Joey Armstrong talks about recording with his dad for Emily's Army

Here's a short interview with Emily's Army from the Associated Press. Joey talks about recording with his dad, and there's a really small clip of Billie Joe talking about being a musician.

Rodeo Queens "Depression Times" in list of 2011's coolest songs

Jesse Malin and Green Day collaboration as Rodeo Queens song Depression Times makes Little Steven's Underground Garage first 26 coolest songs of 2011. You can take a listen to all 26 songs here. I'm listening now and it's a pretty cool mix of bands and tunes.

Check back on this story from earlier in the year for a download of Depression Times.

Jesse Malin is pictured here with Billie Joe in a photo taken by Bob Gruen. Jesse and Green Day produced Depression Times in New York in 2010.

Simple Plan's bassist says "Green Day were my Ramones"

An interview with Simple Plan's bassist David Desrosiers was posted on Atalantic Records website, and he talks about how "Dookie" was the first album he bought and how Green Day inspired him to play.



It is always great to hear from other musicians who mention Green Day as the band that inspired them. No doubt there countless of others out there who saw Green Day and felt the same urge to play along.

"Indonesia wants Green Day" - Fan Video (Idiot Club Indonesia)

Here's a cool video sent to us by the fans of Indonesia, who are calling for Green Day to play in Indonesia. The band haven't played there since 1996, maybe they will again on the next tour? It looks from the video that there are plenty of fans out there waiting for it to happen!



Created By: idiotclubindonesia.com

Have Green Day played a show in your country yet? Leave us a comment of where you'd like to see them play.

New Feature - On this week...

Despite Billie Joe saying "to reminisce is to die" at the surprise show, we're gonna do some reminiscing for this new feature, where we take a look back at what Green Day were up to at this time in previous years. On this week...

Last year:

Green Day were in the middle of the 2nd leg of their North American 21st Century Breakdown tour. Fans were in for a treat as the band were in top form playing old rarities and inviting tons of fans on stage to join in the party, Foxboro Hot Tubs style.

2 years ago:

The trio visited The White House when they stopped off in Washington on the first leg of their US 21CB tour...

In 2004:

The band were gearing up for a big comeback with American Idiot and performed at the Reading/Leeds Festival, which marked a big turning point in the bands career. Green Day actually played a longer than expected set when they filled in for 50 Cent, who was forced off stage at Reading after a barrage of bottles from the unimpressed festival punters!



In 1998:

An early evening set after Iggy Pop in Chelmsford, Essex, was the setting for this Nimrod tour festival appearance. Check out this video where the mosh pit collapses as Green Day open with Nice Guys Finish Last...




(The video says that it is the Leeds performance from the V festival, but unless exactly the same happened there, I’m sure this was Chelmsford!)

I was 17 (“…and strung out on confusion!”) at the time and had bought the Nimrod album that year. I was really starting to get in to music, and this album came at the perfect time for me. To this day, I would say that it’s my favourite album. Mainly because of the time it came out in my life, but also because of its musical diversity. It was an album where Green Day really demonstrated their range of musical ability, and Billie Joe’s brutally honest lyrics made it an album full of feeling that an impressionable teenager like myself could really cling on to.

Some time during our school summer term, my friend Tim had told me that Green Day would be performing at the festival. He already had tickets himself, but unfortunately the festival was now sold out. However, Tim had a look around and managed to find via a notice board on the internet, a spare day ticket that someone had to sell. We arranged to meet the person on the night before the festival, at a hotel in Essex. My Dad drove us down there, and I got my ticket to see Green Day for the first time.

It was at a time when Green Day’s popularity was on the wane, as they struggled to maintain the mainstream success they received with their album ‘Dookie.’ Hence, they had a mid-afternoon slot of only 45 minutes or so. They took to the stage at around 4pm, after another surprisingly early set, from Iggy Pop. I remember the anticipation as we waited in the crowd. It seemed to take an age for Green Day to take to the stage. When they did, there was a massive surge forward in the crowd as the band launched into the opening track from Nimrod, ‘Nice Guys Finish Last.’ Almost immediately, a large proportion of the mosh pit (which we were part of) collapsed. All of a sudden we were practically lying down on fans behind us, with the people in front, on top of us. It was really quite frightening at the time, as we had no control, and the band had to stop playing. Billie Joe directed the crowd to “pick each other up!” before they could carry on.

