Is Green Day a Reincarnation of The Who?

In 1994 when Green Day released their major label debut "Dookie," perhaps no one could have guessed that this Bay Area pop-punk band would release two Billboard chart-topping concept albums and have a Broadway musical based on their music. In fact, there weren't many who thought this quirky threesome of men in their twenties would survive the Sophomore Jinx. Sure "Dookie" was an absolute smash hit, but how much real staying power could a band whose song topics included pot-smoking and masturbation really have?

Now 17 years later it's clear that Green Day is here to stay, and they have reached heights that even the most successful and iconic bands of their era have not reached. Green Day has sustained themselves from the grunge era of the early 1990s and through the milieu of boy bands, pop divas and faceless generic rock of the early 2000s to plant them firmly in the consciousness of Rock and Roll history. With the benefit of time, can it be said that Green Day has become a generation's version of The Who, another band who had modest pop music roots that grew into much larger shoes?

Pop Beginnings

Both Green Day and The Who broke out with songs and albums that established them as masters of the pop tune. Green Day's "Basket Case," a blistering song about post-adolescent angst and drug use could play right after "My Generation," The Who's own track about generational struggles between those in power and those coming of age, and the feelings expressed by both songs seem perfectly suited for each other.

For both Green Day and The Who their early material, while poppy and catchy, still struck an undercurrent of depth that a lot of similar acts could not imitate. "86" is a track on Green Day's sophomore album "Insomniac" and it deals with the band's own rejection in the very scene they sprouted up from, speaking to alienation from those who used to adore you. The Who gave us "Happy Jack," a tune about a bullied little boy who goes on blissfully through life despite his tormentors' abuse. Both songs are wrapped in a shell that only pop-music can impart to deeper and darker subjects.

Emerging Diversity

When Green Day released their third album "Nimrod" they placed a track at the very end entitled "Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)" that featured strings and was devoid of both drums and bass. It became an anthem of the times, and has since been probably played at millions of weddings, graduations and even funerals. This track was the first glimpse into the changes that the band was about to make in its musical direction.

With "Warning," released in October of 2000, Green Day had put together an album that took them for the most part far, far away from their pop-punk origins. While there were still a few songs that hearkened back to Green Day's roots, most of the tracks varied wildly from the beaten path, featuring accordions and horns wherever needed. Similarly The Who in 1967 released "The Who Sell Out" and laid down a similar footprint with songs like "I Can See for Miles" showing The Who's increasingly deep musical penmanship peeking out from the edges.

Both bands were headed for much more ambitious territory at this point in their careers, and both bands would release albums that resonated far beyond what they could have hoped for. After four major label releases they both released pivotal rock operas that forever changed the way they were seen as artists.

St. Jimmy and Tommy

1969's "Tommy" was The Who's tale of a deaf, mute and blind kid who just happened to play pinball better than anyone ever could. It was a double-album complete with an overture. The album's trademark track, "Pinball Wizard" is a three minute gem that tells the story of Tommy, the eponymous protagonist of the album. "Tommy" was The Who's first venture into territory that up to that point hadn't truly been explored by rock musicians. Some credit '"Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band," perhaps The Beatles most well-known album, as being the first concept album, but that album really abandoned its concept after the first two songs, and didn't pick it back up until the reprise of the title track just before the album's close.

35 years after "Tommy" Green Day released "American Idiot." Now a decade after they'd released "Dookie," they were performing their own rock opera; the stories of St. Jimmy, The Jesus of Suburbia and Whatsername. Each of the main characters has their own title track on "American Idiot," with "The Jesus of Suburbia" being a nine minute epic anthem, and it's just the second cut on the album. "American Idiot" gave Green Day a rebirth and showed the world that they were able to grow as musicians and create relevant, powerful material that transcended the post-adolescent angst of their earlier albums.

Quadrophenia and a Breakdown

Though they didn't follow up "Tommy" with another concept album or rock opera, The Who's 1971 album "Who's Next" was based largely on a science-fiction plot line that Pete Townshend had been trying to work into their next record. The remnants of that science-fiction style can be heard in the insane analog synthesizer masterpiece of an intro to "Baba O'Riley," the opening track.

In 1973 The Who released "Quadrophenia," another double-album rock opera. This time the story centered on a young man coming of age, a very similar story to "American Idiot." Ironically, the album's central character is also named Jimmy, and there's a track on "Quadrophenia" entitled "Doctor Jimmy." One could speculate as to whether Billie Joe Armstrong was tipping his cap to Townshend by naming the central character in "American Idiot" Jimmy as well. Quadrophenia perhaps was not as successful as "Tommy" was, partly because of just how ambitious the story was, but it still remains a vital part of The Who's catalog.

To follow-up their own first rock opera, Green Day released "21st Century Breakdown" in 2009. The central conflict in this album seems to come from the couple of Christian and Gloria, a young pair torn apart by religion and war. For some this album didn't quite have the same impact that its predecessor had, but when placed next to "American Idiot' as a one-two punch, its impact is clear and concise. In this record, Green Day took on the idea of power itself, whether that power stem from God, a politician or your parents.

Re-interpretation

Perhaps there's no better compliment to one's work than to have it inspire other artists to re-tell your story. "Tommy" and "Quadrophenia" were both eventually adapted into screenplays and released as motion pictures. "American Idiot" and "21st Century Breakdown" were used as the basis for a musical that is running on Broadway. This is just yet another striking similarity between Green Day and The Who. It's hard to say whether the stories told by these rock operas were so compelling that movies and plays just had to be written or whether commercial success and album sales were the driving inspiration, but clearly the music of these two acts inspired similar feelings in screenwriters and playwrights.

Time Will Tell

The toughest job in comparing Green Day and The Who is that both are from different eras. No matter how much similarity you can find in their works, there's still the undeniable truth that The Who started making music thirty years before the world had heard of Green Day. There will always be a tendency to eschew the possibility that these bands are in fact parallel equals to one another.

The only barometer we'll have is in another 30 years, when we take a look at what Green Day has done from this point forward. If they are able to remain relevant and tour every now and then, it's possible that the argument laid out in this article will seem almost "Well, Duh" in nature. It seems clear though, that Green Day likely made a very conscious decision at some point to move their career paths closer towards the one blazed by The Who and that their music certainly has benefited from that decision. Who's to say that's a bad thing?

Sources
Yahoo! Music
Billboard.com
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