10 More Songs That Are Huge Outliers On Rock Albums
3. Good Riddance (Time Of Your Life) - Green Day (Nimrod)
In their early existence, Green Day were very much viewed as the new guardians of punk; the ones who would help preserve the genre and bring it up to speed with more modern musical values.
By the time their fifth album, 1997’s Nimrod, came along, they had strayed more into the mainstream, but were still very much viewed as punk, or at least punk-adjacent. Then, they did something very un-punky - they put out an emotional acoustic song featuring a string section.
Sid Vicious must have been rolling in his grave.
Good Riddance (Time of Your Life) does not need explaining. It is an incredibly popular song, easily the best-known off Nimrod, and will get traipsed out by TV producers looking to set a wistful scene at the drop of a hat. It’s a lovely song, there’s no denying that, but what about the rest of the album?
Everything else on Nimrod is still dripping in punk tendencies, power chords aplenty and lots of angry lyrics. Good Riddance is a total anomaly - one that has made the members of Green Day very rich over the years.