Green Day: Insomniac [REPRISE]

Why you'll love it

This EU-pressed LP includes a lyric sheet. Insomniac peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard 200, went double platinum within a year and has sold more than 2.1 million copies in the US.

This edition

• Lyric sheet included
• Pressed in Germany

About the album

Selling nearly ten million copies of a major-label debut is a tough act to follow, so Green Day went heavier. With Dookie making them arena headliners and their old punk scene turning its back, Billie Joe Armstrong, Mike Dirnt and Tré Cool set out to prove they belonged, writing and rehearsing in a small house in East Oakland before heading to Hyde Street Studios in San Francisco with co-producer Rob Cavallo. Armstrong had married and become a dad in the meantime, and he has said he wanted nothing more than to keep working and keep writing.

They chased high-energy takes, and it shows. "Armatage Shanks" bursts out of the gate, "Geek Stink Breath" and "Stuck with Me" grind harder than anything on Dookie, "Brain Stew" lumbers in on one of their great riffs before "Jaded" sprints off, and "Walking Contradiction" ends things on a hooky high. Critics singled out Armstrong's songwriting and his sarcastic sense of humour.

Dirnt later said the band felt a real urgency to stake their claim. Tré Cool, newly a dad, reckoned he could hit the drums harder than ever, which anyone who has shared a house with a newborn will find entirely believable.

Also at Kops: more Green Day on vinyl · browse Punk

Tracklist

Listen

On Reprise (cat# 9362-46046-1), a reissue of the 1995 album.