So much for raging against the political machine, Green Day.
The washed-up rock band may see quite the uptick in downloads on one particular song this week. But it’s not because Generation Z has “rediscovered” the genius chord progression or raspy front man, Billie Joe Armstrong.
Rather, some of the millions who tuned in to Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve Sunday night likely did a quick Spotify search to determine what the actual lyrics are to the moldy golden oldie, “American Idiot,” after the wannabe punks changed them.
The original song, released on an album of the same name, warns of brainwashing by the mainstream media, orchestrated hysteria by an elite class, and propaganda handed down in the information age.
The lyrics in question are written, “I’m not part of a redneck agenda.”
Green Day changed them during their New Year’s Eve performance, belting into the microphone, “I’m not part of a MAGA agenda.”
Under all that eyeliner, Green Day has dwindled into anti-American idiots.
For the record, the line prior to that one features an anti-gay slur, a cancellable offense in 2024. And Armstrong did sing that slur live Sunday night, as the audio was cut for a split second for TV listeners. One could argue the band merely implemented immediate distaste for the Orange Man as a sort of woke offset for the f-word.
The band’s heyday, such as it was, came around 2004, when George W. Bush was conducting what was called the War on Terror.
While most of the country felt a strong sense of patriotism, perhaps the rebellious sentiments from these rock stars at that time warned their semi-literate audiences early on to the horrors of the military industrial complex, endless war, and kickbacks to big guys.
But if that’s the case, where and when did Green Day go wrong? A trajectory of revolt against Deep State perfidy would surely lead Armstrong and his fellow comrades toward a disrupter like Donald Trump, right?
After all, everybody Green Day hated in 2004 now despises Trump. Think Dick Cheney’s daughter Liz. Isn’t the enemy of my enemy my friend?
In 2022, Armstrong claimed he was renouncing his U.S. citizenship. (Stop me if you’ve heard this one before.) As usual in these matters, there is no indication that he has carried through on his devastating threat, but in case he does so—good riddance.
And it had to be well over a year and a half ago when the band displayed a well-thought-out message promoting draconian, un-Constitutional gun regulation on the screen behind them on the…European leg of their tour:
“(Bleep) Ted Cruz.”
Don’t forget that in 2021 Green Day required that all attendees at their summer concerts provide proof of COVID-19 vaccination for entry.
Certainly, months of mandated immunization papers could not have been part of the “age of paranoia” Green Day warned America about in 2004!
“No exceptions,” added the cautious, considerate rockstars.
And this flip from anti-establishment to anti-Trump had to be before the 2020 election, when Billie Joe Armstrong whole-heartedly endorsed Joe Biden and Kamala Harris on his Instagram account, claiming another four years of a Trump presidency would put “our democracy” and “our earth” at stake.
The prior month, “wide awake” Armstrong had accused President Trump of feigning illness after he announced he was diagnosed with COVID-19. That must have been all part of the MAGA agenda—the “subliminal mind(bleep)” alluded to in “American Idiot.”
The lapse had to have occurred well before 2016, when Green Day included a special Trump-deranged interlude in their performance at the American Music Awards.
“No Trump! No KKK! No fascist USA!”
So somewhere in the twelve-year interim, the band regressed, in U2- or Springsteen-like fashion, into a flock of hyper-political sellouts.
The band is set to release their latest album, titled “An Invitation into Green Day’s Brain,” later this month. As if they haven’t provided one too many of those.
Perhaps Green Day will be invited back to celebrate the 40th anniversary of their professional peak with Seacrest and the gang in 2044. Maybe by then, they will have come around.
If not, they can continue groveling along the boulevard of broken dreams—er, progressivism.