greendayvideos.com -- Los Angeles concert review

Green Day played a "surprise concert", that was announced only the day before, as a warm-up performance before they head off for a Japan tour a few days later.

This concert was very special because the first time that the public heard material from the upcoming American Idiot album. Here are some exclusive fan concert reviews sent in to greendayvideos.com.

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Review #1, by Eric Sechrist
Review #2, by Scott Gurian
Review #3, by Deborah Opiniano
Review #4, by Gerry Maravilla
Review #5, by Mike Callin
Review #6, by Josue Maury
Photos, by Loren Meadows

The concert was absolutely amazing. Green Day hit the stage and wasted no time going into American Idiot. Those clips* don't do the song justice. My brother and I were about 20 ft from Billie Joe. Immediately after American Idiot they went into Jesus of Suburbia which is unlike anything I have ever heard. The wait is definitely worth it. That was about all from American Idiot and Billie Joe went on to take requests for all kinds of songs from 2,000 Light Years Away to cover songs from The Who, Weezer, Ozzy, Operation Ivy and many more. Also included in their set was I Fought The Law, Welcome to Paradise, King For A Day, Hitchin' A Ride, Brain Stew/Jaded, Basket Case, Longview, Minority, When I Come Around, She, and they ended with We Are The Champions. Green Day rocked the house, it was unbelievable how awesome they were live. After the show we met Tré, Mike and Billie and they were all super cool. It was an awesome show.

Update: I totally forgot to mention one huge thing that dawned on me the next morning they played Supermodel Robots which was really cool but Billie Joe proclaimed it as "a cover song" because The Network had been knocking their stuff for too long so they play it. Anyways I hope that will help.

Eric Sechrist, 07/30/04

*Note from the Editor: Those are two 10 seconds MP3 snippets of the song American Idiot (check snippet 1 and snippet 2), released earlier that day on greenday.com. This was the very first taste of American Idiot, before it was even played on radio, or released on CD.

For my 14th Green Day concert, one word. Unbelievable.

Green Day took the stage at 9pm and blasted into American Idiot. Next came Jesus of Suburbia. Armstrong then told the sold out crowd: "We're gonna play for like 4 hours". Some new material, old and a bunch of cover songs. Hitchin' a Ride was next, followed by Welcome to Paradise. Then as Tré was about to play the intro to Longview, they stopped and took a request. 2,000 Light Years Away. Half way through that, they played part of Only Of You but Mike had to switch his bass. Then some cover songs. Ozzy, Cheap Trick, Weezer, The Who, Billy Idol and more. Highlight of the night, as usual, during Knowledge, they bring up 3 people to play their instruments. Great!! I thought it was awesome as Green Day played 2 Network songs, Reto and Transistors Gone Wild*. Some other Green Day songs on the set were Dominated Love Slave, Longview, Basket Case, She, When I Come Around, King For A Day, Minority, Brain Stew/Jaded. They ended with We Are The Champions by Queen. Amazing show. It ended around 11pm.

*Update: I actually do think it was Supermodel Robots. I'm almost positive Reto was played too. Also, I forgot to add I Fought The Law for the set list.

Scott Gurian, 07/31/04

The Green Day concert was, in my opinion, bittersweet... My reasons are 3 fold:

1. It was easily the best concert that I have ever attended in my life. The talents of Billie Joe Armstrong, Mike Dirnt, and Tré Cool is unparallel. Billie Joe was mesmerizing on stage. For a few seconds he stood on top of the center speaker, arms outstreched, and his head hung down, mimicking Jesus Christ on the cross... Either he was doing that or he just appeared to be a "being" that somehow is just above the rest of us.

2. The show has gotten me so stoked for their new album and their upcoming fall tour. There sure as heck better not be a online presale for their concert tickets. I will fork over an unreasonable sum to a scalper if need be, but if there were any justice in this world, we would all be standing in line for tickets and not sitting in front of our computers at home, screaming at the Ticketmaster website. And the reason why it is bittersweet...

3. I feel like my concert days have reached its peak. Having witnessed the magic that went on inside the Olympic Grand Auditorium on Thursday, July 29th... What's the point of ever going to see another show again? None will ever even come close. Even if it is Green Day, there will be a million kids there. The special "dress rehersal" concert was savored by myself and just 1,999 other true Green Day fans inside of a small venue. Future shows could possibly be as good but none, unless the trio comes to my livingroom to play, will be better. I will continue to support the bands that I like and attend shows, but I will never again, unless the trio comes to my livingroom to play, get choked up when the headlining band takes the stage.

