Pop Music Blog

BY RICK MASSIMO
Journal Pop Music Writer

BOSTON - Green Day's 21st Century Breakdown is the rock record of the year, in the sense that no other rock record feels more like what this year feels like. And in the same way, Monday night's show at the TD Garden was the rock show of the year.

In front of a sellout crowd of 13,380, the California band solved the problem of how to fill a two-and-a-half-hour arena show with short, sharp punk-pop songs the same way they managed to fill an hour-plus CD with the same: with a furious energy, the honing tendencies of righteous anger and the sheer ambition to use words and concepts such as "generation" and "century" and mean it.

This was clear from the first song, the title track from 21st Century Breakdown, a sprawling suite which incorporated sunny beach-rock with high harmonies, a rolling, majestic Who-style anthem and an arena-rock arm-waver all in one. From there, it was "Know Your Enemy" ("Silence is the enemy/ Against your urgency/ So rally up the demons of your soul") and the slamming riff-rock of "East Jesus Nowhere."

By this time, singer and guitarist Bille Joe Armstrong had already prodded people to come down from their seats into the general-admission floor area over the objection of security, screamed at the crowd, "This is not (expletive) television!"; charged way up one of the aisles; and pulled a young fan out of the audience to "heal" him, evangelist-style.

And the manic energy continued from there. So did the audience participation, as a succession of fans came up to sing "Longview" and yet another played guitar on the encore "Jesus of Suburbia."

Throughout, the mix of snarling guitars, cooing harmonies, breakneck beats and arresting hooks completed the decades-long evolution that has let Green Day keep people's attention as they went from basement punk jokers to - well, maybe not the only band that matters, but on a short list, all without becoming pompous. And the cheesy arena touches - the pyro, the fireworks, the confetti - managed to merge with the message ("This is our moment! Right now! Are you alive?!," Armstrong shouted before "The Static Age"), giving depth to the entertainment and entertainment to the depth.

Armstrong and the band (bassist Mike Dirnt and drummer Tre Cool, augmented by three other musicians) included plenty of musical and historical references to their early days, including Armstrong's reminiscence about playing at a skate ramp in Providence 20 years ago (complete with a shout-out to a Providence friend in the scrum on the floor). And the anarchic humor that exemplified their early work was an easy and effective way to break up the long concert - calling up a succession of fans to sing "Longview" as well as an extended "King For a Day" that included silly costumes and quotes from "Shout," "Swanee" and "I'll Be There."

But the ability to go from that extended silliness to the gorgeous power ballad "21 Guns" on a dime showed an ambition and an understanding of crowd dynamics that was clear even in the skate-ramp days.

They finished up with the anthem "American Idiot," the joyous middle finger of "Minority" and of course, the hushed, acoustic "Macy's Day Parade" and "Good Riddance (Time Of Your Life)," two of the songs that first showed that Armstrong had more on his mind than Dookie would have suggested.

The Bravery opened the show with chilly, synthesized rock that recalled The Cure (particularly in Sam Endicott's voice) and Joy Division (particularly in Michael Zakarin's high-drama guitar riffs). They rose and fell on their hooks, which meant they rose more than they fell.

rmassimo@projo.com / (401) 277-7206

 Tags  Green Day The Bravery

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