Odyssey Arena, Belfast Tues 6.30pm £41.50/£38 048-90739074; O2, Dublin Wed 6.30pm €49.20 0818-719300

Surely not even the most optimistic (let alone prescient) of Green Day fans would have seen this one coming. The US West Coast punk band, weaned on early Clash and Stiff Little Fingers records, touring squats in Germany, playing rooms with barricaded windows, energised by the counter- culture of California’s Berkeley area, are now one of the world’s most successful declamatory rock acts.

And not just that; their two most recent records, 2004’s American Idiot and this year’s 21st Century Breakdown, have, at their cores, a heavily politicised agenda, yet come wrapped in heroic, classic punk-rock finery.

The band arrives in Ireland for the first time in some five years, their recent live shows reportedly a mix of effortless bombast and down-to-earth excitement. Like, what’s not to love?

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Josh Ritter the Love Canon String Band Wednesday, Dublin