Headlining the next edition of the Osheaga festival, the Californian group Green Day is launching its fourteenth album today, Saviors. Which, it should be noted, appears thirty years after the release of the album that made him famous, Dookielaunched on 1er February 1994. Sold more than 23 million copies, Dookie led the parade of great punk albums of this pivotal year: Smash, from The Offspring, Let’s go, from Rancid, Punk in Drublic, of NOFX, and Stranger than Fiction, by Bad Religion. Three decades later, what remains of this phenomenal second wave of American punk?
A group, first and foremost: Green Day. Made up of three musicians, now all aged 51, probably still motivated by the studio and the stage. Four extracts from the new album Saviors were revealed: The American Dream is Killing Me, Look Ma, No Brains!, Dilemma And One Eyed Bastard. “I listened to the new songs, and yes, I will listen to the new album with interest,” assures Marie-Ève Roy, co-founder of Vulgaires Machins. “I had my ups and downs with Green Day, I listened, I lost interest, I came back with American Idiot [2004]but it’s definitely a band significant in my musical journey because it is part of my adolescence. »
Same reaction from Hugo Mudie, co-founder of The Sainte Catherines and founding director of the punk festival Pouzza Fest: “I listened to the singles, I’m going to listen to the album, but at the same time, Green Day is a good example of the reasons that push me to stop making music: I don’t think it’s possible to continue making good albums in this musical style. After a while, you either reinvent yourself or repeat yourself. What made this scene good at the time was the effect of novelty. The bands brought something different, freshness, to the punk movement; It’s a lot less fresh when the guys are in their fifties…”
And freshness, the year 1994 had it in spades, “in several other musical styles elsewhere”, notes Rej Laplanche, famous host of the show 1-2-3 Punk at MusiquePlus during the 2000s, today at the helm of the morning show Rej Against Le Matin on the airwaves of BLVD, in Quebec. “What I found in this music was the attitude. In the early 1990s, grunge was hot, but it wasn’t necessarily a sound for everyone, because of its moody and depressing quality; When, in 1994, the landmark albums by Green Day, The Offspring and NOFX were released, this Californian punk or skate punk sound, young people had an alternative. »
“Some of the themes of these groups were similar to those of the grunge groups, but with a completely different energy and musicality,” says Laplanche. The teenager who didn’t recognize himself in the words of Kurt Cobain and Eddie Vedder [de Pearl Jam] rather recognized himself in those of Dexter [Holland, The Offspring] and Billie Joe [Armstrong, chanteur et guitariste de Green Day]. »
They created a monster!
“It was our teenage years, we listened to it constantly, gang, remembers Marie-Ève Roy. Yes, Green Day was skate punk, but at the same time it pushed us to discover the punk that came before, that of The Clash and The Ramones. It was an effervescent period, which made us want to play music, too. » Dookie had the same effect on Hugo Mudie: “Then, in 1994, I heard Basketball Case [tirée de Dookie]. Oh shit ! It got to me. I started dyeing my hair, buying linen at thrift stores, I became a little annoying punk! »
In the Californian punk sound of the 1990s, analyzes Rej Laplanche, “you still have the I don’t care attitude of the original punk, but instead of being camped in the grayness of the streets of London and New York of the 1990s 1970, you are in the sun and the skate from California! » Dookie stood out from Green Day’s first album (Kerplunk1991) with even catchier songs (Welcome to Paradise, When I Come Around) and super careful production. Hugo Mudie says the album has aged well: “These songs are timeless, just like those of the Ramones. A really good punk album, good songs, the theme of boredom [que vivent les ados] timeless. »
Dookie is also, in terms of texts and subjects covered, the stupidest of Green Day’s albums, which will bring back the social and political commitment and the critical eye in his work with the album American Idiot. The punk trio’s now thirty-year-old album has also left a less glorious legacy, that of the pop-punk wave of the late 1990s, characterized by the successes of Blink 182, Sum 41, Simple Plan and Avril Lavigne.
“Green Day is undoubtedly the child of the Ramones, with the same kind of theme and riffs similar guitar, believes Mudie. It is true that [Dookie] created a monster, allowing pop-punk — the most Walmart version of punk possible! — to exist. So why is Green Day still so popular? Because it was sincere. They started in the late 1980s, in a real scene underground. They weren’t trying to be someone else’s accessible copy. »
And how is punk doing in 2024? According to Laplanche, we are currently riding the crest of a third wave: “I say it with a smile because this style is super popular today because of nostalgia: the fans from then are today in the late thirties, early forties, with jobs, a family, they are the ones who keep the economy going and have the means to buy show tickets. Skate punk is making a comeback, but it’s not necessarily because young people love this music,” adds the host, who is however looking for a new flagship group of young punk musicians.
Hugo Mudie found some, particularly in the sound of Turnstile, more hardcore and avant-garde than the sound of Green Day. “Turnstile, a lot of young people listen to it, and it comes from punk. I think, actually, that punk is exactly where it belongs today. The anomaly of the story is that Green Day and The Offspring became so famous. What is normal is that punk remains a musical style appreciated by some; The abnormal thing is that these groups from the 1990s end up on the front pages of magazines and achieve popular and commercial success, although I think that could still happen. One day, a new punk band will release an album that will become cult for my children’s generation, but that’s not necessary for punk to continue. »
Saviors by Green Day was released on the Reprise label; the group will be one of the headliners at the Osheaga festival, from August 2 to 4, 2024.