Green Day played an amazing show. The cover songs didn't sound like covers. I'm sure that everyone, including the original artists, would agree that they sounded like the real thing. Best show ever. Best band ever. Buy the album. Buy tickets for their tour this fall. Join their Street Team. We are all disciples of Green Day, go forth and spread the word of Billie Joe. Spread the word about AMERICAN IDIOT... now!

Deborah Opiniano, 08/01/04

Wow.

Yup, that's pretty much what I felt about Green Day's show last night, just wow.

I get there and they have the stage all set up with new logos and fonts from the new album which is very cool for a long time fan like myself. A little after 9, Green Day hits the stage with their new single "American Idiot". After that Billie Joe thanks the audience for coming on such sort notice and informs the crowd that they will be playing new songs, covers, and of course, old classics. With that Billie goes right into the 9 minute rock opera called "Jesus of Suburbia" from their new album. He goes into Hitchin' a Ride from that and then Welcome to Paradise.

I won't tell you every song they played in order, but they played ALL their hits from Dookie. They did a lot of neat covers too. Billie Joe is a great showman and he just keeps getting better. He had the crowd eating of the palm of his hand.

Possibly my favorite moment is when a member of the audience brought up The Network. The Network was a band that did a strange combo of new wave and punk and concealed their identities. Rumors surfaced that it was Green Day, and it was pretty obvious that it was. Green Day denies it thought and often says things like "Fuck The Network, rumor starting bastards". It doesn't help that the band's album was released by Billie Joe's record company.

Anyway, the audience member brings up The Network, and he says "Fuck those guys, we can play their songs better than they can!" From that they start playing Supermodel Robots, which is my favorite Network song and one of my favorite songs of all time, and I think I was the only audience member singing along. It was great.

The night ended with their cover of Queen's "We Are The Champions" for which Billie dauned a fake moustache.

Great ending to a great night.

Green Day songs played:
New- American Idiot, Jesus of Suburbia
Old- Hitchin' a Ride, Welcome to Paradise, 2,000 Light Years Away, Longview, She, Basket Case, Brain Stew, Jaded, Dominated Love Slave, Minority, When I Come Around, Knowledge, I Fought The Law, King For A Day.

Covers:
Cheap Trick- Surrender, The Who- The Kids Are Alright, Some Ozzy Song, You Know You Make Me Wanna Shout, The Clash- Rock the Casbah, Some Misfits Song, Danny Boy- Elvis, Our Lips Are Sealed- GoGo's (WITH JANE!), The Network- Supermodel Robots, and Queen- We Are The Champions.

Gerry Maravilla, 08/02/04

My brother called me and let me know that he heard Green Day was doing a last minute warm up show in preparation for their upcoming tour overseas. Well, I didn't believe it. I mean, why would the Godzilla Band from Berkeley do a warm up show in LA?

Then I thought to myself, if this is true it's going to cost a few bucks that I couldn't afford. Well, I was wrong on both counts. Green Day WAS playing the next day in downtown LA and the tickets were only $10!!!!! So needless to say, I was there.

The show seemed about half full and everywhere in the venue was a good seat. It was great. No opening bands, just Billie Joe and the gang for a solid 2 hours or so. And... The place sold booze!!!!!

The guys started their set about half an hour later than they were supposed to but it didn't matter. Everyone was chill. There was a very relaxed atmosphere to the show. Nobody beating each other up trying to be tough guy in the pit or anything. Believe it or not, security wasn't trippin' either. It just felt like a back yard party and we were waiting for our friends ALT ROCK band to play or something.

As soon as the guys came out, the mood changed. You could feel the excitement. The played some of the new stuff with a pretty good response from the crowd. Billie seemed a little bit drunk but still shot through the songs like a pro. Tré flung sticks through the air between fills and Mike bounced around the stage like a pogo stick.

The guys were making the set list up as they went along. Afterall, this was just a dress rehearsal. Then they started taking requests. The guys played quite a few covers of songs screamed to them by the kids in the front. They covered Hendrix, Ozzy, Weezer, among others but the cover highlight was their kick ass version of Queen's We Are The Champions where Billie had stagehands bring him his fake moustache in order to look like the late Queen singer.

