Azura Amphitheater partied late last night thanks to punk trio Green Day. In honor of two of the band’s essential albums’ anniversaries and a brand new album, the band celebrated three albums throughout their setlist.
The group ran on stage to kick off the night with flames and “The American Dream is Killing Me” from their January-release album Saviors. Once they finished, frontman Billie Joe Armstrong yelled in the microphone, “Welcome to the 30th anniversary of Dookie,” with loud pyrotechnics bursting behind him. In celebration of the anniversary, they played the album in its entirety, starting with “Burnout.”
During “Coming Clean,” the band’s crew brought out the Bad Year blimp to drop inflatable Dookie bombs on the audience. Before wrapping up Dookie, Green Day broke out 21st Century Breakdown hit, “Know Your Enemy.” Halfway through the song, Armstrong pulled up a girl from the audience to sing along, but while on stage she gave him friendship bracelets to which he responded, “Oh my God, I’m a Swiftie.” Then the girl stage dived into the audience for a temporary crowd surf. They ended the Dookie portion with drummer Tre Cool prancing around the stage alone, dressed in a robe, singing “All By Myself.”
Using new songs “Look Ma, No Brains,” “Dilemma,” and fan-favorite song, “Brain Stew” to transition into American Idiot.
After the band’s energetic performance of the title track, Armstrong once again yelled into the mic, “Welcome to the 20th anniversary of American Idiot,” then kicked into “Jesus of Suburbia,” which the band broke up into different segments throughout the American Idiot setlist. After “Holiday” and “Boulevard of Broken Dreams,” the second segment of “Jesus” featured a confetti cannon, launching red streaks high into the sky and back down on to the cheering fans. Halfway through the album, Armstrong took a moment to talk about ignoring algorithms, conspiracy theories, and propaganda, and instead focusing on the love between everyone in attendance. Tre Cool was allotted more lead vocal time and as he started singing, “coming home again,” green confetti blasted through the air and drifted throughout the venue. Off to the side of the seats, by concessions, a group of guys chased the green confetti down and stood, looking up, and smiling as they tried to catch the pieces.
Green Day fans started their own project to celebrate the trio and show appreciation by handing out pink and green paper hearts for attendees to shine their flashlight on during “Wake Me Up When September Ends” and “Bobby Sox.”
Instead of saying goodnight and then walking off the stage to have fans chant for an encore, Armstrong stepped off, came right back with an acoustic guitar, and said “Alright, you’ve been holding that sign all night.”
In the pit stood a 17-year-old girl holding a sign that read she was only 17 and wanted to come on stage to play “Good Riddance.” He brought her up and the girl killed it. They sang together as she played the guitar and the crowd went crazy for her. Turns out the girl was Ruby Leigh from season 24 of The Voice. The concert simply just ended after that.
The Linda Lindas and Rancid were the two openers.
When walking up to the seats, Green Day was encouraging attendees to register to vote by allowing those who did to enter for a chance to win a free autographed poster. They also were doing a giveaway for an autographed guitar if guests signed up for a water test.
The three bands are traveling to Cincinnati where they will meet with the Smashing Pumpkins for their next show.
