Murder City

On several 21st Century Breakdown tracks, including this one, frontman Billie Joe Armstrong sings higher than on previous albums. He told Billboard magazine: "Even on our harder rock numbers, like 'Murder City,' I was doing it a little bit of falsetto. There are two different kinds of falsetto people can do. One is the irritating kind, and then there's the other kind, where it sounds like it's an appropriate thing for the song."

Whilst most of the songs on 21st Century Breakdown were penned by Armstrong in the final period of Bush's second term, this was the one track on the album to be written after Obama's election to the presidency.