The night ended with the band doing the traditional encore and finishing off their set. Fans stayed loyally until security shoo'd them away. All in all, the night was amazing. And not just because I'm a big Green Day fan. It would have been cool for anyone seeing their favorite band playing a small show with no other bands and just totally engaging the crowd. Plus, it only cost a Punk Rock $10!!!!!! The last time NOFX were in town, it was like $40 or so. That's not very punk rock. :)

Mike Callin, 08/04/04

I received a call from Kimberly and she personally invited me to the show. It was FREE for me (All Ages Fan Club Member) and one guest. What was best is that I was right up in the front with my younger brother the whole time!! Billie Joe emptied some beer on me and told me "I hate you too!" in response to my Platypus (I Hate You) request. This show was very cool. It was one of those chill, "we're gonna play new, old and covers you want" show.

The new songs are awesome, especially Jesus of Suburbia, it didn't feel like 9 minutes though. Only two new songs were played, Jesus of Suburbia and American Idiot, pretty good as well! Jesus of Suburbia is really amazing. There are many backup vocals that make the song beautiful and epic. The backup vocalists are: Jason White, Mike Dirnt, Captain Underpants and Z. Billie said their real names, but I can't remember them (D'oh!!). A part of Jesus of Suburbia turns into a fast punk beat and it made me very happy to hear that section. Billie Joe's singing is like nothing you've heard before; it's more soulful at points. The drum beats vary from midtempo to fast and the fills definitely make the song more interesting. There isn't a word to describe how much I loved this song. It just sounded so beautiful, that it almost brought a tear to my eye.

Moving on to the covers they played, guess what they played?! The Network songs, of course! At the beginning of the requests section, I asked Billie to play "Joe Robot," and he responded "I don't know that shit! Fuck The Network, they've taken a lot from us." So Green Day didn't play Joe Robot, but when someone requested Misfits, Billie said, "Ok, fine, we'll play some Misfits, but we'll do it Network style." And what do my ears hear, the space ship sound of the intro of 'Teenagers From Mars' exactly as it appears on the Network's CD "Money Money 2020." Tré put on his headphones and Mike busted some nice distortion on his bass. It was excatly Network, note by note, sound effect to sound effect. The human version of Captain Underpants was playing the synths in the back, I saw him! And Z was in front of his piano playing with one finger (for this song). It was unbelieveable! Later in the night, Billie said, "Fuck the Network, I can play Network songs better than they can!" And he did sans costume, Supermodel Robots. The only thing missing from this was the sirens, but it still sounded like the CD.

2 Clash songs were played back to back. I Fought The Law and Rock The Casbah. Jason White stood up for Billie Joe on vocals for a really awesome rendition of Rock The Casbah. Jason White sounded so much like Joe Strummer that I'm glad he got the chance to sing it. Other covers included Buzzcocks, Purple Haze, Crazy Train, Cheap Trick, Billy Idol. Mr. Tré Cool jumped off his drum kit to play guitar and sing "Like a Rat does Cheese" and "Dominated Love Slave." Billie Joe took over drums and an explotion of beer bursted out of his mouth as the drums kicked in for "Dominated Love Slave." Finally Green Day ended they're fun-filled set with Queen's "We Are The Champions." For this special song, Billie required a little assistance from his guitar tech, "Where's my moustache? I need a fucken moustache!" The guitar tech pasted a piece of black tape on Billie's upper lip, hahaha. A surprising thing about the show was that they did not play Good Riddance, after covering Queen's song, they said thanks and walked off. We waited for more, but it never came and we got kicked out by the security staff! It was fun, very fun! We even picked up two American Idiot guitar picks from the floor.

I spoke to John Roecker (Doctor Svengali) before the show and he said that Live Freaky! Die Freaky! will be out this Fall, and The Network film that will come with an extra enhanced Network CD will be out in October. John said Live Freaky! is some sick sick shit, and that The Network film will be sick as well!! There were video cameras at last night's show, so maybe, hopefully there will be some sort of thing to come out of that footage. Peace to all and keep on rockin'!!

Josue Maury, 08/06/04

Here's some pictures that I took, but they are really small 'cause they were on a picture phone. Enjoy!

Photos by: Loren Meadows, courtesy of Molly Gooding