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Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)

"Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)"
Green Day - Good Riddance (Time of Your Life) cover.jpg
Single by Green Day
from the album Nimrod
B-side "Desensitized"
"Rotting"
Released October 17, 1997
Format CD single
Recorded June 21, 1996
Genre Acoustic rock, soft rock, alternative rock
Length 2:34 (album version)
2:28 (music video)
Label Reprise
Writer(s) Billie Joe Armstrong, Mike Dirnt, and Tré Cool
Producer(s) Rob Cavallo and Green Day
Green Day singles chronology
"Hitchin' a Ride"
(1997)
"Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)"
(1997)
"Redundant"
(1998)

"Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)" is a song by the American punk rock band Green Day. Although written by lead singer Billie Joe Armstrong before the release of the band's third album Dookie (1994), the song was not released until Green Day's fifth album, Nimrod (1997), and was the second single released from that album. An alternative version (in a different key, with a faster tempo and sparer arrangement) appeared as a B-side to the 1995 German import single for "Brain Stew/Jaded".

Although it was not issued as a single at the time of its release in the United States, "Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)" sold over 2.6 million copies as a digital download in the country. The song was certified Gold in the United Kingdom for sales of 400,000.

Billie Joe Armstrong wrote "Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)" in 1990 and did not show the song to his bandmates until the Dookie recording sessions in 1993. During the sessions, the song was determined to be too different from the rest of the songs on Dookie, and producer Rob Cavallo was unsure of how to structure the recording. When the time came to record Nimrod, Armstrong decided to use the song, and Cavallo suggested they add strings to the track. He sent the band to play foosball in another room while he recorded the strings, which took "like fifteen, twenty minutes, maybe a half an hour at the most." Cavallo reflected on his decision to add the strings "I knew we had done the right thing. It was a hit the second I heard it."

In comparison to previous Green Day material, "Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)" features more mellow, contemplative lyrics with acoustic music. Band member Mike Dirnt said that the release of this song was probably the "most punk" thing they could have done. The song is more commonly promoted on the radio as "Time of Your Life", and it became a Billboard Country Rock chart-topper and an international hit, and was the only song from Nimrod that was a crossover success when released in single form.


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