green Day is facing to come up with a subsequent title is similarly gigantic. They were silent for a long time, and during those 5 years, they were only involved in minor projects such as "The Saints are coming" with U2, "Working Class Hero" and a off-shot album under the pseudo name of "Foxboro Hot Tubs".

When it was finally revealed that they'll come up with a new album, high expectations were already placed there for it. Anything less than the epic nature of American Idiot will be unacceptable. Some felt that perhaps the bar that Green Day had set is already too high for themselves.

Just like American Idiot, 21st Century Breakdown is a rock opera. While AI had two massive songs of 8 to 9 minutes each, 21st Century is divided into 3 different acts each. Something that I love about the album is that it still retains the continuing feature of songs as in there are some songs that connect continuously to each other without breaking. As a whole, 21st CB is musically less complicated than AI but it still retains the power chords ra-ra and Tre cool's rallying drum rolls that Green Day is famous for. Considering that Green Day quotes Queen as one of the inspiration of the album, the songs in 21st CB generally lean towards the anthemic stadium rock where everyone can just shout out along together.

The lyrics of the second song of the album, also titled "21st century breakdown" reminds me of those in Billy Joel's "Leningrad" and the narrative in there is a little like Bob Dylan's "Desolation Row". But I think it's closer to Leningrad coz Leningrad's chorus verses were "I was born in 49, a cold war kid in McCarthy's time" while Green Day's 21st CB starting phrase is "Born into Nixon.." For me, the best songs in the album has got to be Viva La Gloria, Static Age and 21 Guns. Viva La Gloria just has a nice piano combination slotted into it at the beginning and I like how the electric guitars goes into it. Static Age is just pure catchy stuff and fades off nicely into the melancholic 21 guns. The good thing about the album is that each song has a unique style on its own and the style rarely gets repetitive. The words of the lyrics in many of the songs echoes and bounces off each other nicely because there'll be some reference of the other tracks inside the song. So, it feels like the song speaks for each other.

Thematic wise, 21st CB dealt with abstract issues of post-apocalypse nuclear holocaust and living in the modern age. AI was anti-Bush, and 21st CB according to Green Day deals with the mess that Bush had left behind. Still, the album's theme can be interpreted generally with the apocalypse theme that is relevant for all ages. 21st CB could be and should be the soundtrack for Watchmen. Both would fit in nicely with each other. Lol, some of the songs in 21st CB contain just the right baggage of nihilistic or melancholic emotions. It's complex mix really because one can't avoid feeling the impending awfulness of the incoming nuclear winter after listening to 21st CB. (speaking of Fallout 3..ahaha) It can also be said that Green Day continues on the protests of the rock bands of different eras. In the past, around the 70s and 80s, it was the nuclear excesses of the Cold War and the dire warning of the world being annihilated tragically by the twist of the key. In the 90s, it was more of the sociological protest on issues such as exploitations against child/3rd world labour, capitalism and various social problems/maladies. And just as we entered the new age, not many had much to say about the 21st century, or for that matter, the first 10 years or so into the new century. Green Day stakes the claim in speaking out for the generation of this time on issues such as the gross excesses of the mass media and the complications in living in the modern era. Not only that, they have succeeded in reconstructing back past themes such as the disillusionment of the American dream, desolation and excesses of the American society as advocated by modernist writers T.S. Elliot and Hemingway in the 1920s and the same nuclear fear and hysteria that gripe the population during the Cold War.

I find the artwork of 21st CB to be very well done too. I like the powerful emotions that is presented in the locking of the lips and again, the imagery is reminiscent of a scene in the Watchmen too. To sum it up, 21st CB is a fitting successor to AI and it's definitely worth the money for 18 tracks and 69 minutes (most albums don't even hit 45 minutes). 21st Century Breakdown is a true masterpiece of magnus opus by Green Day and demonstrated their transition from their playful punk days of Dookie and Nimrod to the maturity of being social commentators in the new century.