Once we were back on our feet, the band started up the song again, and our adrenalin took over as we went crazy for rest of the short, but typically song packed set. I can still remember looking at my friend Tim at one point, and we both just gave each other this mad look, with clenched teeth and wide eyes. It was our way of communicating our joy, and triumph at surviving this intense Green Day experience!

My Chemical Romance and Blink-182 talk about past Green Day tour pranks

Currently, My Chemical Romance and Blink-182 are on the "Honda Civic Tour" together and were both interviewed by Spin magazine about tour pranks. Both bands said that they currently do not pull any pranks on each other, but when they both had memorable stories of being pranked when they were on tour with Green Day.

Mikey Way of My Chemical Romance said:

"When we were out with Green Day they got us really good on the last night of the tour. They had a garbage bag filled with popcorn above me and they poured it out during our set. They also had flood lights and their lighting directors came out and pointed them directly in our faces. Every time [MCR frontman] Gerard [Way] tried to talk between songs they'd light off the concussion blasts -- and then the band came out onstage with light sabers and were fighting while we were playing [laughs]."

Tom DeLonge of Blink-182 talked about one of their tour pranks being inspired by Green Day.

"We don't really prank anybody. Well, we did [on a previous tour] with a bunch of concussion light blasts during Jimmy Eat World's set. We did it just randomly in the middle of a song. [Frontman] Jim [Adkins] would be singing about a girl and we'd just hit it. That was partly Green Day's idea, too."

You can read the whole interview on Spin.com by clicking here. Also you can find out more information about Blink and Green Day teaming up on Jimmy Eat World here.

Song of the Week: "Amy" - Green Day's tribute to Amy Winehouse

This week’s Song of the Week is the brand-new Amy Winehouse tribute, Amy, one of sixteen new Green Day songs debuted on the 11th of this month at the ‘secret’ Green Day show in Costa Mesa, California. At that show, Billie Joe performed the song solo on guitar, with the lyrics written down on a piece of paper next to him, as he’d "just wrote it last week". The song is a simple, sad, and honest lament to the loss of such a young and extraordinarily talented life.

The show had a no-camera rule, so we don't have a high quality version of the song, but a pretty decent version was uploaded to YouTube (though it's not the full song). Another video of the song can be seen below


(video credit: billwhite93)

Lyrics to the song can be found on this post, and this is Amy’s Song of the Week thread on the forum. Feel free to stop by and post your opinion, or nominate next week's song.

Green Day themed sunglasses now on sale from Tilly's

Tilly's has updated their online store to include two new Green Day themed sunglasses. Both feature 21st Century Breakdown and Awesome As Fuck themed artwork on the inside of them.

 

Both are a little pricey, but they sure are slick looking. I could definitely see myself wearing the first pair. Anyone feeling nice and want to get me a back to school gift?

Video of a new Green Day song, "Stray Heart," from their surprise show

YouTuber billwhite93 came through and posted another song from Green Day's surprise show. We think this song is called "Stray Heart," (but we're not 100% sure) and goddamn is it wonderful. The bass lines sound great, it's a nice mix between a chill Foxboro Hot Tubs song and .... something new. Hearing this fits in so well with what Amanda wrote yesterday about their new sound.



There are some people on the forum working out the lyrics, so you can pop over there if you'd like.

Thanks to everyone who sent us messages letting us know when the video was published

Green Day included in Gibson's "10 Top Trios" list

Recently, Gibson.com comprised a list of who their thought were rocks "10 Ten Trios". Green Day made the list coming in a number 6.

"In 20 years the Californians have gone from three-man, three-chord punks to auteurs of Broadway, which is some achievement. Billie Joe Armstrong remains the hub, spitting out lyrics and riffs while drummer Tré Cool is no slouch, summoning the spirits of The Clash’s Topper Headon and The Who’s Keith Moon with gleeful abandon. Unlike many veteran bands, Green Day retain immense ambition… their American Idiot show is touring late in 2011 with talk of a movie version also coming soon."

