It debuted at number 11 in the United Kingdom and reached the top 20 in Canada, Denmark, Ireland, New Zealand, and Norway.

One of two explicitly political songs on the album (the other being fellow single "American Idiot"),[5] "Holiday" took two months to finish writing, because Armstrong continually felt his lyrics were not good enough.

Armstrong felt that Republican politicians were "strategic" in alienating one group of people—for example, the gay community—in order to buy the votes of another.

[9] Armstrong for the first time imagined how he would perform the songs he was writing, and envisioned an audience responding to his lyric "Can I get another Amen?

"[12] The first half of the video takes place in a car (a 1968 Mercury Monterey convertible), where Billie Joe Armstrong, Mike Dirnt and Tré Cool are partying around in Las Vegas.

Billie Joe Armstrong plays the mentioned Representative of California, two fighting clients, a punk rocker and a nerd.

"Holiday" has been included on the set lists of numerous Green Day concert tours, some of which played American Idiot in its entirety to promote the album.