TEMPLAR’S PICK | Wake Me Up When September Ends by Green Day

Sofia Riobaldez

Layout | Tahnia Dalit

TEMPLAR’S PICK | Wake Me Up When September Ends by Green Day

Genre: Alternative/Indie

Album: American Idiot

Released: 2004

Rating: 5/5

Review by: Sofia Riobaldez

What Is Grief, If Not Love Preservering?: The Shadow Behind Green Day’s 2004 Hit

“Grief is a price we pay for love.” 

Dealing with a loved one’s death is one of the most excruciating parts of our lives. The sorrow and loss don't go away easily, nor are they ever going to. As gut-wrenching as it can be, we have to move on and live on without them—constantly carrying the weight of their absence every day. Green Day’s song, “Wake Me Up When September Ends," encapsulates that exact predicament—how it is to grieve over losing a loved one. 

The song was written by Billie Joe Armstrong, lead vocalist and guitarist of Green Day, about coping with his father’s death. It was released with their 5th album, American Idiot, in 2004. As the story goes, Armstrong cried on the way home from his father’s funeral. He isolated himself in his room and when his mother came to check on him, he said, “Wake me up when September ends.”

In the song, he reminisces about his father’s death. Armstrong knows he could never be free of guilt. “Summer has come and passed; the innocent can never last. Wake me up when September ends.” The month always brings back the anguish he felt—so much that he wants to skip the entire month so that he wouldn’t have to live through it again. 

“Ring out the bells again like we did when spring began,” he pleaded. He wanted to run away and live in blissful ignorance. Armstrong doesn’t want to confront that dreadful reminder, begging Spring to rewind once more so he wouldn’t feel the void his father left in his life.

Years flew by, but only one thing remained in Armstrong’s life — grief. It swallows him whole, weighing him down as he goes through September. “Become who we are,” he remarks. Pain always finds its way to bite us in times of weakness. It isn’t a pleasant feeling, but pain becomes a part of us once we love someone. 

“As my memory rests but never forgets what I lost.” During those years, the memories hurt less as Armstrong grows to accept what has happened but he will never forget the pain of the past. Grief and loss will always be on his side. They will never disappear no matter how hard he tries.

Green Day’s “Wake Me Up When September Ends” captures the experience of losing someone you loved. The lyrics described the feeling of sorrow and anguish of coping with their death. I commend Armstrong and Green Day for their outstanding songwriting and musical composition on this song. “Wake Me Up When September Ends” continues to tug the heartstrings of people, letting them know that they’re not alone grieving. Their death isn’t the end. As Hellen Keller said, “What we once enjoyed and deeply loved we can never lose, for all that we love deeply becomes a part of us.”