Stay True. Stay punk.

I went to college at UC Berkeley. For those of you who do not know, it was where the countercultural movement of the sixties originated. The streets are filled with burned out hippies and all sorts of freaks. The Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, and Santana are all from the bay area. Latter day acts from the bay area are Counting Crowes, Green Day, and Rancid.

Green Day was definitely one of those bands that had the bay area misfit mentality. I saw them perform at Woodtock ’94. Conveniently, I was working in Upstate NY and got in for free. I paid a grand total of $35 the entire weekend on food and gas. But I digress... At the end of their set, Green Day got into a mud pelting contest with 50,000 fans. Several mud covered fans got up on stage and one point security mistook bass player Mike Dirnt for a fan and tackled him.

I still remember that during the mud pelting, Billie Joe spoke to the crowd and at one point he said, “Okay, shout ‘stop playing’ and we will.” I remember thinking that I didn’t want them to stop. So I stayed silent. But all the dumb kids caught up in the cult of personality shouted out “Stop playing.” And true to form – they did! They dropped their instruments and left the stage and that was the end of their set. I kinda expected that to happen, because this was not my first time seeing Green Day perform.

In May 1993 I saw them perform at the Berkeley Square. A small club that held about 300 people. Tilt and Rancid were the opening acts. The show cost $7. At the time Green Day had two indie albums, but I did not own either. So everything was new to me. At one point, a fan got up on stage and started singing the song. Security moved to throw him back into the crowd when Billie Joe stopped him and let the fan sing the entire song for him. Pretty cool if you ask me.

What I remember most from that night was waiting in line to buy my ticket. At a certain point I realized that the line had stopped moving. So I move over to look see what is going on. I see a guy wearing a red bra (with no shirt) talking to the guy in the booth.

Now, I am from an upper middle class suburb. I have done some wild and crazy stuff. But I have never worn women’s underwear. And certainly not as outerwear. Who is this self involved freak that is wasting my time forcing me to stand around and wait? I get pretty frustrated and decide to go up to this jerk and say something. But right at that moment, their conversation is finished and he steps aside and the line starts moving again.

Well I am glad nothing happened. When Green Day took the stage, I learned that the freak in the red bra was the drummer Tré Cool. How embarrassing would that have been? I truly would have been an American Idiot, twelve years early. But when I think about it, it's pretty damn cool that when they signed to a major label and became big, they didn't sanitize their act to appeal to the masses. They stayed true to who they were. That is pretty rare.

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