Other bands that made the list include Cream, Nirvana, ZZ Top, and The Jimi Hendrix Experience.

You can see the whole list on the Gibson website.

"To Reminisce is to Die" - Thoughts on Green Day's new sound

When Green Day announced that they were playing a not-so-secret benefit show on Thursday, August 11th, the fandom was ablaze with hopes and concerns about the setlist. Would they stick to the 21st Century Breakdown setup and open with a slaying arena-rock anthem; would they open with a pop-punk gem from the album that launched them into musical relevance; or would they break out a tune that has rarely been heard live, much less begun a night? What the band did start and fill the show with was beyond any fan’s expectations - a show devoted entirely to new music. “To reminisce is to die,” Billie said, before he launched into an evening of brand new material. After having listened to several songs from the show, I can confirm that this adventure is new and different, but in no way is it scary – in fact, I highly anticipate the new direction in which Green Day seems to be headed. 

When I first awoke the morning after the show and tried to catch up with the madness that had ensued on the forum, one of the first things I noticed were Billie’s clothes – they were plain. He had stripped himself of his rock star image, which struck me as intriguing. In fact, I was more than simply intrigued – I was excited, thrilled, ecstatic. Ever since I had known Green Day, they had been mega-stars in the rock world – the kings of their craft, arguably the best touring band in existence. They sold out some of the biggest arenas in the world, and filmed a live DVD at the Milton Keynes Bowl in England. They accomplished all of this with a rigorous structure – a setlist that included the classic must-haves without much room for change, crowd antics that were amazing to witness but remained the same night after night, and a costume-esque attire that set them apart from the baggy-short wearing skater punks of yesteryear.

During the second leg of the 21st Century Breakdown tour, this structure began to break down. The costumes and crowd-pleasing acts were still in place, but the music and atmosphere became more relaxed. It became less about the politics and more about the favorites. Fans requested songs and heard them played, and the band peppered in some of their personal favorites as well. In the spring of 2011, the release of Awesome As Fuck (a fan-created title) reflected this loosening of the reigns. However, the chains that bound Green Day to their arena-rock, punk-God, and Broadway-hero acts did not fully break until their impromptu show last week. For the first time since the last of their Warning shows, they stripped themselves of all of that. A setlist full of brand new songs, no more water gun shticks, and plain street-clothes to me symbolize a new beginning; a new beginning for which I think I’m ready.

Many of the songs I’ve heard are clearly headed away from the rock-opera style of the last two albums, but also not backward toward anything prior to American Idiot. The songs seem to have a pure rock ’n roll vibe, separate from the pop-punk angst of Dookie, the pure rage of Insomniac, or even the somewhat rootsy vibe on Warning. The style of the music seems to be completely fitting to the band Green Day has become – a band that has written two enormously successful and ambitious rock-operas but recognizes that its time to move on while maintaining a sense of growth and not retreating into old territory. Billie’s remarks about the past from the show say to me that he is ready to move on from it all, but wants to take the lessons he’s learned with him.

These new songs take everything Green Day has ever recorded and send it spiraling down a new path; a path that is different, but which also has familiar landmarks scattered along the way. This path does not alienate the fans or the past, but rather embraces them while breathing into them new life. American Idiot changed everything for the band, and 21st Century Breakdown completed Billie’s mission; however, the mission is just that: complete. Judging by the new material displayed at The Tiki Bar, the band has recognized this. Green Day has boarded a train into uncharted territory, and I am sure as hell willing to abandon any doubts or expectations and ride along.

Pretty decent quality video of "It's Fuck Time" from Green Day's surprise show

Jeff Matika releases new album with his band "The Wicked Good" - out today!

Last month we wrote about Green Day's tour guitarist, Jeff Matika, releasing an album with his band "The Wicked Good." Their debut album, titled "You're Welcome," is out today!

You can purchase the album directly from their site for $10. They also have a couple awesome t-shirt designs up, check them out and support the band.

If you haven't heard any of their material, visit their Facebook Page and take a listen. I'd suggest "Memory Don't Know" or "Hush Hush". Both very good songs and different sounds.

The band is playing their CD release party tonight in Little Rock, AR at The White Water Tavern.

