Melodic Pop Punk: Descendents vs. Green Day

by Daniel McDermott • April 30, 2008

In a family tree of popular music that begins with great-grandfather Robert Johnson, stretches down to Chuck Berry, branches off to Buddy Holly, the Beatles, Dylan, Zeppelin, the Ramones, and ends with the birth of Green Day, the Descendents would be the crazy musical uncle, the one who is 45 and in a perpetual state of relationship breakup; lives alone in a one-bedroom apartment with two Fender Stratocasters, one Les Paul, and a Pearl drumset displayed in the living room; mourns the death of Keith Moon each September; wears a white t-shirt and jeans regardless of the occasion; and still maintains his teenage bodyweight of 150 lbs. despite a diet of Ramen noodles, Mexican takeout, and Coors Light. You may not always respect this uncle or trust him around your girlfriend, but he's the one who put that Sex Pistols album under the Christmas tree when you were still in preschool, he's the one who first placed the guitar in your hands, and he's the reason rock music is a part of your life at all.

Perhaps Green Day did not wear out any record needles pining over the Descendents' 1985 album I Don't Want to Grow Up, and they might not mention them as a significant influence, but without the Descendents there never would have been a genre of melodic pop-punk for Green Day to capitalize upon. They came first, like it or not, influential or not. They just did it with a little less media attention, a little less theatrics, and maybe a little more respect.

To see how the battle plays out, click here.

Crawdaddy! Magazine was founded by Paul Williams in 1966 and was the first U.S. magazine of rock criticism. John Lennon, Cameron Crowe, P.J. O'Rourke and many others have contirubted to its pages, and it is currently owned by Wolfgang's Vault, home to the legendary rock promoter Bill Graham's archive.