BAND HEADS OVERSEAS JANUARY 20 FOR SIX-WEEK U.K./EUROPEAN TOUR BEFORE RETURNING TO U.S. FOR APRIL TOUR

FROM: MITCH SCHNEIDER/ AMANDA CAGAN

GREEN DAY '98

BAND HEADS OVERSEAS JANUARY 20 FOR SIX-WEEK U.K./EUROPEAN TOUR BEFORE RETURNING TO U.S. FOR APRIL TOUR;

'NIMROD' SOUNDSCANS OVER 500,000 COPIES, EARNS VAST CRITICAL ACCLAIM AND PRODUCES #2 TRACK WITH "GOOD RIDDANCE (TIME OF YOUR LIFE)"

Everything's turning green again.

Brash, reflective and downright entertaining, GREEN DAY will head overseas January 20 for a 28-date, six-week theatre tour of the U.K. and Europe. Next, they'll return in April to tour the States, where their current NIMROD album–described by Details as "smart, energetic and tuneful…the band's best album to date"–has SoundScanned over 500,000 copies (achieving gold status) and produced its second huge radio track, "Good Riddance (Time Of Your Life)."

This week, the song–an acoustic ballad that's "proof of GREEN DAY's ability to reconcile the seemingly incongruent concept of grown-up punk," in the words of critic Steven Mirkin–is positioned at #2 on Billboard's "Modern Rock Tracks" chart; bulleted at #13 on Billboard's "Mainstream Rock Tracks" chart; and is #5 on MTV's video chart. Meanwhile, NIMROD is #49 on Billboard's "Top 200 Albums" chart.

Since the October 28 release of NIMROD (Reprise), GREEN DAY—BILLIE JOE ARMSTRONG (vocals, guitar), MIKE DIRNT (bass, vocals) and TRE' COOL (drums)–have been earning vast critical praise for the album as well as for live performances on their late Fall '97 U.S. tour:

Greg Kot, Rolling Stone (***1/2):

"With NIMROD, ARMSTRONG's juvenile sense of humor is back. On 'The Grouch,' he complains, 'I'm turning out like my dad,' and on the ska romp 'King For A Day,' he imagines life as a drag queen. But ARMSTRONG's teen-slacker protagonists can also sound almost reflective on NIMROD as they slide into an adult world not much more promising than the dazed-and-confused one that they left behind. Lost opportunities are mulled over in 'Walking Alone' and 'Haushinka,' and a handful are kissed goodbye on 'Good Riddance (Time Of Your Life).' The music also takes a broader view, with neo-psychedelic studio touches, acoustic guitar, violins and horns flavoring the attack. Melody is emphasized, and a measure of sincerity is detectable in the singing. 'Redundant,' with its chiming, Byrds-ian guitars and soaring vocals, and 'Walking Alone,' with its plaintive harmonica, are persuasive midtempo pop songs, while 'Good Riddance' is a surprisingly sweet folk anthem buoyed by strings. This music is a long way from GREEN DAY's apprenticeship at the Gilman Street punk clubs, in Berkeley, California. But now that the band has seen the world, it's only fitting that GREEN DAY should finally make an album that sounds as if it has."

 

Jonathan Gold, Spin (October 1997):

"GREEN DAY's current album, NIMROD–saturated with acoustic numbers and swing ballads, old-fashioned hardcore and Stephen Foster-style tuneage–toys with the boundaries of pop- punk, recasting it as a thoroughly modern American music…He (BILLIE JOE ARMSTRONG) may be an important American songwriter now, but you still wouldn't bring home to Mom."

 

Sandy Masuo, Los Angeles Times (December 12, 1997):

"For all the adolescent obsessions that seethe on the surface of GREEN DAY's music, it's the savvy song craft and deft musicianship behind the paeans to sex, drugs and self- absorption that give them their appeal. True to character, when the Bay Area trio took the stage at the Palace on Wednesday (December 10) for the first of three sold-out shows, it put on a crowd-pleasing display of goofy antics fueled by some truly inspired music…Crisp drumming, melodic bass lines and piquant guitar locked into a groove that never let up, even at the tail end of the evening after a Who-like finale of trashed equipment and feedback."

