In another time, Green Day's energetic singer-guitarist Billie Joe Armstrong might have made the perfect court jester.

He certainly showed he knew how to whip a crowd into a frenzy last night as more than 1,000 Green Day fans were treated to a rare and raw club show by the Berkeley-based trio whose muscular punk sound has sold 20 million albums.

Green Day last played in Toronto at Maple Leaf Gardens two years ago to a crowd ten times the size of last night's rowdy bunch.

So maybe Armstrong's silly shenanigans -- including the use of a Tickle Me Elmo doll to get a clap-along going, impersonating both Marilyn Manson and a heavy metal handbanger, inviting an audience member up on stage to play guitar, and dressing up in a half-dozen shirts, a toque and a bra thrown from the crowd -- were inspired by the small room.

Or maybe it was Green Day's mini-concert in the alley behind HMV earlier in the day.

Whatever the reason, Armstrong was definitely pumped from the get-go as he, bassist Mike Dirnt and drummer Tre Cool took the stage to the strains of Devo's Whip It.

"I am the Karate Kid!" he yelled after someone tossed up a T-shirt which he promptly wrapped around his head just two songs into the evening.

Both older favorites Geek Stink Breath, Chump, Longview (which began as Manson's The Beautiful People) Brain Stew, Basket Case, and new songs, Nice Guys Finish Last, Hitchin' A Ride, The Grouch and Scattered, from their latest album, Nimrod, followed.

But in the end it was Armstrong's seriously playful sense of humor, something getting harder to find in music, that set Green Day's performance apart from so many other shows this year.

It definitely goes down as one of the funnest evenings of music, if nothing else.

"I remember some of you from about four years ago," he teased the crowd at one point. "You guys were like 14 with your mom and dad saying, 'I like your band.'

"Now you're 18 or 19 and you're completely f--ed up! I'd have to take full responsibility for that!"

My only regret is that Green Day didn't play more of the more interesting, experimental stuff from Nimrod.

Here's hoping the band is saving that material for a bigger show, expected to return to Toronto next year.

JAM! Rating: 4 out of 5