07 August 2024 (gig)
10 August 2024
The Boston music landscape has always had a burgeoning punk scene dating back to the 1970s. Long-gone clubs as The Channel and The Rat hosted many punk shows which featured local legends as Slapshot and Gang Green.
Boston also has ties to power-punk kings Green Day. In 1994, Green Day was booked to play a free welcome-back concert for returning college students at the Hatch Shell in Boston (the place where the Boston Pops play their annual Fourth of July show).
Apparently Green Day was booked prior to Woodstock '94 (in August of 1994) where the band became overnight darlings of the music world (due to a killer set and a mudslinging fight with the audience that endeared them to the crowd). So when Green Day showed up to play the Hatch Shell, a few weeks after the Woodstock gig (on September 9, 1994), a crowd of 65,000 were waiting and the show was stopped after just a few songs (the city was overwhelmed by all the moshing) and a bit of a riot ensued.
Flash forward 30 years and Green Day is back in Boston. The once-punk upstarts are now a stadium-level band and played to a packed house at Fenway Park in Boston, Massachusetts (USA) on August 7, 2024.
What is making this year's tour extra special is that Green Day is celebrating the 30th anniversary of the release of their breakthrough disc, "Dookie", and also the two decades that have passed since they dropped the groundbreaking 2004 record, "American Idiot". To mark the occasions, Green Day are playing both discs in their entirety on this year's jaunt.
After piped-in versions of Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody" and The Ramones' "Blitzkrieg Bop", Green Day (Billy Joe Armstrong, guitar/lead vocals; Tre Cool, bass/vocals; Mike Dirnt, drums/vocals) rushed the stage and opened with "The American Dream Is Killing Me", and immediately started performing "Dookie" in full.
Standouts of the full album presentation were "Welcome to Paradise", "Pulling Teeth" (where Armstrong played a bit of Neil Diamond's "Sweet Caroline" as a tribute to the Boston Red Sox baseball team) and a phenomenal version of "Basket Case".
An amazing moment came during "Coming Clean", where a helium-filled "Dookie" themed airplane soared above the crowd, bringing Pink Floyd-like antics to the show.
After completing "Dookie", Green Day pumped out a few other cuts with "Dilemma" (which began with a bit of Tom Petty's "Free Fallin'") and raucous versions of 2000's "Minority" and "Brain Stew", which started with a snippet of Black Sabbath's "Iron Man".
Following this, the full recitation of "American Idiot" began with the title cut and prime versions of "Holiday" and "Boulevard of Broken Dreams".
Deeper cuts from "American Idiot" as "Give Me Novocaine" and "She's a Rebel" resonated quite well with the enthusiastic Boston crowd.
The standout of the "American Idiot" set was "Wake Me Up When September Ends". An atmospheric song about the end of summer was given an unexpected prop, as the night air was unseasonably cool this night (most suprising, as Boston has had a streak of heatwaves recently), and added much more of a feeling to the song.
As "American Idiot" came to a close, the crowd was elated, as hearing both albums live was an almost-surreal experience.
After a very brief off-stage saunter, Green Day returned with "Bobby Sox" and then Armstrong stayed solo and, armed with an acoustic guitar, gave a magical rendition of 1997's "Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)". Dirnst and Cool joined Armstrong and the final bows were taken, ending what has been the best stadium-level show this summer.
The Smashing Pumpkins went on prior to Green Day. One of the heroes of 1990's alternative rock, the band was very tight. Billy Corgan had several great moments, but especially shined on the haunting "Disarm" and an amazing "Bullet With Butterfly Wings" (one of the best rock tracks of the 1990s).
