On Labor Day, Green Day graced Hershey, PA, with their rescheduled date, and I had the opportunity to venture to Hershey Stadium for this amazing show. The nineties kid in me was excited when this tour was announced, as Green Day’s Dookie was one of the first albums I bought, also growing up with the sounds of Smashing Pumpkins and Rancid.
They also brought openers The Linda Lindas which I had sadly missed after getting to the area right as they were finishing. After talking with concert-goers, they were well-received on stage, as the young American female rock band stood up with their rock, pop punk and power pop sound. Someone also mentioned their love for cats, as during the set someone on the crew was walking around wearing a big cat head and dancing around. One of the members also had some whiskers painted on her face.
Up next was Rancid, and being a band since 1991 they’re no strangers to the stage. I had the opportunity early in my career to photograph them alongside Rise Against in 2009 in Philadelphia; they were just as good live as they were then. Formed in Berkeley, CA, by Tim Armstrong & Matt Freeman, them along with Green Day, Offspring and others are among a plethora of bands that woke the mainstream interest in punk rock during the mid-90s.
With a Funko-pop of Tim sitting on an amp in front of the drummer, the guys kept mid-90’s punk alive with hits like “Timebomb,” “Fall Back Down,” which is a favorite of mine, and closing with “Ruby Soho.” At the end of their set, Tim yelled a loud ‘Thank You’ to the cheering crowd, went back and fist bumped each member before one last drum hit, and exited the stage.
Following Rancid was Smashing Pumpkins, but without ex-member D’arcy. At this point, I’d noticed more of the crowd was starting to fill in the stadium. While their presence was somewhat static on stage, they still managed to entertain the crowd with hits like “Today,” “Tonight Tonight,” “Ava Adore,” “Disarm,” “1979,” “Bullet With Butterfly Wings,” and “Cherub Rock.” At one point, during “Cherub Rock,” there were two people that came on stage, one man and one woman from the National Wrestling Alliance and had a choreographed “fight.” I didn’t understand why this was happening, but then I learned that lead singer Billy Morgan is a huge wrestling fan and also may own that company. They ended the hour long set with Lenny Kravitz’s “Are You Gonna Go My Way?” as an intro into “Zero” which the crowd seemed to really love.
Green Day was up, and you could feel the intensity and excitement from the crowd. As I stood around the stage in the pit, I started to hear the fans chant “Green Day, Green Day,” both young and old alike which was a great sight. The lights dimmed, “Bohemian Rhapsody” played in its entirety as the Drunk Punk Bunny came out on stage to The Ramones “Blitzkrieg Bop” with a shirt in its’ hand. Punk Bunny is the bands coffee brand, and after doing the worm to get the crowd even more hyped up, threw the shirt into the crowed for one lucky person. As the bunny exited the stage, the roaring got louder as we saw the guys emerge from backstage. They began with “The American Dream Is Killing me,” followed by Dookie, which is 30 years old.
Green Days set was electric from beginning to end. It was full of larger than life album decorations behind Tre, as well as streamers, fireworks, and of course some pyro. During “Pulling Teeth,” there was a brief pause because one of the amps caught fire after some pyro emerged, and it was extinguished. Billie Joe turned around as he notices what was going on, laughed and said, “Whoops! Sorry about that!” Everyone knows at the end of Dookie, there is a hidden track called “All By Myself,” in which it is only Tre singing. Everyone exited the stage after Dookie was over, but then we see Tre coming out in a leopard print robe, his converse, and a mic. The crowd cheered as he included “All By Myself” in the set, also with laughs from the crowd.
Green Day also added some songs from other albums along with Dookie and American Idiot. In between these albums, they sang “Know Your Enemy,” “Look Ma, No Brains!,” “One Eyed Bastard,” “Minority,” and “Brain Stew,” with Black Sabbaths “Iron Man” intro. During this time Billie Joe also forgot the lyrics to the third verse and he laughed as did the entire stadium; then he made jokes about it. During “Know Your Enemy,” Billie Joe was asking the crowd for someone to come up on stage that knew all of the words to the chorus. A lucky young high school student named Maura was chosen, and I was waiting for her to faint or pass out; she was so excited she was on stage with the singer. She indeed did impress everyone with knowing all the words.
It was time for American Idiot; before they began, Billie Joe yelled “How’s everyone doing?!” As the crowd cheered, he went onto ask the crowd to put their phones away and to be present, to be here right now. We all know American Idiot has some political parts in the album, and every so often, Billie Joe would insert some quick political zingers in there. During “American Idiot,” he yelled out “I’m not part of your MAGA agenda,” in place of part of the chorus. He also paused during one song to briefly talk about everything currently going on over in the middle east, how he is tired of all of the suffering, the hate (even over here in the U.S.), and how it needs to stop and how we need to get control of ourselves. This was followed by a huge cheer from the crowd. The rest of the album continued with banger after banger, it was nice knowing the songs in order already and not being surprised by what is coming next.
37 songs and almost two and a half hours later, they ended the night with “Good Riddance (Time of Your Life).” The guys took very few breaks, pretty much going nonstop the entire night, only walking off to change their outfits before coming back on for American Idiot, and Tres solo. It was truly one of the best concerts I have been to, and Green Day is definitely in my top five of favorite performers as they always have been. Armstrong’s voice was amazing, as him, Mike & Tre also sound just like they did when younger. All of the bands deserved to be on this bill as well as on big stages, their stage presence was top notch. If you haven’t seen Green Day or any of the other bands, I suggest you do once they announce future tours; you’ll have the “Time of Your Life.”
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