Survivor

Green Day just put out another big ass rock opera album. And by all reports, it’s good. Whoda thunk?

I mean, seriously, if you were holding a copy of Dookie in your hands back in the early ‘90s, monster album though it was, would you have guessed they would be relevant in 2009? Personally, I would have laid money on them making it another 3 years, beating each other bloody, breaking up, spending 20 years making nasty comments about each other in “where are they now” interviews, and then getting together for a love-me-for-the-money tour. Who knew the brat princes of pop-punk had staying power? And something real to say?

And that’s the way with a lot of bands. It’s a craps shoot on who will make it. In the 80s I’d have said Terrence Trent D’Arby was the real deal. Gone with the mists of time. I’d have said everybody in Depeche Mode would be dead before the millennium. Still putting out the tunes. I’d have said the Beasty Boys were one trick ponies. Turns out they’re kings of all media. Talent can fool you. Bad life choices may not be fatal. And sometimes swagger just hides a fiendish work ethic.

Kind of makes me wonder. Will Lady GaGa be cranking out the hits 20 years from now? Will we wonder whatever happened to Coldplay?