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Green Day returns to Bay Area town where punk rockers went to school and 7-Eleven behind the music
While the punk rockers who make up Green Day are from nearby Rodeo, it was in Pinole among the Slurpees at 7-Eleven in the 1980s where the teens would gather on their way to and from Pinole Valley High School that would shape their music.
PINOLE, Calif. - The punk rock band Green Day returned home to the East Bay on Sunday to a roaring crowd of die-hard fans, not at a concert venue, but this time at a 7-Eleven in Pinole with a storied past.
"We’ve come full circle, and we’re back here in Pinole and my family still lives around here in West Control Costa county," said Green Day’s lead singer Billie Joe Armstrong.
While they are from nearby Rodeo, it was in Pinole among the Slurpees and hot dogs back in the 1980s where the teens would gather on their way to and from Pinole Valley High School.
Billie Joe Armstrong, Mike Dirnt, and later Tre Cool, would form the band that’s still making music today.
"We [all] came together because there were so many great bands that were from Pinole," said Armstrong.
"Great things can come from anywhere, can come from your mind, from your bedroom, from your friend’s house," said vocalist and bassist Dirnt. "Just believe in yourself."
Generations of fans from around the world waited in line for hours hoping to get their memorabilia autographed, including bobbleheads and records, while others brought their guitars.
"Their music just gives me, I don’t know how to say, life, the strength to keep going," said Ana Brandan who traveled with a friend all the way from Argentina to see Friday’s Green Day concert at Oracle Park in San Francisco before getting a close-up view of their favorite band in Pinole.
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"They’re one of the first bands that made me play guitar, and I’ve just been idolizing them ever since," said Luis Elequin of nearby Hercules.
Ken Chiu of Fremont brought his young son, hoping to update the photo he took with the band twenty years ago.
"There’s something about their energy that they channel, just their music, and their lyrics," said Chiu, a teacher, who also saw one of his former students in the crowd.
"They’re the best band!" said Oscar Echavarria of Vallejo. "Their whole range of songs, but mostly "American Idiot," that’s the one I grew up on."
The trio was presented with the key to the city of Pinole, and a plaque marking the historic significance of the convenience store, which is mentioned in the lyrics to "Jesus of Suburbia," was unveiled outside the store, along with a large mural that reads "Green Day was here," signed in spray paint by the bandmates.
"I’m a Pinole kid myself and the fact that they grew up in the same area, went to the same high school that I did, and they’re here now and this store really was our American dream," said Jay Sarang, the second-generation owner of the 7-Eleven franchise in Pinole, a business he hopes his children will take over one day.
To mark the 30th anniversary of the band’s breakout album "Dookie," Green Day now has its own limited-edition Punky Bunny Coffee, formerly Oakland Coffee Works, founded by the rockers in 2015 and available at 7-Eleven.
The slow brew is one way to, as the song goes, "wake me up when September ends."
There were about 200 die-hard fans in the crowd who waited outside the convenience store for hours to welcome the musicians home, with some lucky enough to see Green Day play at Oracle Park on Friday.
Green Day’s world tour will wrap up on Saturday, Sept. 28 in San Diego.