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Basket Case


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In celebration of Dookie’s upcoming 18th birthday, this week’s Song of the Week is its 7th track and 3rd single, the super-hit Basket Case. The song reached the number 1 spot on the Billboard Modern Rock chart at the time of its release and stayed in that position for 5 weeks, and earned Green Day a nomination for the Best Rock Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group Grammy in 1995. Basket Case is also Green Day’s second most played song live of Setlist.fm’s artist statistics, behind Longview.

Basket Case’s popularity can partially be credited to its brilliant music video which features the band (as patients) playing in a psychedelically coloured mental hospital; the surreal colouration is thanks to the fact that the video was shot in black and white and then coloured in post-production. The setting of the video in a mental hospital reflects the lyric’s exploration of the feelings experienced by Billie Joe during his anxiety attacks before he was diagnosed with a panic disorder; he felt he was going insane (“It all keeps adding up, I think I'm cracking up”, “Grasping to control, so I better hold on”). The simple-yet-catchy tune and structure of the song that’s complimented by Tre’s manic little fills completes Basket Case’s strong appeal.

There are a plethora of live videos out there, and it was just too difficult to choose one, so instead here’s the forever brilliant music video for Basket Case in all its surreal, colourful glory.

Lyrics:

Do you have the time to listen to me whine

About nothing and everything all at once?

I am one of those melodramatic fools

Neurotic to the bone, no doubt about it

Sometimes I give myself the creeps

Sometimes my mind plays tricks on me

It all keeps adding up, I think I'm cracking up

Am I just paranoid? Am I just stoned?

I went to a shrink to analyse my dreams

She says it's lack of sex that's bringing me down

I went to a whore, he said my life's a bore

So quit my whining 'cause it's bringing her down

Sometimes I give myself the creeps

Sometimes my mind plays tricks on me

It all keeps adding up, I think I'm cracking up

Am I just paranoid? Am I just stoned?

Grasping to control

So I better hold on

Sometimes I give myself the creeps

Sometimes my mind plays tricks on me

It all keeps adding up, I think I'm cracking up

Am I just paranoid? Am I just stoned?

*********************************************************************************************************

You can nominate songs for discussion as Song of the Week in the SotW Nominations and Archive thread, which contains links to each previous Song of the Week in its first post.

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Basket Case is badass. Very, very badass.

That's all I can really say without writing an oversized paragraph about how amazing it is. :P

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It's interesting that the video was filmed in black and white, with the color overlayed, because that's how this song is - it comes from a bleak, monochrome place, translated to poppy-color by the thrust of the music. Basket Case is most of all a totally courageous song, because it speaks stuff that's a social taboo in straight-up, honest words - it goes to the places people fear to go and sings it out loud. The vista is all there in the video - medication, constraint, removal from society - here are the fears that 'Android' mutters blurted out in bold, seeing the light of day and being fucking freed in the process.

It's become a standard, and so maybe overlooked for the intensity of its content, but for me, it always strikes a nerve. I think of how hard it is to say those things when you're at that place, and how this one guy had the balls to say 'I feel this way, and it fucking scares me'. And now let's rock out and fucking dance to it. :)

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Holy shit!!! Dookie anniversary!!!! Ahhhhh!!!!!

Well I love this song (who doesn't?) I wanted to sing this song when I went to see my psychiatrist thingy for the first time, but realized that I wasn't there because I was smoking weed. I just needed to talk to someone non-biased in my life. So I didn't. But this an amazing song, I think one of the best of Green Day's, but also too popular. If I wanted to see one old Green Day song live, it would definitely be Basket Case.

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Good choice with Dookie's 18th coming up.

I've always loved this song, along with the rest of the album.

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Great choice for the Dookie's anniversary. Totally love this song as much as this awesome video! It looks banal but it's my favorite song from Dookie.

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I've never really cared for this song. I always skip it, always have. However, the bass Mike plays in the video stole my heart when I was a young teen.

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First GD song I heard (knowing it was Green Day), and even though I've heard it a million times it never gets old. It has a special place in my heart.

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This song always meant a lot because it helped me bridge the gap between the so-called "old" and "new" Green Day. I was an AI convert to them, and hearing this song and falling in love with helped me realize the greatness of the band.

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No matter what, whenever I'm passing-out kind of drunk, the way my friends keep me awake is by asking me to sing Green Day songs, and this always seems to be the one that I go with. Great song, better album, what else can you say about the beloved Basket Case??

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This had never been the song of the week before? Really?

Anyways, I must admit that it's possibly my least favorite from Dookie, either that or Sassafras Roots. So I'm not really amazed by this week's choice.

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This song was always on the rock music video channels before I became a big Green Day fan. I enjoyed it but thought nothing more of it than that. When I started getting into American Idiot was was very surprised to realize this was the same band! I had the same realization with Good Riddance.

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It's interesting that the video was filmed in black and white, with the color overlayed, because that's how this song is - it comes from a bleak, monochrome place, translated to poppy-color by the thrust of the music. Basket Case is most of all a totally courageous song, because it speaks stuff that's a social taboo in straight-up, honest words - it goes to the places people fear to go and sings it out loud. The vista is all there in the video - medication, constraint, removal from society - here are the fears that 'Android' mutters blurted out in bold, seeing the light of day and being fucking freed in the process.