You guys can also follow @TheWickedGood on Twitter as well as @JeffMatika.

The Network's "Disease Is Punishment" is out of print.

Earlier this week, John Roecker confirmed on his Facebook that "Disease is Punishment," The Network's live DVD that he directed, is out of print. Roecker also directed Heart Like a Hand Grenade, a documentary about the making of American Idiot (which was coincidentally never released on DVD).

You can find copies on eBay for under $20. Amazon is no longer selling the DVD directly, butit's available from third-party sellers on the site (prices range from $6-$60). If you're a Netflix subscriber, the DVD is available from them. 

Boulevard of Broken Dreams featured in MTV poll "Best video of the 2000's"

Boulevard of Broken Dreams has been nominated to win the "Best Video of the 2000's" VMA by MTV.

The BOBD video was one of Green Day's most popular music videos, it got plenty of airtime on MTV, VH1, and other music channels around the world. It was one of the reasons American Idiot was such a huge success.

Polls close on Wednesday, August 24th at noon. Help Green Day win go vote here!

Alfred Publishing has released a new Green Day songbook

Alfred Publishing has released a new Green Day lyrics and chord songbook, containing almost 70 songs, spanning the band's entire career.

"Green Day: Lyric & Chord Songbook is an ideal representation of Green Day’s career highlights, featuring nearly 70 songs from chart-topping and award-winning albums including Kerplunk!, Dookie, Insomniac, Nimrod, Warning, American Idiot, 21st Century Breakdown, and more. The lyric/chord songbook format includes complete lyrics and guitar chords, plus all critical guitar riffs in TAB. The lyric chord songbook is a perfect pocket reference guide for rehearsals and performances, or just for sharing with friends."

The book is on sale now and is available on Alfred's site, music stores across the world, and on Amazon.

Scan from Kerrang's "50 Greatest Rockstars in the World Today"

Earlier this month we posted that Billie Joe was included in Kerrang's list of the "50 Greatest Rockstars in the World Today".

Billie Joe came in at number 10 on the list with Hayley Williams, Jason Aalon Butler, and Oli Sykes ahead of Billie on the list.

This line made up for the fact that he was behind some of those musicians:

"...due to the man's ability to make almost every other rockstar look like a cack-handed slouch."

You can read the whole article by clicking on the image to the right.

Green Day talks about their "secret" show

GreenDay.com has just posted a message from the band about the secret show that they played on Thursday. At the end they give us a little gift by giving us the lyrics to a new song entitled "Amy".

"Thanks everyone for coming out to the show Thursday night and supporting us and the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. We have been in jamming and writing new songs for the last few months. It felt great to play these new Green Day songs live and share our "work in progress".. Stay tuned for more!
Love green day

P.S. here are the lyrics for The new song Amy...

Amy
Is your heart singing out of tune
Are your eyes just singing the blues
Dirty records from another time
Some blood stains on your shoes
No one really knows about your soul
And I barely even know your name
Burning rhythms and posting lies
For a bunch of fools drown in shame
Amy don't you go
I want you around
Singin' woah please don't go
Do you wanna be a friend of mine?
Did you tattoo a lucky charm
To keep you out of harms way?
Warding off all evil signs
But it never really kept you safe
You're too young for the golden age
Cause the record bin's been replaced
27 gone without a trace
And you walked away from your drink
Is your heart singing out of tune
Are you eyes just singing the blues?
Dirty records from another time
Some blood stains on your shoes
May I have this last dance
By chance if we should meet?
Can you write me a lullaby?
So we can sing you to sleep"

Green Day plays an entire set of new songs at surprise show in California

Green Day fans who attended last nights show in Costa Mesa, CA were in for a pretty incredible show. The entire set for the show was made up entirely new songs by the band, 15 songs that are brand new, as well as a couple rare ones. Here's the current setlist that is hopefully correct. It's really early in the morning, so it's possible that there will be some changes as people discuss and confirm it.

This is from setlist.fm. The final thing may change as folks add and settle on the order of the songs.

