Insomniac (Green Day album)

Insomniac is the fourth studio album by the American punk rock band Green Day. It was released on October 10, 1995 through Reprise Records. Though it peaked at number two in the United States and went double-platinum (according to the RIAA)[1]  by 1996, Insomniac did not have the sales endurance of its predecessor, Dookie, largely due to its slightly darker lyrical tone and heavier, more abrasive sound.[2]  Insomniac is the band's third-best selling album behind Dookieand American Idiot with sales at over 10 million worldwide and 2,100,000 copies in the US alone.[3]  The album was reissued on vinyl on May 12, 2009.



Contents
[hide]  *1 Background  ==Background[ edit] == Before the name Insomniac was decided on, the band considered naming the album Tight Wad Hill (after track 13 on the album). After visiting collage artist Winston Smith for the album cover, Billie Joe Armstrong asked him how he managed to make such intricate pieces in such short times. Smith answered: "It's easy for me. I am an insomniac."[4]  Armstrong himself has said that the album title comes from his own insomnia, after having been woken up frequently during the night due to his son's screams. Armstrong also mentions his insomnia in the song "Brain Stew."
 * 2 Cover art
 * 3 Reception
 * 4 Singles and commercial success
 * 5 Track listing
 * 6 Charts
 * 6.1 Album
 * 6.2 Singles
 * 7 Personnel
 * 7.1 Production
 * 8 In popular culture
 * 9 References

"Panic Song" was inspired by bassist Mike Dirnt's panic attacks he has suffered as a result of being born with an enlargedmitral valve in his heart.[5] ==Cover art[ edit] == God Told Me to Skin You Alive<p style="margin-top:0.5em;line-height:17.9200000762939px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:14.3999996185303px;">The collage on the album cover was created by Winston Smith <sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-6" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:11.1999998092651px;">[6]  and is called God Told Me to Skin You Alive, a reference to the Dead Kennedys song "I Kill Children". Interestingly enough, the cover art contains an image (the dentist) that was originally used in a collage featured in the inside cover art of Dead Kennedys' album Plastic Surgery Disasters (1982). Smith knew drummer Tré Cool from Green Day's time at [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lookout!_Records Lookout! Records] and told Cool that if he ever needed album artwork that he should call him.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-Smith_4-1" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:11.1999998092651px;">[4]  The cover art features several hidden images: a naked woman, three fairies, and several other ghostly faces in the flames.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-Smith_4-2" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:11.1999998092651px;">[4]  There are also three skulls on the entire album cover and back, one for each member of Green Day. One of the skulls requires you to view the piece at an angle. The hidden skull is taken from Hans Holbein's 1533 painting The Ambassadors.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-Smith_4-3" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:11.1999998092651px;">[4]  Green Day's version, however, is slightly different from the original, with the woman holding Armstrong's Sonic Blue Fernandes imitation Stratocaster rather than an acoustic guitar.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-Smith_4-4" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:11.1999998092651px;">[4] ==Reception<span class="mw-editsection" style="-webkit-user-select:none;font-size:small;margin-left:1em;line-height:1em;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-family:sans-serif;"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">[ edit<span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">] == <p style="margin-top:0.5em;line-height:17.9200000762939px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:14.3999996185303px;">Insomniac did not have the big sales or airplay as the singles from Dookie, but it was generally well received by critics. It earned three and a half out of five stars from Rolling Stone, which said "In punk the good stuff actually unfolds and gains meaning as you listen without sacrificing any of its electric, haywire immediacy. And Green Day are as good as this stuff gets".<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-RS_10-1" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:11.1999998092651px;">[10]

<p style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:17.9200000762939px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:14.3999996185303px;">Entertainment Weekly gave the album a B with particular praise for Billie Joe Armstrong, stating that: "Fans needn't worry about Armstrong, a new father, rhapsodizing over the joys of changing diapers or whining about being a wealthy rock star. Once more, the songs relate the travails of a pathetic, self-loathing goofball whose sense of self-worth is continually reduced to rubble by sundry jerks, authority figures, and cultural elitists."

<p style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:17.9200000762939px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:14.3999996185303px;">However, Green Day was slightly criticized for not progressing as much as their predecessors. Entertainment Weeklystated that: "Insomniac does make you wonder about Green Day's growth, though. Between albums one and four, The Clash, to take an old-school example, branched out from guitar crunch to reggae, dub, and Spectorized pop. By comparison, Green Day sound exactly the same as on their first album, albeit with crisper production and, ominously, a palpable degeneration in their sense of humor. The few hints of growth are fairly microscopic: a tougher metallic edge to a few of the songs ... and lyrics that are bleaker than Dookie's."

