Saviors

About

Arriving 20 years after the open political ire of <i>American Idiot</i>, Green Day’s 14th album sees the veteran California punk trio energized by a new wave of worrying trend. Now in his early fiftie, singer/guitarist Billie Joe Armstrong retains the snotty defiance that has always been his calling card, whether the stakes are high or low. He doesn’t mince words on opener and lead single “The American Dream Is Killing Me,” calling out the nation’s boom in conspiracy theories and reimagining the classic patriotic lyric “my country, ’tis of thee” as “my country under siege.” While less of a concept album than the rock opera turned stage musical <i>American Idiot</i>, <i>Saviors</i> still latches on to some recurring themes in the name of getting a point acro, such as updating 1950s-era rock ’n’ roll tropes: “Bobby Sox” swaps the aw-shucks question “Do you wanna be my girlfriend?” with “Do you wanna be my boyfriend?” while the timeless-sounding romantic ballad “Suzie Chapstick” is timestamped with a reference to absently scrolling Instagram. And “Living in the ’20s” may flash a guitar solo ripped straight from rock’s earliest day, but it also cites the more modern markers of mass shootings and pleasure robot. .

via Apple Music

The Clerk says

Start your shelf to read the full take →