Green Day

International Superhits!

Reprise Records

Once upon a time Green Day was a great band - back in the day when it was all about Lookout! Records.

When it signed to Reprise Records, it most-likely frightened many of its faithful, but came through with a decent effort on 1994’s Dookie.

1995’s Insomniac presented some decent tracks, but nothing to rave about. 1997’s Nimrod also wasn’t too bad either, but 2000’s Warning? Hey, it gave you an indication to prepare yourself for ultimate disappointment with the title of the record.

Although most greatest hits albums are a joke (see Groove on the Barenaked Ladies), this album I can somewhat understand its reason.

Green Day knows how to market itself as a superstar outfit, producing songs that rock like punk rockers do. But at the same time it is able to sneak into teenie bopper radios and worse, RapBizkitTV (also known as MTV).

Not many bands can pull that off, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but this greatest hits is a chronicle of the band’s radio hits and not a sample of its amazing (and true) punk rock roots it had on its first couple for Lookout!.

As a matter of fact, the only song represented from its first two records on Lookout! is “Welcome to Paradise,” from 1992’s Kerplunk, which was rereleased on “Dookie.” Nothing is demonstrated from 1991’s “1039/Smoothed Out Slappy Hour” or it’s 1989’s 1000 Hours EP.

However, it was nice to see J.A.R (Jason Andrew Relva), which was featured on the “Angus” movie soundtrack and a couple new tracks, “Maria” and “Poprocks & Coke,” which are both traditional and modern poppy Green Day.

But it’s getting stale.

And it’s impossible to try to figure out why it decided to include “Minority” on its greatest hits album.

All in all, there’s way too many questions that present themselves about this release.

Simply put, this is an example of a great band past its prime and it’s perfect for the radio-friendly fan.

As for the rest of us who appreciated it more when they were just a punk rock band on a rad label, stay away from this nonsense.

Dan Julian