<p style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:17.9200000762939px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:14.3999996185303px;">Allmusic similarly noted that "they kept their blueprint and made it a shade darker. Throughout Insomniac, there are vague references to the band's startling multi-platinum breakthrough, but the album is hardly a stark confessional on the level ofNirvana's In Utero. ... While nothing on the album is as immediate as "Basket Case" or "Longview," the band has gained a powerful sonic punch, which goes straight for the gut but sacrifices the raw edge they so desperately want to keep and makes the record slightly tame. Billie Joe hasn't lost much of his talent for simple, tuneful hooks, but after a series of songs that all sound pretty much the same, it becomes clear that he needs to push himself a little bit more if Green Day ever want to be something more than a good punk-pop band. As it is, they remain a good punk-pop band, and Insomniac is a good punk-pop record, but nothing more."<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-allmusic_7-1" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:11.1999998092651px;">[7] ==Singles and commercial success<span class="mw-editsection" style="-webkit-user-select:none;font-size:small;margin-left:1em;line-height:1em;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-family:sans-serif;"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">[ edit<span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">]  == <p style="margin-top:0.5em;line-height:17.9200000762939px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:14.3999996185303px;">The first single released from Insomniac was "Geek Stink Breath". The song was successful on both Top 40 and rock radio stations and peaked at number 27 on theBillboard Hot 100 Airplay.

<p style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:17.9200000762939px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:14.3999996185303px;">The second single, released exclusively in the United Kingdom, was "Stuck with Me". The song was moderately successful in the UK, Australia, and New Zealand, but was not one of the group's bigger hits in the US.

<p style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:17.9200000762939px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:14.3999996185303px;">The third single from the album was "Brain Stew/Jaded". The two were separate songs (tracks 10 and 11 on Insomniac), but they were released together as a single and a music video.

<p style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:17.9200000762939px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:14.3999996185303px;">The last single from the album was "Walking Contradiction".

<p style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:17.9200000762939px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:14.3999996185303px;">The song "86" was released as a promotional single.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-13" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:11.1999998092651px;">[13] ==Track listing<span class="mw-editsection" style="-webkit-user-select:none;font-size:small;margin-left:1em;line-height:1em;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-family:sans-serif;"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">[ edit<span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">] == <p style="margin-top:0.5em;line-height:17.9200000762939px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:14.3999996185303px;">All lyrics written by Billie Joe Armstrong, except where noted, all music composed by Green Day, except where noted. ==Charts<span class="mw-editsection" style="-webkit-user-select:none;font-size:small;margin-left:1em;line-height:1em;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-family:sans-serif;"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">[ edit<span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">] == ===Album<span class="mw-editsection" style="-webkit-user-select:none;font-size:small;margin-left:1em;line-height:1em;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">[ edit<span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">] === ===Singles<span class="mw-editsection" style="-webkit-user-select:none;font-size:small;margin-left:1em;line-height:1em;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">[ edit<span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">] === ==Personnel<span class="mw-editsection" style="-webkit-user-select:none;font-size:small;margin-left:1em;line-height:1em;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-family:sans-serif;"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">[ edit<span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">] == ===Production<span class="mw-editsection" style="-webkit-user-select:none;font-size:small;margin-left:1em;line-height:1em;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">[ edit<span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">] === ==In popular culture<span class="mw-editsection" style="-webkit-user-select:none;font-size:small;margin-left:1em;line-height:1em;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-family:sans-serif;"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">[ edit<span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">] ==
 * Billie Joe Armstrong – lead vocals, guitar
 * Mike Dirnt – bass, backing vocals
 * Tré Cool – drums
 * Rob Cavallo; Green Day – producers
 * Kevin Army – engineer
 * Jerry Finn – mixing
 * Richard Huredia; Bernd Burgdorf – additional engineers
 * Winston Smith – cover art
 * Dirk Walter - art direction<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-liner_notes_23-0" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:11.1999998092651px;">[23]
 * David Harlan - typographic design<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-liner_notes_23-1" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:11.1999998092651px;">[23]
 * The song "Westbound Sign" was used in the teaser trailer for the Disney/Pixar film Cars.
 * The title "Bab's Uvula Who?" comes from a 1976 Saturday Night Live sketch with Gilda Radner and Chevy Chase.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-24" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:11.1999998092651px;">[24]
 * "86" was featured in the 1996 MTV film Joe's Apartment.
 * The songs "Geek Stink Breath", "Brain Stew", and "Jaded" are featured in the music game Green Day: Rock Band.