Show Notes: Mole Tracks: "Another year, another Warped Tour. Except this year, one of the dates happened to be right in my backyard of Ventura, at the good ol' fairgrounds. Which meant that I wouldn't have to struggle to find a ride to a venue three-plus hours away, nor would I have to endure a long ride to and from the festival, and Seaside Park being, well, seaside, meant that the weather would not be as blistering hot as it usually is for the all day outdoor concert. Actually, it was still pretty fucking hot, but oh well, it's Warped Tour, and this year the lineup was probably the best it has ever been: Jurassic 5, NOFX, Long Beach Dub All-Stars, and, just added a few weeks prior, Weezer! Not to mention Green Day, who I wanted to see just to be able to say I saw them. Just a few years ago, it was considered completely unhip to like Green Day, those sellout, wannabe punk rock brats. However, with the trio having been out of the public eye for a few years, it was time for all the hypocritical 'punk' kids who dyed their hair purple when Dookie blew up then denounced the band by the time they released their last album, Nimrod, to roll out the red carpet for them and pretend they've supported Green Day for the past six years. I myself, I admit, bought Dookie in 6th grade, and later their older albums, and even purchased their follow up, Insomniac. I've since sold those albums as my musical taste has changed, but I've never jumped on the 'Green Day are the worst band ever' bandwagon, nor have I aligned myself with the 'It's so dorky to like Green Day that it's cool now' group, either. I was down in the pit with the excited masses, singing along to every song simply because I knew I wouldn't be able to contain myself from doing so anyway -- Green Day was a pretty big part of my junior high school years, after all (though I was always more of an Offspring fan). There were some guys who were trying to look hard by staring stone-faced at Billie Joe and the rest of the band as if they hated them, but I caught them mouthing the words to Longview and Basket Case. Green Day refrained from playing anything from Kerplunk! or 1039/Smoothed Out Slappy Hours (with the exception of their cover of Operation Ivy's "Knowledge," during which they invited someone from the crowd - who turned out to be Armand from local Oxnard band the Whereabouts - to play guitar) or any new songs; instead, they played it safe and packed their set with all the singles everyone knows: Welcome To Paradise, Geek Stink Breath, Hitching A Ride, etc. Hey, at least they know their place with the nostalgic fans. Luckily they chose not to perform their acoustic attempt to cross into Matchbox 20-ish territory, Good Riddance, because there probably would've been a riot. They ended appropriately with "When I Come Around," then proceeded to go all arena rock and light Tre's drumset on fire. Well, that was stupid, but still, it's hard to truly hate Green Day. Their show didn't persuade me to rush out and re-buy all their albums or anything, but seeing Billie Joe run across the stage, smiling wickedly, blissfully aware of the novelty act they're becoming, and lead the crowd in a fist-pumping session, and the fact that I was doing it along with everyone else, made me laugh more than just about anything the whole day."