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Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed albums.

American Idiot
by Green Day


8.7

based on 26 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 327 votes
Read user comments
Rate this album

Official Artist Site

Structured as a rock opera complete with 9-minute-plus songs and a somewhat complicated storyline, 'American Idiot' is the Berkeley punk band's first album in over four years.

LABEL:	Reprise
RELEASE DATE:	21 September 2004
DISCS:	1 disc
GENRE(S):	Alternative, Rock

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

All Music Guide

In its musical muscle and sweeping, politically charged narrative, it's something of a masterpiece, and one of the few -- if not the only -- records of 2004 to convey what it feels like to live in the strange, bewildering America of the early 2000s.

Mojo

It's exhilarating stuff, the kind of record that sets new parameters as to what is possible from a punk rock'n'roll band in the 21st century. [Oct 2004, p.106]

Austin Chronicle

American Idiot is one of the most politically volatile albums to come out since the ascension of the Accidental President. It's also the best album of Green Day's 12-year career.

ShakingThrough.net

An energetic, musically ambitious pop-rock record that employs its expanded vistas in the service of animating punk's well-worn thematic underpinnings.

E! Online

There's still plenty of spunk in to be found in this Sgt. Pepper-lite.

Entertainment Weekly

As often happens with concept albums, the disc tends to rely on lyrics over music, so some of the songs are forgettable. [24 Sep 2004, p.105]

Billboard

It is exactly what the band needs to boost itself to the next level of pop-punk prowess.

Paste Magazine

As pretentious a concept as that might seem, Green Day pulls it off brilliantly.

Dot Music

Not only does it contain Green Day’s finest songs (and choruses) to date... but it also scratches at the surface of political dissatisfaction with nails sharp enough to leave a nasty scar.

Stylus Magazine

This is the type of album impressionable teenagers fall in love with, crammed with melody and variety and thrill.

Q Magazine

A powerful work, noble in both intent and execution. [Nov 2004, p.110]

New Musical Express

An onslaught of varied and marvellously good tunes presented in an unexpectedly inventive way. [18 Sep 2004, p.65]

Playlouder

There are several duff tracks, certainly. And, sure, as a whole 'American Idiot' can easily be criticised for its simplistic, occasionally naïve sixth form lyrics, all round pomposity and general adherence to the group's tried and tested formula of punchy three-chord pogo-pop. But it's still a wonderfully entertaining, polemical punk rock record.

cokemachineglow

If the forced lyrical growth is a little stunted, it’s more than made up for by the band’s newfound sonic ambitions.

Pitchfork

For all its grandiosity, American Idiot keeps its mood and method deliberately, tenaciously, and angrily on point.

Rolling Stone

Against all odds, Green Day have found a way to hit their thirties without either betraying their original spirit or falling on their faces.

Village Voice

As a rock opera, Idiot is a mostly three-penny thrill.

Splendid

American Idiot isn't so much meticulously crafted as it is unflinchingly audacious.

Uncut

Fans will be relieved to know that although it pulls few lyrical punches, slam-dancing is still possible. [Nov 2004, p.119]

The Onion (A.V. Club)

The observations don't always dig as deep as they're meant to, and buzzwords occasionally stand in for insights, but American Idiot finds Green Day both shaking up its formula and applying it in novel and unexpected ways.

Tiny Mix Tapes

Self-referential, unified, and insanely catchy, American Idiot's positives outweigh its clichéd delivery and ironic medium for corporate America critique.

The New York Times

Green Day trumps any pretension with melody and sheer fervor.

Drowned In Sound

An album that doesn’t sell us short on the pop hooks of albums past, but one that also delivers a healthy dose of politics to the mix without sounding like a six-legged cliché-riddled embarrassment.

Blender

Concept or not, American Idiot is still decent fodder for a mosh pit, a luagh and a sob session. [Nov 2004, p.136]

The Guardian

American Idiot is a mess - but a vivid, splashy, even courageous mess.

Village Voice (Consumer Guide)

There's no economics, no race, hardly any compassion. Joe name-checks America as if his hometown of Berkeley was in the middle of it, then name-checks Jesus as if he's never met anyone who's attended church. And to lend his maunderings rock grandeur, he ties them together with devices that sunk under their own weight back when the Who invented them.

The average user rating for this album is 8.7 (out of 10) based on 327 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Desmond H. gave it a9:
If you think they are anti-America, you are an idiot. GD are anti-war, idiots.

J A. gave it a2:
It's funny how the people who are praising this album, are the same people being criticised on it.

Jon C. gave it a0:
There's so many reasons to not like this album. First off, Green Day is just plain not talented, playing beginner guitar player's style power chords and lazy riffs that turn into the same hooks in every song. Also, it's anti-American. They're basically make a statement that America sucks, and that everybody should just leave it, which is pretty much a terrorist's point of view. Don't support this trash, or else more and more bands will get political and it'll just ruin music altogether.

Music Lover gave it a6:
This album was sort of just a plain rock album. Don't get me wrong: it had good songs on it. I loved how they had medleys like "Jesus Of Suburbia" & "Homecoming", but it didn't offer something totally new. It almost turned me off from Green Day, but I still love them.

paul d. gave it a10:
by far there best album

Bern S gave it a10:
I'm normally annoyed by the user votes being averaged out from some people voting 0 and the rest 10, but this is one of my favourite albums ever, so... Apparently it's not punk, but that means nothing to the likes of me. It's all very accessible pop-rock, and just plain pleasant to listen to. It's not often I can say that I love 11 songs out of 13.

Keila T gave it a10:
OK so this is like 4 yrs after Aerican Idiot was released but I still adore this album with every fragment of my teenaged soul. I wish that everyone could comprehend the brilliance and underhanded eloquence of this organized rave! Green Day is impeccable hands down.

American Idiot by Green Day

American Idiot
by Green Day