Why American Idiot is Still a Great Album

A few years back, Green Day’s American Idiot took the world by storm and got he band absurdly popular while pissing off every indie music kid in the universe who feels the need to be cynical about anything mainstream. However, both parties have had this album all wrong. Indie-fags for obvious reason, but the album has been looked at wrongly as some kind of passing fad of an album, and the fact that critics have treated the shitty new Green Day album with the same praise shows me that they didn’t understand what made American Idiot so great in the first place.

My Alltime Favorite Guitar Riff

There are so many memorable and awesome riffs out there that I could talk about. In particular, I think that the two bands who pull off more amazing riffs than any other are Pearls and Brass and Mastodon, both of whom comprise many songs as essentially a string of memorable riffs. Between either of them, my favorite songs for riffs would be Capillarian Crest forom Mastodon and Wake in the Morning (not findable) by Pearls and Brass. However, neither of these songs nor even either of these bands produced what has persisted for years as my single favorite guitar riff of all time.

Interestingly, the riff comes from a band I don’t even listen to much: Gojira. I’ve only heard a few of their songs more than once, having meant to get into them for a long time. I was never all that into death metal, though lately I’ve been getting more interested in the genre through bands like Nile, Amon Amarth, and Bloodbath. Nevertheless, I first heard the track ‘To Sirius‘ on, of all things, MTV2’s Headbanger’s Ball, years ago. Since first hearing it I knew it was the most brutal thing I’d ever heard at the time and I had to give a few more listens.

It’s a pretty good song with one of the most intense chugging bits I’ve ever heard, but the part that always stood out to me was the riff that plays at the end of the song and as it fades out (it also appears briefly around 2 minutes in). Written down, it looks something like this:

JUH-JUH-JAAAA NAAAA JUGAJUGAJUGA-JUGAJUGAJUGA – repeat

It’s a pretty simple riff and not even very melodious, but it has something that sticks in your head. I think a lot of it has to do with the timing of the spaces between the first four notes and the perfect balance of heavy and spacey that makes you picture the scream of a whale in the chords of the guitar. This has always been the most memorable, awesome riff to me.

TV on the Radio is Not Quite Like Anything I’ve Heard Before

I have listened to a LOT of music, in a LOT of different genres. I’ve listened to bands that were not quite like any other, such as Agalloch or Ye Olde Relic, but they were usually grounded in some kind of familiar sound that I enjoyed. I’ve also listened to shit like Mr. Bungle and Unexpect, who are fundamentally different from just about anything else out there, but not in a way I can enjoy.

Amon Amarth at The Norva, Norfolk, VA, 4/28/09 With Goatwhore, Skeletonwitch, and Lazarus A.D.

While I can’t say I’ve been to a great many, The Norva remains my favorite concert hall. The  sound quality is superb, the place is shaped perfectly, there’s plenty of space, and most of all, the crowds are usually totally into it. Amon Amarth isn’t one of my favorite bands, but I do enjoy them, and I knew seeing them at the Norva would be all the more worth it. AA has the perfect sound for a live show – their songs are all sweepingly epic and grandiose with plenty of heaviness and emotion. Therefor, it was a must-go.

M83’s Saturdays=youth – My Long-Awaited Genre-Buster

M83 is a French shoegaze band with 5 currently available albums. I’ve listened to a bunch of their songs, but mostly the albums ‘Dead Cities, Red Seas, and Lost Ghosts’ and ‘Saturdays=youth’. While I love ‘Dead cities…’, which is one of the band’s pure shoegaze albums, their latest release, Saturdays=youth, has become one of my favorite albums for it’s interesting genre-bending.