"1993: Green Day plays the Brass Mug in Tampa. Tampa singer Joe Popp and his punky trio opens the show. The tiny bar, which normally books local bands, is packed with fans standing on pool tables."

"...Like a legendary concert at the Brass Mug in 1993..."

"...The place was packed beyond belief. That night, the crowd helped the Brass Mug with a little remodeling by tearing down a good portion of the ceiling tiles."

"...After that, they played the Brass Mug and there were way too many people there for the Mug."

Joe Popp: "Life can be full of coincidences. Circa 1993 I was playing in a punk trio called Dogs On Ice in Tampa, Florida. We had some minor local success and even signed to a small label out of San Francisco run by Jello Biafra's graphic artist [Winston Smith]. We were doing as good as any local band could hope to do, but thought that maybe we would get a big break after learning we were going to open for our punk idols - Green Day. The show was scheduled at a scrappy hole in the wall called The Brass Mug - sort of the CBGB's of Tampa. I remember the evening vividly. Green Day had not been signed by Reprise yet, but were doing great on Lookout Records. As we pulled into the club in our oxidized blue Ford Econoline, a rougher, more road worn van pulled into a space close to ours. It was them - yes, Green Day, all the way from the notorious punk rock mecca - 924 Gilman Street. The band we listened to constantly and read so much about in the pages of our bible, the 'zine Maximum Rocknroll. We greeted them, and they seemed bigger than life. Tre Cool asked if any 5-0's were rolling because he had to "take care of some business", and Mike Dirnt asked our bass player for a string, which he provided. The Mug was filled beyond legal capacity that night - at least 400 in a place that regularly drew 40. We took the stage with anticipation and rocked a pretty good set to the enthusiastic crowd. We felt good. Then Green Day took the stage. They transformed the seedy club into a whirling vortex of energy. It didn't matter that the sound was crap or the ceiling was low. They played with such tightness and fervor that I knew great things would come to them. My opinion of my band admittedly dropped drastically when I witnessed a new musical paradigm first hand. Weeks later their Dookie album was released on Reprise. Dookie sold millions of records and proved to be the record that lead them to stardom. My band went the way of most: we broke up."

buckeyeneer: "Really fun show...before Dookie, so they werent mainstream yet. Tickets were $5...It got wild and remember somebody body surfing and ripping the lights down from the ceiling."