The kids who snagged tickets to a bill advertised as “Mike Dirnt with very special guests,” were pleasantly surprised when the guests turned out to be Tre Cool and Billie Joe Armstrong.
Indeed, Green Day, who are no strangers to raucus surprise club shows, notched another one up Wednesday (1/22) at The Observatory in Orange County, California.
The Santa Ana club, whose capacity is nearly 1,000, sits about 4 miles from the recently shuttered Chain Reaction. Together the two venues have been the go-to spot for underground music for decades.
With tons of musicians at the NAMM Show week in nearby Anaheim, Bass Magazine was wise to honor Dirnt with the Lifetime Achievement award.
Blink-182's axe wielder Mark Hoppus did the honors presenting the Green Day bassist with the award.
Here's most of what he had to say:
In the early '90s, I was going to community college and playing bass in a garage band, and had dreams of one day actually going into a studio and recording a song, maybe even a demo or a single.
And at that time, one of the bands that I couldn't get enough of was this East Bay stoner trio called Green Day. They were awesome.
A friend of mine [said they were] like Ramones meets Descendants meets some kind of fucking weird Gilman Street shit that I didn't understand, but I loved.
The songwriting was tight. The melodies catchy and throughout it all, the beating heart of the low end was this fucking killer bassist.
I moved to San Diego and met Tom DeLong. Thank you. And we started playing. And while we were still learning how to write songs and practicing our punk rock jumps in front of the mirrors, we went to a club called SOMA to watch Green Day in a 1,200 capacity club.
It was sweaty and shitty and fucking awesome.
They started songs and tore through them and broke him down and went off script and improvised, and the whole time, the beating heart of the low end was this fucking killer bassist.
The day it came out, I drove all around San Diego trying to find a store that had a copy of Dookie. I sat in my room and listened to it and dissected it.
Dookie blew my mind.
It was no surprise to me that the song that broke through and made punk rock mainstream success was "Longview," which, of course, starts with Mike's iconic bass line.
Several years later, blink-182 and Green Day toured together on the Pop Disaster Tour.
That tour was one of the highlights of my life. Mike was awesome from day one at the photo shoots, at the press events, throughout the tour and beyond.
When I was sick with cancer. Fucking cancer. Shut up.
When I was sick with cancer a few years ago, Mike texted me all the time to check in and see how I was doing, and also he sent me a hot pink Mike Dirt signature Telecaster bass to lift my spirits.
I don't even know how to describe Mike.
He's kind of rockabilly, kind of punk rock, kind as hell, unapologetically himself, a master craftsman and a great friend and always the beating heart of the low end.
Ladies and gentlemen, Mike Dirnt.
Don't be sad you weren't one of the 1,200 at the Observatory.
The whole world will have a chance to see Green Day in a few weeks when they are the warm up act for the Super Bowl which will be taking place about 45 miles south of Gilman Street at Levi's Stadium in San Jose, CA.
Charlie Puth will sing the national anthem, Brandi Carlile will give us "America the Beautiful" and Coco Jones will deliver "Lift Every Voice and Sing" and of course you know Bad Bunny is the half time entertainment.
The rock starts at 3pm Pacific on Super Bowl Sunday (2/8). Tune in to NBC, Telemundo, Peacock and/or Universo.
Or get your tickets to see all of it live. Prices start at $7,000.
