Passion is a fashion

It's been a couple months since Green Day released their follow up to the punk opera, American Idiot. It's an album similarly styled about the downfall of America or whatever. Let's get to brass tacks, any band preaching revolution and playing yesterdays tunes isn't getting anything done. Green Day are notoriously styled after the Ramones and first wave English Punk bands i.e. 1977 style punk. There is nothing wrong with those bands, I like those bands, but those bands almost all notoriously walked away from that style when it stopped being edgy. For better or worse, most got heavier or slower or creepier or more metal or went in a completely different direction. The point is, they progressed and grew (even if no one but them liked their new direction), the exception is the Ramones. The Ramones never had to change, they owned the speed and they were never overtly pissed off. They were angry dudes from queens, who set out to make bubblegum rock and roll and failed. Their failure just so happened to coincide with the disaffected youth of the time. The Ramones were the template from which all great bands from there on out were based. So here's the question, if you want to make a difference in the world, make different. As Soon as Black Flag wrote My War they changed punk rock. This is an almost unlistenable record, if you've never been knee deep in the depths of anger and depression, you wont get it. It didn't make the top 100, but it made an impact. The moment Refused wrote The Shape of Punk to Come they destroyed the acetate. This is revolutionary music to make you ponder WHY your revolting. Making sense of the mess the world was in, the ramifications of this album are still being heard 10 years on. The Locust are another band, actually most 31G bands, that break the rules every time. The 90's had a ton of bands that refused to follow preconceived notions of what punk rock could be. The Jesus Lizard, Sonic Youth, Helmet even, yes, Nirvana. They strayed enough from the formula to make it interesting. So, Green Day why the hell are you pandering and sticking to the set rules? To sell records? No one would fault you for that, if you were trying it by doing something different, by doing nothing different your further limiting the scope through which people see punk rock. It's more then 4 on the floor and 3 chords with spiky hair and sneers. I get the point that could be made that, the more assessable the music the farther the message reaches. Well, that's great join Bruce Springsteen (who actually DID step out of HIS box) in making pseudo-political records. If your a punk band, be a fucking punk band, do something different, buck the trends and what's expected. Both, Rancid AND Green Day made great records earlier in their careers where they tried experimenting and quickly retreated back to the fray. If Fugazi can maintain a career for like 20 years and stick to their guns on ticket prices, while touring constantly and releasing innovative albums; can't you even try?