1. Nuclear Family (Played Twice)
2. Stay The Night
3. Too Young To Die
4. Oh Love
5. Carpe Diem
6. Crushing Bastards
7. Little Boy Named Train
8. Trouble Maker
9. Sweet 16
10. Wow, That's Loud
11. 8th Avenue Serenade
12. Ashley
13. Gabriella
14. Wild One
15. It's Fuck Time (Foxboro Hot Tubs song)
16. Stray Heart
17. Last Gang In Town (New song, not a Clash cover)

Encore:
18. Amy
19. Goodbye to Romance (Ozzy Osbourne cover)
20. Welcome To Paradise
21. Burnout
22. Murder City
23. J.A.R. (Jason Andrew Relva)
24. Only Of You
25. Hitchin' a Ride
26. St. Jimmy
27. Minority 

Surprise Green Day show this Thursday in California!

The rumors that have been spreading on Twitter about a secret Green Day show have just been confirmed by GreenDay.com. 

The show will be held this Thursday, August 11th at The Tiki Bar in Costa Mesa, California. Tickets will be $20 at the door and all proceeds will go to the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. 

The show is 21+ and will be enforcing strict no camera and recording policies. Get ready to have the time of your lives to the lucky few who make it into the show! 

Mike Dirnt donates to "Pipeline To A Cure"

Mike Dirnt and his wife Brittany recently went to the fourth annual Pipeline To A Cure Gala, which is a charity that is actively looking for a cure for cystic fibrosis. In the interview below, Mike talks about buying some artwork whose proceeds went to charity as well as his donation of his signature bass which brought in more than $3000 for the organization. Mike and Brittany's children as well as Green Day were also mentioned toward the end of the five minute interview. 

Green Day mentioned in MTV's 30th anniversary lists

This month MTV celebrates their 30th anniversary of being on air and broadcasting music videos. A few websites have compiled lists of the top music videos that have been showed on MTV through the years.

Yahoo.com's list included Green Day's video for "Wake Me Up When September Ends" coming in at number 12. You can view the complete list on Yahoo.com by clicking here.

Gigwise.com also came up with a list and Green Day came in at number 14 with the video for "Basket Case". You can view the whole list on Gigwise.com by clicking here.

Featured Download: "Who Wrote Holden Caulfield?" featuring Davey Havok

While on tour with AFI last year, on occasion, lead singer of AFI, Davey Havok would come out and sing a song with Billie Joe on stage. Our new Featured Download is a video recording of Davey Havok coming out and singing the song "Who Wrote Holden Caulfield?" with Green Day at their August 14th tour stop at the PNC Bank Arts Center. 

You can download the 52mb iPod and iTunes ready MP4 file over on our Featured Download page now.


This download was recorded by RockConcertNo1Fan on YouTube.

Green Day included in "20 Years of Lollapalooza in Photos" list

Billboard.com has compiled a list of 20 bands that have played Lollapalooza for the festivals 20th anniversary. The list also includes commentary from official Lollapalooza photographer Tim Mosenfelder.



Tim Mosenfelder had this to say about photographing Green Day at Lollapalooza:

"Green Day played the Lollapalooza tour in 1994 and returned to the festival in 2010. Green Day has always been one of my favorites to photograph, thanks to frontman Billie Joe's animated antics while on stage. He has a wild approach to performing that has always surprised me, even after 15 years."

You can see all of the other bands that made the list on Billboard.com by clicking here.

The Top Five Green Day Songs that Had an Impact On My Life

Of all of the bands that I’ve listened to in all of my years of listening to music, I’ve never found a band whose music resonates with me so deeply. In many cases, the messages that I relate to are not profound, but I believe that’s what makes them all the more special and personal. Of the many songs in Green Day’s catalog, I’ve decided to share the five songs that have had the greatest impact on my life, from when I was 13 and got American Idiot in my Easter basket to the present day as I sing these familiar tunes with the same enthusiasm I had when I first learned the lyrics. 

