Formed in 1987,Green Day consists of three core members:Billie Joe Armstrong (guitar, lead vocals), Mike Dirnt (Back-up vocals, bass), and Tré Cool (drums).

Green Day was originally part of the punk rock scene at 924 Gilman Street in Berkeley, California. Its early releases for independent label Lookout! Records earned them a grassroots fanbase, some of whom felt alienated when the band signed to a major label. Nevertheless, its major label debut Dookie became a breakout success in 1994 and eventually sold over 10 million copies in the U.S. alone. As a result, Green Day was widely credited, along with fellow California punk bands The Offspring and Rancid, with reviving mainstream interest in and popularizing punk rock in the United States. Green Day's three follow-up albums, Insomniac, Nimrod and Warning did not achieve the massive success of Dookie, but they were still successful, reaching double platinum, double platinum and gold status respectively. Its 2004 rock opera American Idiot reignited the band's popularity with a younger generation, selling 5 million copies in the U.S.

The band has sold over 60 million records worldwide, including 22 million in the United States alone. They also have three Grammy Awards, Best Alternative Album for Dookie, Best Rock Album for American Idiot, and Record of the Year for "Boulevard of Broken Dreams.

Breakthrough success (1994–96)

Kerplunk's underground success led to a wave of interest coming from major record labels, and eventually they left Lookout! on friendly terms and signed with Reprise Records after attracting the attention of producer Rob Cavallo. Signing to Reprise caused many punk rock fans to regard Green Day as sellouts. After signing with Reprise, the band went to work on recording its major label debut, Dookie.

Released in February of 1994, and recorded in 3 weeks Dookie became a commercial success, helped by extensive MTV airplay for the videos of the songs "Longview", "Basket Case", and "When I Come Around", all of which reached the #1 position on the Modern Rock Tracks charts. That year, Green Day embarked on a nationwide tour with queercore band Pansy Division as its opening act. The band also joined the lineups of both the Lollapalooza festival and Woodstock 1994, where they started an infamous mud fight. During the concert, a security guard mistook bassist Mike Dirnt for a stage-invading fan and punched out some of his teeth. Viewed by millions via pay-per-view television, the Woodstock 1994 performance further aided Green Day's growing publicity and recognition, and helped push its album to eventual diamond status. In 1995, Dookie won the Grammy Award for Best Alternative Album and the band was nominated for 9 MTV Video Music Awards including Video of the Year.

In 1995, a new single for the Angus soundtrack was released, titled "J.A.R.". The single went straight to #1 on the Billboard Modern Rock Tracks chart. The song was followed by its new album, Insomniac, which was released in the fall of 1995. Insomniac was a much darker response by the band, compared to the poppier, more melodic Dookie. Insomniac opened to a warm critical reception, earning 4 out of 5 stars from Rolling Stone Magazine, 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."Insomniac used a piece of art by Winston Smith entitled God Told Me to Skin You Alive for its album cover. The singles released from Insomniac were "Geek Stink Breath", "Brain Stew/Jaded", "Walking Contradiction", and "Stuck With Me". One track, "86", was a reference to the Gilman Street club refusing them entry after the release of Dookie, claiming that they had "gone too commercial." Though the album did not approach the success of Dookie, it still sold seven million copies in the United States. Insomniac won the band award nominations for Favorite Artist, Favorite Hard Rock Artist, and Favorite Alternative Artist at the 1996 American Music Awards, and the video for "Walking Contradiction" got the band a Grammy nomination for Best Video, Short Form, in addition to a Best Special Effects nomination at the MTV Video Music Awards. After that, the band abruptly canceled a European tour, claiming exhaustion.

Nimrod and Warning (1997–2002)

After taking a break in 1996, Green Day began to work on a new album in 1997. From the outset, both the band and Cavallo agreed that the album had to be different from its previous records.The result was Nimrod, an experimental deviation from the band's standard pop-punk brand of music. The new album was released in October 1997. It provided a variety of music, from pop-punk, surf rock, and ska, to an acoustic ballad. Nimrod entered the charts at number 10. The success of "Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)" won the band an MTV Video Award for Best Alternative Video for the song's video, which depicted people undergoing major changes in their lives while Billie Joe Armstrong strummed his acoustic guitar. The other singles released from Nimrod were "Nice Guys Finish Last", "Hitchin' a Ride" and "Redundant".

In 2000, Green Day released Warning, a step further in the style that they had hinted at with Nimrod. Critics' reviews of the album were varied. All Music Guide gave it 4.5/5 saying "Warning may not be an innovative record per se, but it's tremendously satisfying." Rolling Stone magazine was more critical, giving it 3/5, and saying "Warning... invites the question: Who wants to listen to songs of faith, hope and social commentary from what used to be snot-core's biggest-selling band?" Though it produced the hit "Minority" and a smaller hit with "Warning", some observers were coming to the conclusion that the band was losing relevance, and a decline in popularity followed. While all of Green Day's past albums had reached a status of at least double platinum, Warning was only certified gold.

