“LONGVIEW”

Green Day

THIS MID-NINETIES breakout song for Green Day features their signature melodic punk style and simple but effective riffing, served up with an undercurrent of eighth-notes triplets, what may be called a “punk shuffle,” similar to what the Clash had used in “London Calling.”

In stark contrast to the roaring power chords that come crashing in on the song’s chorus, the arrangement begins sparsely, with bassist Mike Dirnt playing a swinging, catchy four-bar walking bass figure that effectively implies a repeating E-D chord vamp, with drummer Tré Cool providing a conga-like tomtoms-only beat as accompaniment. Playing with a pick, Dirnt judiciously combines notes

G#, from the arpeggios E major (E, B) and D

F#, major (D, A), both of which live together in

F#, G#, C#, the E Mixolydian mode (E, A, B, D), to convey the implied chord changes, targeting the root note on the downbeat of each bar to clearly establish the tonality before hitting the other chord tones and non-chord tones. Notice how, in the fourth bar of the repeating riff (see bar 9) the bassist cleverly takes advantage of his open D string to use it as a pedal tone beneath moving fretted notes on the G string.

As the chorus kicks in at section C, guitarist Billie Joe Armstrong boldly pounds out B5, A5 and E5 power chords in a “long-short” swing-eighths rhythm, using alternate strumming. Rather than just strumming the chords, though, he embellishes them on the eighthnote upbeats, which helps accentuate the downbeats. Notice how, on the B5 chord, the guitarist lifts up his fret hand’s 3rd finger from the 9th fret to expose the note barred at the 7th fret with the 1st finger, creating melodic activity within the otherwise static chord. On the A5 and D5 chords, he employs fret-hand muting to create those pitchless “dead” notes, indicated by X’s in the tablature. This is performed by momentarily relaxing your fret-hand grip on the strings, just enough that they break contact with the frets. All the while, Armstrong employs his signature “wood sawing” strumming motion, with the pick slamming down onto the strings on each downbeat then brushing them with upstrokes on the upbeats.