5. “American Idiot” – American Idiot

Let’s travel back in time to 2004. On the first day of Jr. High as I straightened my hair, put on my make-up and tied my brand new sneakers, I heard the song that started it all. To be completely factual, I saw the music video, and it stopped me dead in my tracks. I’d never heard of Green Day, but they certainly made one of the coolest videos I’d ever seen. Without this, the opening song of one of the most epic albums of our generation, I would conceivably not be writing this today. “American Idiot’s” message, its sound and the era of uncertainty and confusion it existed in are all a part of me, and without it that part of me may never have existed. Hearing Billie slam out the chords- whether recorded, live, or on Broadway - is one of the most satisfying musical experiences I’ve ever known because it brings me back to that first day, as well as to a crucial time in American history, both of which have shaped who I am as a person. 

4. “21st Century Breakdown” – 21st Century Breakdown

I believe that this epic album-opener truly defines the generation to which I am confined – those members of the “class of ’13, born in the era of humility”; I am “the desperate in the decline,” working toward a degree that may not lead to a job as kids I grew up with go off to a war that has no end in sight to fight for a country that is spiraling downhill due to “the bastards of 1969.” If “Jesus of Suburbia” mirrored my 13-year-old self’s angst and hatred toward the small town I lived in, than “21st Century Breakdown” mirrors the anxieties that I face as a 19-year-old American. Although it doesn’t offer answers, it offers an outlet for our collective frustration, allowing us to “dream, America dream”; to “scream, America, scream”; and to question our belief in the supposed “heroes and cons” that are to determine the fate of our entire generation. Although this is the newest song on my list, I believe that as the years pass, this song will bring me back to how I feel right now. Even if it doesn’t hold that power five years from now, it describes to a tee the confusion and frustration I feel over never being able to make it as a “working class hero”, and maybe not being able to make it at all.

3. “Paper Lanterns” – 1039 Smoothed Out Slappy Hours

And now we come to the joys and pains of first love. Around the same time I got into Dookie, I also got into 39/Smooth. I was also falling irrevocably and pathetically in love with one of my best friends. For obvious reasons, this was the song I lamented to when I realized that things would never work between us. I consider it to be in the top five songs that had an impact on my life because first love is serious business, people. To this day I have memories of that time period whenever I listen to this song, and I think that’s a really special thing, simple as its significance to me may be.

2. “Jesus of Suburbia” – American Idiot

Welcome to teenage angst at its purist. This song has time and again proven itself to be incredibly meaningful to me, as its layered meanings continue to reveal themselves with the things I’ve experienced as I’ve gone through Jr. High and High School and into college and my foray into being an actual adult. At first listen, I related instantly to the Jesus of Suburbia’s insatiable thirst for adventure, and ultimate disappointment when none was to be found in his suburban nightmare of a town. I, as I’m sure was common of many kids my age, envisioned myself as “the [daughter] of rage and love, the Jesus of Suburbia”, fighting to come into my own in a town that I did not want because I felt that it did not want me. I would scream along to the “I Don’t Care” verses, thinking of all the people whom I felt had wronged me in some way. At the end, I vowed with JOS not to “feel any shame, [not to] apologize when there ain’t nowhere you can go.” I took this as another symbol of the unchangeable circumstances of my sexuality, and “Tales of another Broken Home” gave me the strength (albeit very dramatically) to stand strong as an early adolescent. As I grew older, and especially upon seeing the musical as a freshman in college, the verses about leaving home and striking out on my own became the most pertinent messages the song had to offer. It seems that in many ways, “City of the Damned” mirrored many of the feelings I had that eventually lead up to me breaking down the wall that kept me from chasing after what I really wanted within the last few months. “Jesus of Suburbia” was one of the first Green Day songs I truly felt described me, and in the five years that I have listened to, played, and sung this song, it has followed me and continuously adapted to who I am; I question to this day whether it is a testament to the band that produced the song or this fan who has held it in her heart for so long.

1. “Coming Clean” – Dookie

I bought Dookie the summer before I entered eighth grade, which was a crucial time in my life in terms of discovering my sexuality. Everything was starting to come together for me – I began to notice that I had strong feelings for girls and not for boys, and as those feelings developed into my first true crush, I came to the realization that I was an enormous gaywad. Having this record in my life at that time was, I believe, one of the most pertinent reasons that I embraced who I was and came out at such an early age. I understood from the song and from interviews that I found that Billie Joe had questioned his sexuality as a teenager. It seemed to me that if he could be such a successful adult even after exposing “skeletons… in [his] closet” that I could do the same. His story helped me to begin my own story, and without it I don’t believe I would be in the same place that I’m in today. 