It's become a standard, and so maybe overlooked for the intensity of its content, but for me, it always strikes a nerve. I think of how hard it is to say those things when you're at that place, and how this one guy had the balls to say 'I feel this way, and it fucking scares me'. And now let's rock out and fucking dance to it. :)

Anyone who's ever wrestled with panic attacks, generalized anxiety disorder, or depression can identify with this song for exactly the reasons you described. Theme-wise I suppose it would have been more appropriate to place Basket Case on Insomniac rather than Dookie, but there is a difference -- Dookie sets its edgy subject matter to poppy rhythms and melodies, whereas on Insomniac, the music tends to be as dark as Billie Joe's mood.

My favorite Green Day memory that's built around Basket Case has got to be April 2010...opening week of AIOB, third night of performances. I had scored a pair of orchestra level seats and Green Day was in the house! After curtain call they took the stage and played a brief 2-song set....second song was Basket Case and saying that they blew the roof off the fucking joint is an understatement. :)

Edit: Ah, yeah....here it is..... :wub: :wub: :wub::dance:

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This song is simply amazing. I'm actually surprised that it hasn't been Song of the Week before, but it's even more awesome to have it here right now. I love Basket Case's lyrics and the song itsself is so damn catchy. To be honest, I think it's probably one of Green Day's best songs. It really never ever gets old. :)

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I'd also say this was the most covered Green Day song too. Not hard to see why! :)

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I listen to this every time I drive to my therapy.I hate therapy but I do enjoy blaring "Basket Case" as loud as I can along the way!

I'd also say this was the most covered Green Day song too. Not hard to see why! :)

I hear it a lot at public places. It is pretty much played at every hockey game here and I hear it a lot of other places. People who don't really know Green Day usually know this song.

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What can I say about about Basket Case besides that is fabulous? :dance:

When the guys play it live is like they're kids again, they jump, they smile, they go nuts! :happy: I love that.

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A classic Green Day song I would say. Also one of the first ones I got into. :happy:

The video isn't available in my country though =/

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Aaah, more time to write about this now. :D

Nobody has yet brought up the first-person/third-person and gender confusion that leaps out of the second verse's lyrics. Let's haff a look, shall vee?

I
went to a shrink to analyse
my
dreams

She
says it's lack of sex that's bringing
me
down

I
went to a whore,
he
said
my
life's a bore

So quit
my
whining 'cause it's bringing
her
down

It's never clear who is acting on whom or saying what to whom in this part of the song. A superficial read starts off clear and seemingly straightforward: the narrator seeks psychological help, and like any good psychologist he's told that his problem is he's not having enough sex. That's when things get messy: to solve that problem, the narrator seeks out a (male?) prostitute who, ironically, tells the narrator that he's boring and to basically shut the fuck up -- that the narrator is responsible for the convoluted psychological state that he finds himself in. But if the "whore" is a "he" then why is the narrator's whining "bringing her down"? Is the prostitute talking about somebody else here? Maybe the "shrink" the narrator saw in the first phrase is the "her" in the last phrase -- that is, the lyric becomes circular: the narrator goes to a psychologist for help. The psychologist says "you're not having enough sex, go get some." The narrator goes to a prostitute (who happens to be male, thus emphasizing the gender role confusion that is fueling the narrator's internal conflict and anxiety). The prostitute then tells the narrator in essence: "Look at you, you putz -- you're even boring your own psychologist. Don't look to me (sex) for help , look at yourself -- get a fucking life."

That's the only way I can make sense of this lyric for now. How do the rest of y'all look at it? Is it even possible to make sense of it, or is its messy androgenousness just part of the song's artistic brilliance?

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^^ Oh yeah, I forgot about that aspect, I always thought my brother was wrong when he sang it like that until I read the lyrics :ermm:

But then I think it's kind of sticking with the whole theme of Dookie, an unsure teenager, for example in 'Coming Clean', where Billie describes the insecurities about his sexuality, and I think he brought this into Basket Case through these lyrics.

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That's the only way I can make sense of this lyric for now. How do the rest of y'all look at it? Is it even possible to make sense of it, or is its messy androgenousness just part of the song's artistic brilliance?

Thats always the way I've seen it to, forgot about to mention that! I also compare it to the sexual liberation theme seen in Coming Clean. It's Billie showing he's not limited to sex with a girl, in this case the whore is a man. Gotta admire him, its pretty brave to sing about that. Early Green Day were usually more popular with girls than guys, and either way Billie was seen as a rockstar around 94/95. For a cool young punk rocker to possibly alienate/anger some fans by singing about fucking a guy is not often seen!

I can't find the link anymore but some music magazine made a list of the best drum fills of all time, with Tré's intro fill in Basket Case making it into the chart. I vaguely remember them describing it as manic drumming along the lines of Animal from The Muppets :lol:

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Classic song, obviously one of the biggest songs of their career, but I never listen to it anymore... Just too many times.

Always will be a classic though.

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I can't find the link anymore but some music magazine made a list of the best drum fills of all time, with Tré's intro fill in Basket Case making it into the chart. I vaguely remember them describing it as manic drumming along the lines of Animal from The Muppets :lol:

i remember reading this quote, too. unfortunately, i do not remember what magazine published this one.

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