 

Neal Weiss, Allstar (October 14, 1997):

"Classic stuff, really: cuts like 'Redundant,' 'Worry Rock' and even the suicide-themed 'Uptight' are pure bubblegum-chewing satisfaction, owing as much to Cheap Trick as to the Sex Pistols. Sure, there are the typical GREEN DAY gallop-y tunes and self- deprecation, but such bursts are overshadowed by other stellar moments, like guitar leads that jangle heavenly, lonesome harmonicas and giddy horn lines."

 

Clare Kleinedler, Addicted To Noise (December 19, 1997):

"Though I have been a GREEN DAY fan since the guys were touring in their now-infamous milk truck, I have to admit I too had gotten caught up in growing chants of 'GREEN DAY has sold out.' What can I say? When a punk band starts selling millions of records and are recognizable to your friends' grandmothers, it just reeks of conformity. But as the show went on (at the Fillmore in San Francisco, CA) and ARMSTRONG and the boys banged through song after song with good, old- fashioned punk ferocity, I felt ashamed to have ever doubted them."

 

Worldwide, NIMROD has sold over 1,000,000 copies already and garnered platinum and gold awards in many countries, including double-platinum in Japan (over 300,000 copies), platinum in Canada (over 100,000 copies) and platinum in Malaysia (over 25,000 copies), and gold in Spain and Australia (each over 35,000 copies).

In addition, the band's 1994 DOOKIE album was cited by England's prestigious Q magazine (January 1998) as one of the "essential dozen" all-time punk albums alongside other pivotal albums by the Ramones, Sex Pistols, the Clash, the Stooges and Nirvana.

With NIMROD, GREEN DAY have, in the words of Jon Wiederhorn in Request, "come to grips with its position as a platinum-seller and returned with a self- deprecating bundle of spite that surges and bounces with the force and exuberance of the Ramones' Rocket To Russia."

GREEN DAY's creative growth on NIMROD has elicited some comments from certain people who don't want to see a punk rock band evolve. As BILLIE JOE ARMSTRONG told Cleveland Scene (November 20, 1997), "Some people will say, 'Oh, he's not being very punk rock because they're using guitars and strings and stuff.' And it's like, 'All right, you tell me what punk means, asshole. I've been in it for 10 years, I think I have a better clue about it."

GREEN DAY's U.K./European tour itinerary is as follows:

DATE                    CITY                            VENUE

Tue     1/20            Belfast, Ireland                Ulster Hall
Wed     1/21            Dublin, Ireland                 SFX
Thu     1/22            Dublin, Ireland                 SFX
Sat     1/24            Glasgow, Scotland               Barrowland
Sun     1/25            Glasgow, Scotland               Barrowland
Mon     1/26            Manchester, UK          	Apollo
Tue     1/27            Leeds, UK                       Town & Country
Wed     1/28            Wolverhampton, UK               Civic Hall
Fri     1/30            London, UK                      Brixton Academy
Sat     1/31            London, UK                      Brixton Academy
Sun     2/1             London, UK                      Astoria
Tue     2/3             Paris. France                   Elysee Montmartre
Wed     2/4             Brussels, Belgium               Ancienne Belgique
Thu     2/5             Cologne, Germany                Live Music Hall
Fri     2/6             Amsterdam, Holland              Paradiso
Sun     2/8             Copenhagen, Denmark     	Pumpehuset
Mon     2/9             Stockholm, Sweden               Klubben
Wed     2/11            Hamburg, Germany                Grosse Frehelt
Thu     2/12            Berlin, Germany         	Huxleys
Fri     2/13            Prague, Czech Republic  	Sky Club
Sun     2/15            Lubljana, Slovenia              Halle Tivoli
Tue     2/17            Zurich, Switzerland             Volk Haus
Wed     2/18            Munich, Germany         	Babylon
Fri     2/20            Milan, Italy                    Palalido
Sat     2/21            Lyon, France                    Transbordeur
Mon     2/23            San Sebastian, Spain            Polideportivo de Anoeta
Tue     2/24            Madrid, Spain                   La Riviera
Wed     2/25            Barcelona, Spain                Zeleste