Posted in: ABC, Opinion, TV, TV, YouTube | Tagged: donald trump, elon musk, Green Day, opinion, trump

Green Day Bassist on Trump/MAGA Lyric Change; Musk "Is The Machine"

Green Day bassist Mike Dirnt on the lyric change to "American Idiot" that angered a lot of Donald Trump/MAGA folks and Elon Musk's tweet.

It was… "The Lyric Change Heard Round the World!" Of course, we're talking about Green Day taking some time out of their performance during ABC's Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve with Ryan Seacrest 2024 to remind a whole lot of folks that they are Green Day. During the band's first set from the West Coast, Green Day launched into the title track from its 2004 album, American Idiot – and that's when a lot of Donald Trump followers got a reality check from the band. Because instead of the original line, "I'm not a part of a redneck agenda," lead singer Billie Joe Armstrong updated it to, "I'm not a part of the MAGA agenda." Well, apparently, a whole lot of "right-wingy" folks felt insulted by the lyric change – asking that a punk band keep politics out of their music. Let the pure, raw, uncut stupidity of that statement wash over you for a second – we'll wait. Even Twitter overlord and owner of some of the worst pop culture takes in the history of mankind, Elon Musk, chimed in with an alleged "joke" that falls so painfully flat and is so painfully cliched that you can tell that the laughing emojis were paid well to put up a good front: "Green Day goes from raging against the machine to milquetoastedly raging for it." Now, bassist Mike Dirnt is addressing both topics in an interview with Rolling Stone – here are the highlights:

On Reaction to "American Idiot" Lyric Change: "The song's twenty years old, and we're Green Day. What did you expect? Come on. I think the best part about it is that it provoked conversation. It got people talking. First, it was rhetorical, and then it got into conversation. Anytime you can get people talking, you're always going to have the loudest voices [heard first], and then everyone else in the room is going to figure out what it really means."

On Musk's Reaction: "Elon Musk actually is the machine. I can't take anything else from that. He's not shy about saying stupid shit on the internet. Whatever."

"The American Dream Is Killing Me" Was Written During Trump Administration – Here's Why It Wasn't Released: "[Saviors track] 'The American Dream Is Killing Me' was written by Billie almost four years ago. But we all knew it was just low-hanging fruit. We're not a parody of who we are, and songs like that need time to be fleshed out. If that means just sitting back and letting life happen, so be it. And it was one of the last things we recorded. Rob's like, 'What else do you got?' As we get towards the end of recording, it was two songs. It was that one and 'Father to a Son.' And those two songs, Rob's like, 'Oh, you've got to record those.' And then Billie had to go in for 'American Dream' and just deep dive on the lyrics, and just tweak a few things here and there. But 'The American Dream Is Killing Me' was the line a while back ago. We were like, 'Yeah, it's just not the right time.'"

Green Day Causes FOX "Business" to Lose Their Minds

Over on FOX "Business" (sorry, but anything even slightly associated with FOX "News" gets the quotation marks), three talking heads (we're going to skip the names because they're all interchangeable anyway) took some broadcast time to show us just how much they don't know about Green Day… the history of rock music… how FOX "News" operates… and the reality of how ratings work.

In the following clip, the trio (though the dude on the left might just be a prop) discuss the moment from the New Year's Eve special. Of course, a lot of it is built around the idea that people don't like to have politics preached at them by musical artists and that they should "stick to what you're good at," questioning just how much musicians even know about the issues they comment on. Just to be clear? The alleged business network's flagship, FOX "News" has routinely had such "fine scholars" such as Kid Rock, Ted Nugent, and Gene Simmons from KISS to comment on topics during segments that resemble SNL sketches that didn't make the cut.

Also, the entire foundation of rock was built on resistance – and if there ever was an agenda that deserved pushing back on, it's Trump's MAGA manifesto. And to the one talking head in the clip who brought up the issue of what "MAGA" means to them? Well, I can't speak for them – but if I could, I would say that the MAGA agenda is Trump & his worshippers' efforts to "Make America Great Again" (MAGA) by dragging the country back to a time that only worked for white, straight males and pretty much sucked-ass for everyone else.

Though one of the talking heads said she didn't believe the show would do any real ratings – guess what? ABC's Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve with Ryan Seacrest 2024 was up 30% in primetime, with an average of about 8.4M viewers tuning in from 8-11:30 pm on Sunday. In addition, the late-night edition scored a jaw-dropping 18M viewers – topping out at 22.2M by the time the ball dropped. So it looks like Green Day contributed to the show's huge success. Whoops.

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