Last week we (and the whole rest of the Internet) leaked the new Sixten-inspired album art for Green Day's 21st Century Breakdown, and we've been making out in alleys all over the city ever since. Well, that is, if you consider our minds to be alleys... Which we definitely do. Anyway, since us Buzzworkies have been so wrapped up in other people's mouths, that grouchy genius FNMTV panelist / MTV News anchor James Montgomery beat us to the album preview. And it's a good thing he did! That guy really knows how to put a sentence together, I tell you what. Here are a few choice clips:
["21st Century Breakdown"] takes off on a multi-sectional sprint, featuring big, clean guitar chords (played windmill-style, à la Pete Townshend, one imagines) one minute, cacophonous drum breakdowns the next — not to mention a "We Are the Champions"-style interlude. Armstrong yelps couplets like, "Video games of the towers' fall/ Homeland Security can kill us all," before the whole song comes crashing to a close with him singing, "Oh dream, America, dream ... / Oh, scream, America, scream."
"Restless Heart Syndrome" starts with piano, and Armstrong sings "I've got a really bad disease/ It's got me begging on my hands and knees." He keeps going — again reaching that upper register — as the song picks up a swing tempo, eventually interrupted by a buzz-saw guitar section and some lock-step bass and drums. "21 Guns" — which, if it's not Breakdown's final song, really ought to be — is a cell-phones-in-the-air anthem...
Hungry for more? Yeah you are! What did I tell you about that Montgomery? That guy is GOOD. Read his full analysis of the 21st Century Breakdown preview, and realize how bad you been missing Green Day since American Idiot!
Also, Billie Joe turned 37 on Tuesday! Whoa! Check out this clip of Green Day playing the amazing "Christy Road" on 120 Minutes back in '94 to see how far he, Mike and Tre Cool have come in 15 years.