Emily's Army featured on Converse.com

Converse.com recently sat down with Emily's Army to discuss their new album and the experience of touring. They discuss how it is to live in a shadow of Green Day and how they feel about being their own band.

Joey Armstrong had this to say about being different from Green Day:

" I feel some pressure, just ‘cause we’ve been getting a lot of good press, and as much as we try to avoid the whole “Green Day Jr.” label or whatever, we’re gonna get it put on us. I just push past it—we’re a different band than Green Day. We’ll do what we want and we’ll play how we play."

Overall, I think it is an excellent interview that I recommend you guys check out. I love how they are so down to Earth about their success, and how they don't seem to want to have anything to do with the "Green Day created spotlight" so to speak. I really enjoyed their new album, and I can't wait to see where this band goes. 

You can read the whole interview over on Converse.com by clicking here.

Billie Joe featured on the cover of this weeks Kerrang

Billie Joe is featured on the cover of their weeks issue of Kerrang magazine. The topic being covered in this weeks issue is "50 Greatest Rockstars in the World Today". 

We will have scans up of the article later on in the week.

You can pick up the magazine now at your local newsstand or on Kerrang.com by clicking here.

Green Day get #1 in Rolling Stone's poll of the Best Punk Bands

A few days ago we posted about Rolling Stone's online poll asking people to vote for the 'Best Punk Band' of all time. The results were posted today and Green Day took the #1 spot. And we even got a little shout out:

"Two weeks ago, we asked our readers to select their favorite prog rock bands. We figured it was only logical to flip it around this week and ask about their favorite punk rock bands. What we didn't count on were fan site Green Day Authority and the band's official site at GreenDay.com both posting the link and asking fans to vote for Green Day – which gave the group a significant boost in the final tally. "

The full list is available to view on RollingStone.com.

Fender.com talks to Mike Dirnt about "making his mark"

This summer, Fender.com sat down with Mike Dirnt to talk to him about a spectrum of things. They get Mike on the record about everything fromCigarettes and Valentines to his diner, Rudy's Can't Fail Cafe. Mike opens up about his feelings regarding American Idiot, and even brags about Green Day's supremacy over all other bands. 

When talking about his own goals and ambitions in life, MIke had this to say:

"I think because I was adopted I have this sense of always needing to prove that who I am and what I do matter,” says Dirnt. “I don’t want to leave any stone unturned, and I guess I feel like I need to stake my claim no matter what it is I’m doing. If I was selling vacuum cleaners, you better believe I’d be the best damn vacuum cleaner seller on the planet."

You can read the whole article over on Fender.com by clicking here, it is really worth taking a few minutes to read.

Rolling Stone Poll: Who is the best punk band of all time?

Rolling Stone just put out a new poll for their Facebook and Twitter followers. They want to know who the best punk band of all time is. Well, it's Green Day, of course. The answer is obvious isn't it? Yes, Ok. Glad we have that cleared up. Now, go vote for them!

"@RollingStone: Weekend Rock poll: Who's the best punk band of all time? Respond w/hashtag #weekendrock or here: bit.ly/oDQhYG"

Here is how to vote:

On Facebook - Like Rolling Stone's Facebook page and write "Green Day" in the comments section under the post asking who the best punk band of all time is.

On Twitter - Tweet "@RollingStone Green Day #weekendrock" (without the quotes)

We can help Green Day win!!

Kerrang Magazine features "30 Amazing Facts" about Billie Joe

In the most recent issue of Kerrang Magazine, Billie Joe is featured in the magazine's "30 Amazing Facts" section celebrating Kerrang's 30th anniversary. 

Only 29 of the 30 facts are correct and if you can pick out what one is the false fact and email swag@kerrang.com with "Billie Joe Facts" as the title and you will be entered to win a Kerrang goody bag. The fact that is wrong should be pretty obvious to anyone who is an avid Green Day fan. 

You can read a scan of the article by clicking the thumbnail to the right. In addition, the magazine also comes with a poster of Tre cool as an added bonus!

The magazine is now available at local news stands or online for order at Kerrang.com byclicking here.