At the 2001 California Music Awards, Green Day won all eight awards that they were nominated for. They won the awards for Outstanding Album (Warning), Outstanding Punk Rock/Ska Album (Warning), Outstanding Group, Outstanding Male Vocalist, Outstanding Bassist, Outstanding Drummer, Outstanding Songwriter and Outstanding Artist.

The release of a Greatest Hits compilation, International Superhits!, and an assemblage of B-sides, Shenanigans, followed Warning. International Superhits and its companion collection of music videos, International Supervideos!, sold reasonably well, going platinum in the U.S. Shenanigans contained some of the band's b-sides, including "Espionage" which was featured in Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me and was nominated for a Grammy for Best Rock Instrumental Performance.

In the spring of 2002, Green Day co-headlined the Pop Disaster Tour with Blink-182. Despite the co-headlining title, Green Day would play each show before Blink-182, who at the time were experiencing more success. The tour was documented on the DVD Riding In Vans With Boys.

American Idiot and renewed popularity (2003–present)

In the summer of 2003 the band went into a studio to write and record new material for a new album, tentatively titled Cigarettes and Valentines. After completing 20 tracks, the master tapes were stolen from the studio. The band, understandably upset, chose not to try to re-create the stolen album, but instead started over with a vow to be even better than before. In this same year, Green Day collaborated with Iggy Pop on two tracks for his album Skull Ring. In addition, they underwent serious "band therapy," engaging in several long talks to work out the members' differences after accusations from Dirnt and Cool that Armstrong was "the band's Nazi"and a show-off bent on taking the limelight from the other band members.

The resulting 2004 album, American Idiot, debuted at #1 on the Billboard charts, the band's first ever album to reach #1, backed by the success of the album's first single, "American Idiot." The album was billed as a "punk rock opera" which follows the journey of the fictitious "Jesus of Suburbia". American Idiot won the 2005 Grammy for "Best Rock Album" and the band swept the 2005 MTV music awards, winning a total of seven of the eight awards they were nominated for, including the coveted Viewer's Choice Award.

Through 2005, the band toured in support of the album with about 150 dates — the longest tour in its career — visiting Japan, Australia, South America and the UK, where they drew a crowd of 130,000 people over a span of two days. While touring for American Idiot, they filmed and recorded the two concerts at the Milton Keynes National Bowl in England, which was voted 'The Best Show On Earth' in a Kerrang! Magazine Poll.

These recordings were released as a live CD and DVD called Bullet in a Bible on November 15, 2005. This CD/DVD featured hits from American Idiot as well as a few songs from all its previous albums, except "Kerplunk" and "1,039/Smoothed Out Slappy Hours". The DVD featured behind-the-scenes footage of the band, and showed how the band prepared to put on the show. The final shows of its 2005 world tour were in Sydney, Australia, and Melbourne, Australia, on December 14 and 17 respectively. On January 10, 2006 the band was awarded with a People's Choice Award for favorite group.

On August 1, 2005, it was announced that Green Day had rescinded the master rights to their pre-Dookie material from Lookout! Records, citing breach of contract regarding unpaid royalties that had been ongoing for some time, a complaint shared with other Lookout! bands. The pre-Dookie material, which remained out of print for about a year, was reissued by their current label, Reprise, on January 9, 2007.

In 2006 Green Day won the Grammy Award for Record of the Year for "Boulevard of Broken Dreams" which spent 16 weeks at the number one position of Billboard's Modern Rock Tracks, a record it shares along with Red Hot Chili Peppers' "Scar Tissue" and Staind's "It's Been Awhile". Green Day was also nominated for Best Rock Video for "Wake Me Up When September Ends" at the 2006 MTV Video Music awards, but lost to AFI's "Miss Murder". Both the music videos for "Wake Me Up When September Ends" and "Boulevard of Broken Dreams" retired showing on TRL after being on the top ten for 50 days each.

In December 2006, Green Day and NRDC opened a web site in partnership to raise awareness on America's dependency on oil.

Green Day released a cover of the John Lennon song "Working Class Hero", that was featured on the album "Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur". The band performed the song on the season finale of American Idol.

That summer, the band appeared in a cameo role in The Simpsons Movie, where they perform the show's theme song. Their version was released as a single on July 24, 2007.

On their myspace page, the band cites the Sex Pistols, Ramones, The Clash, Van Halen, The Replacements, Hüsker Dü, NOFX, Operation Ivy, and Rancid in their influences section.

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