Welcome to paradise! Green Day are returning to Philadelphia this summer. The Oakland trio have always had a second home in Philly – they’ve been playing gigs here since their pre-Dookie days, and even immortalized their ’97 show at the Electric Factory in their recently released Nimrod box set.

WMMR has spoken with the gang many times, and you can always spot Pierre Robert bringing you complete concert coverage from the pit. In fact, when Pierre spoke with all three members of Green Day a few years ago, he brought along a list of past gigs, and Tre Cool was quite impressed with the history.

Thanks @pierrerobert933 from WMMR 93.3 fm for bringing us this list of past gigs in and around Philly! pic.twitter.com/oKismmarta
— Tre Cool (@trecool) August 31, 2017

Green Day is our featured MMaRtist this weekend (1/20-1/21). This means we’ll have chances for you to fill in blocks of their music with your song requests, plus we’re giving out copies of the new LP on CD, and we’ll get you qualified for pit tickets to their show on Friday August 9th at Pierre’s Good Citizens Park.

WMMR's Featured MM-aRtist artwork showing the band Green Day as the artist. Green Day in green lettering against a bright pink background.

Here’s a tally of every time they’ve brought the house down in the City of Brotherly Love. Scroll through the list and tell us how many of these shows you were at on X/Twitter and Instagram. And if you’ve got any photos from the early days, DM us – we’d love to feature them!

January 16, 1993: JC Dobbs
Could you imagine seeing this arena-level band at a 125-person bar on South Street? Whenever he plays Philly, Billie Joe asks the crowd “Who was with us at JC Dobbs?!”, and far more than 125 cheer in response. If you were actually there, you witnessed rock history in the making.
February 13, 1993: The Pennant East
Just two months after their Philadelphia debut, Green Day graduated to the 300-cap Pennant East in Bellmawr, NJ. That club closed in 2011.
February 18, 1993: Trocadero Theater
A few days later, the gang went across the river to the historic Trocadero in Chinatown.
February 23 + 26, 1993: Grape Street Pub
Grape Street hosted the trio for 2 nights in the same week. (They’ve still got the volume up over in Manayunk.)
February 27, 1993: Khyber Pass Pub
Billie Joe, Mike and Tre really made the rounds in Philly in the first half of 1993! Their next stop was Old City for a show at the Khyber.
March 5, 1993: Silk City Diner
Do you think they ordered a post-show vegan mushroom cheesesteak?
August 2, 1994: Trocadero Theater
On the heels of the release of their breakthrough record Dookie, the trio returned to the Troc with a batch of new songs that would go on to become classics, including “Longview”. See if you can spot hidden references in the album art. [SETLIST]
December 1, 1994: Philadelphia Convention Hall
This ripper of a set at the Convention Hall included a mix of Dookie tracks (which were brand new at the time), plus covers of the Who and Operation Ivy, and early songs like “Going to Pasalacqua.” [SETLIST]
November 14, 1995: Civic Center
About a month after dropping Insomniac, we witnessed Green Day live at the Civic Center. We couldn’t track down the setlist for this one, so if you were there, let us know what they played that night!
November 14, 1997: Electric Factory
This entire epic show is now available as part of the Nimrod anniversary set, as Pierre explains in his unboxing of the reissue. [SETLIST]
July 14, 2000: Blockbuster-Sony Music Entertainment Centre
In 2000, Billie Joe, Mike and Tre returned to the E-Centre for punk rock summer camp, aka Warped Tour. [SETLIST]
May 29, 1998: Blockbuster-Sony Music Entertainment Centre
By 1998, Green Day had reached dizzying heights with chart-toppers like “Good Riddance”, which they played for the Y-100 FEZtival at the E-Centre in Camden. [SETLIST]
June 23, 2001: Kahunaville
Thanks to listener Andrew in West Chester for reminding us that Green Day once played in a volcano… well, if Kahunaville in Wilmington, DE counts. (It totally does.) [SETLIST]
May 28, 2002: Tweeter Center
With 6 LPs now under their belt, Green Day found themselves back in Camden for the Pop Disaster tour in 2002. [SETLIST]
October 29, 2004: Liacouras Center
Green Day became the biggest band in the world not once, but twice: if Dookie was the catalyst that brought pop-punk into the mainstream, American Idiot was the second coming of the genre, dominating the airwaves and permeating pop culture worldwide. [SETLIST]
September 7, 2005: Wachovia Center
By mid-2005, the rock opera American Idiot was one of the best-selling new albums in the world. The setlist on this tour pulled largely from that LP, with their 90s hits sprinkled throughout. [SETLIST]
July 21, 2009: Spectrum
This was one of the last rock shows in our old air conditioned girl, the Spectrum, which closed later in 2009 with Pearl Jam’s legendary 4-night run. [SETLIST]

Billie Joe Armstrong at the Spectrum in 2009

Billie Joe Armstrong at the Spectrum in 2009
August 3, 2010: Susquehanna Bank Center
When Green Day released yet another concept album, 21st Century Breakdown, we wondered if it could possibly be as fantastic as its predecessor American Idiot. Spoiler alert: it totally was. [SETLIST]

Billie Joe Armstrong in Camden in 2010
August 3, 2013: Liacouras Center
At Green Day’s stop on Temple’s campus, we witnessed Derrick from Macungie rip through “Jesus of Suburbia” on Billie Joe’s guitar with unbelievable precision. Pierre caught up with an ecstatic Derrick after the show, and a few years later played that audio for Billie Joe, who choked up over the emotion on display. [SETLIST]
September 29, 2016: Tower Theater
By 2016, there weren’t many venues that the band had *not* hit in Philly, but on this night they checked another one off the list: the iconic Tower Theater in Upper Darby. [SETLIST]
August 31, 2017: BB&T Pavilion
Now on their 12th studio album Revolution Radio, the boys returned to Camden, and this time all three of them sat for an interview with Pierre. Check out the concert gallery here. [SETLIST]

August 2017 at the BB&T Pavilion
August 20, 2021: Citizens Bank Park
After a long break – made even longer by the COVID pandemic – Green Day triumphantly returned to Philly with the Hella Mega Tour for a bombastic show at the ballpark. See more photos here. [SETLIST]

Green Day /
Hella Mega Tour /
Citizens Bank Park /
Philadelphia, Pa /
August 20, 2021 / DerekBrad.com
Honorable Mention: The Longshot at the First Unitarian Church
Billie Joe did make an additional appearance in Philly a few years ago, so we’ll include one of his side projects on this list. The Longshot played the Church basement in the summer of 2018, and it was so hot that the walls were sweating. [SETLIST]
August 9, 2024: Citizens Bank Park
Green Day return to Pierre’s Good Citizens Park this summer with the Smashing Pumpkins, Rancid and the Linda Lindas. Listen to WMMR this weekend (1/20-1/21) for your shot at pit tickets!