Green Day - July 13th 2009

This first post is a personal one. I'm not sure where I want to take this blog so this is simply a post to start it off.

July 13th 2009 was quite honestly the best day of my life, the day I finally got to see Green Day in concert. We left for Chicago, arriving 4 hours before the concert started. The ride there was pretty calm until we saw the Verizon sponsor bus with their picture on the side.

Even though it wasn't their tour bus it was enough to get us going. We made our way over to Will Call to pick up our sweet floor tickets and then continued to the line that had started in front of one of the many gates around the United Center.

We were pumped, to see our heroes for real instead of the pictures and videos that we spent hours and hours looking at before. Time passed quickly and 6:30 arrived, the time that they finally opened the gates and let all of us rush in. We made our way through the crowd and approached the table where we could get our wrist bands for the mosh pit. After we had them we practically ran down into the pit hoping we'd make it to the front. We got there only to find that the first row had been filled, so we stood behind the first row on the right side of the catwalk. With my friend Kylie's help we squeezed into the first row and waited until eight o'clock.

Soon the Bravery walked out on stage, starting the show off and opening up for our boys. They had a pretty good setlist including Unconditional, Believe, and An Honest Mistake so it was entertaining enough, but everyone just wanted to see Green Day. They played for a half hour, some of that including tracks off of their new album Stir the Blood that hadn't been released yet, and left the stage. Their set was cleaned out soon after and we watched as all of Green Day's gear was moved onto the stage. This took a half hour as well and we were kept entertained with music over the sound system. The Clash and the Ramones kept us amused until the drunk bunny stumbled out on stage.

The whole crowd was chanting "Chug! Chug! Chug!" and watched as the bunny tumbled over in front of Tre's drumset. He eventually hopped off stage and the lights dimmed. Soon everyone heard "This is Rock n' Roll Radio, stay tuned for more Rock n' Roll" , the end of "Do You Remember Rock and Roll Radio?' by the Ramones, and "Song of the Century" was blaring over the loud speakers, sending everyone into a fit of yelling and screaming. When "Song of the Century" cut out the acoustic guitar intro for "21st Century Breakdown" started. Immediately afterwards, Tre Cool came storming out on stage, hands in the air running around like a mad man, followed by Billie Joe and Mike who grabbed their guitars and went to their spots. Tre started hitting the bass and Billie jumped in the air, strumming the first chord as the song kicked in. Billie always talks about how much he loves to play live and you could see it from the huge grin on his face. During the first song Billie smiled at me and at that point I could've gone home happy...except for missing the rest of the show. "Know Your Enemy" followed and eventually moved on to "East Jesus Nowhere." Billie proceeded to ask us, "Who wants to be saved!?!" and continued with his mock sermon until Jason White started the guitar intro, "Amen..." he waited for us to respond, "I said Amen!" and we chanted back at him as the riff kicked in. Towards the end of the song he brought up a little kid named Jack who was the lucky one that got "saved" that evening. As Billie sang the last "Yeah" of the song he shoved Jack backwards on the stage and played the final chords.

They played "Holiday" followed by "The Static Age" , in which Mike Dirnt winked at me, "Before the Lobotomy" and soon the familiar drum beats of "Are We The Waiting were drifting through the air. The song went on and Billie came out to the front of the catwalk. Kylie and I both had our hands out hoping that he would simply "brush" them with his own. He touched my hand and then I really could've gone home happy. But then Billie motioned to one of the security guards to pull me out of the pit. I felt myself being pulled up by the beltloops and soon I found myself on stage in front of thousands of people, right next to Billie Joe Armstrong, who happened to also have his arm around me. I swayed back and forth with him while we both sang "Are We The Waiting" until the end of the song when he wrapped a scarf ,thrown onstage by a fan but worn by him, around me...sweat covered and all.

I was helped off stage by another security guard and led around to the entrance of the pit right in front of the stage, but this time instead of by the catwalk it was in front of the right side of the stage. They played "St. Jimmy" which I don't remember all to well because I was still in shock at that point and then "Boulevard of Broken Dreams" which they performed entirely acoustic. "Hitchin' A Ride" followed which was the first track that night that wasn't on "American Idiot" or "21st Century Breakdown" but instead on "Nimrod." The normal antics on Hitchin' A Ride followed and Billie mocked a few people in the audience keeping us even more entertained with his great sense of humor. Billie decided to mess around for a bit playing the intro to "Crazy Train" by Ozzy Osbourne followed by intros to "Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Love" by Van Halen and "Master Of Puppets" by Metallica. Billie got us all singing "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" and then they kept the older songs coming with "Brain Stew." In the middle of "Brain Stew" Billie got out a toilet paper gun and shot it at our side of the mosh pit along with a t-shirt gun that shot out free tour t-shirts. They followed "Brain Stew" with its usual companion, "Jaded" during which Billie showed off his gangster moves, spinning around on the floor. After this Mike Dirnt headed out to the front of the catwalk looking at Kylie, pointing at her and making a very laughable facial expression which needless to say, made her night, along with Billie Joe squirting her with the super soaker. They pulled up two fans to sing Longview, the second one was a girl who got the "okay" from Billie to do a stage dive. "That was the worst stage dive I've ever seen..." Billie laughed afterwards. She barely made it into the pit and fell more on the barrier than into the fans waiting to catch her.

The boys played "Basket Case" and "She," both nice older tracks from "Dookie." Billie walked around with his police hat on "...this is the Chicago police..." he waddled around, "The party is officially over!" Everyone booed at him. "No more havin' a good time and makin' sexual noises out in the crowd..." he made his way towards my side of the stage. "No more smokin' any of that damn, fuckin' marijuana..." They played "King For A Day" complete with all the crazy hip swinging from Billie and ridiculous outfits and hats. The most ridiculous of all being Jason Freese who was dressed up as Micheal Jackson. Kylie and I were also two of the lucky people who were right in front of Billie when he mooned everyone.

Jason Freese as Micheal Jackson alongside Officer Armstrong.

Tre stood up when "King For A Day" was over wailing his usual terrible solo which got some of the biggest chears of the night as usual and Billie unbuttoned his shirt, which no one was going to complain about! "Shout" was next along with "21 Guns." As soon as the guitar solo kicked in sparks fell from the ceiling which was amazing!

"American Eulogy" followed and in the second half Mike got to take the lead vocals which was cool to hear live. After that they walked off stage. After enough cheering and "Green Day! Green Day! Green Day!" we convinced them to come back out for an encore consisting of "American Idiot," "Jesus of Suburbia," "Minority," and "Good Riddance." It was the best night of my life, and I'd give anything to re-live it.