Green Day Never Gives Up.

• Author: D'Ambrosio, Antonino
• Position: Political themes on Green Day's album '21st Century Breakdown' - Critical essay

They're playing the sang of the century of panic and promise and prosperity Tell me a story into that goodnight T hese are lyrics from the opening track, "Song of the Century from Californian power pop punk trio Green Days newest album, 21st Century Breakdown . Hearing the song for the first time, I was reminded of Dylan Thomas's poem "Do Not Go Gentle into that Good Night." Billie Joe Armstrong, the group's guitarist and lead singer, seems to have had the Welsh poet's verse in mind when he composed the eighteen songs that comprise this blistering record, as he has infused a similarly defiant rallying cry into the music.

While Thomas's poem was a plea to his dying father to not give up but instead "rage, rage against the dying of the light," Green Day's newest music is raging against the dying of a different light: American democracy. In the album's title song, the band addresses this directly: "Dream, America dream/I can't even sleep/From the light's early dawn/Scream, America scream/Believe what you see/From heroes and cons?"

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

A searing, emotionally charged concept record that mixes bold rock tunes with introspective ballads, 21st Century Breakdown follows a young couple named Christian and Gloria as they navigate the chaos Bush left in his wake. Divided into three acts--"Heroes and Cons," "Charlatans and Saints," and "Horseshoes and Hand Grenades"--the album steadily balances an intensely personal perspective with a collective worldview.

Green Day--guitarist and singer Armstrong, bassist Mike Dirnt, and drummer Tre Cool--didn't always create this kind of music. Well, at least not until 2004 and the release of their first concept record, American Idiot . Before then, their social awareness and political outrage never really went beyond the three-chord frenzy of the music or the jagged, screaming vocals of punk. There was little doubt from the band's sound that it was a direct descendant of punk bands from the glory years--the Damned, the Ramones, and the Clash--blended with a heavy dose of 1980s hardcore from the likes of Black Flag, Bad Brains, the Minutemen, and Minor Threat.

Still the group's early sound bobbed on the surface, never going deep politically in a way that defined the music of both the punk and hardcore greats they so admired. Green Day's initial songs were the stuff of suburban boredom and angst with a sprinkle of the standard issue alienation and feeling of hopelessness.

A rmstrong and Dirnt started...