Useless Trivia about Green Day [INROCK October 2012]
★ The first album Billie Joe bought himself when he was four years old was Elvis Presley's The Sun Sessions. From then on, he sang as Elvis in front of the mirror.
★ At the age of five, he recorded his debut single, ‘Look For Love’. (You can hear Billie Joe singing as a five-year-old on YouTube.)
★ Billie Joe's record collecting began at the age of four, and now, at the age of 40, he has no idea how many records he already owns, most of which are in the basement with his wife Adrianne's also huge record collection. He says, "I'm not a librarian, so the order of the records is all over the place", so even if he suddenly wants to listen to an album, it's difficult to find it.
★ Billie Joe is the youngest of six siblings. His eldest brother was born in 1950 and is much older than him. Under the influence of his older brothers and sisters, he became familiar with the music of The Beatles, The Kinks, The Who, Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones, R.E.M. and Black Flag from a very young age. His first concert was a Van Halen (pictured right) show at the age of 12, which "blew his mind". His first punk gig was at Operation Ivy when he was 15. He was not allowed in the venues due to age restrictions, but was allowed in as a member.
★ When Billie Joe arrived at the airport in Minnesota to visit his wife Adrianne's parents, he was surprised to see someone standing in line right behind him. It was his idol Joe Strummer (The Clash, pictured above)! "He was talking to my son Joey. ‘My name's Joey too,’ he said. That was awesome."
★ When Billie Joe tries out guitars in music stores, he plays his own songs. "It's easy to know what that guitar feels like. Of course, I don't want anyone to see me playing my songs, so I do it when no one is around."
★ Billie Joe, although a millionaire, still professes to be blue collar. "We come from a community of people who work hard to make a living… We are still a working class band." So, naturally, he sends his sons to a very ordinary public school, not a private school.
★ "You're lucky if you work hard" is his working philosophy and motto.
★ He has an 18-year-old cat, Cleveland. His brother Zero died in a dryer ‘accident’. He also has a dog, Rocky.
★ Just before Billie Joe gets his creative juices flowing, he gets into a terrible mood and says things he shouldn't say, hurting everyone around him. And then he has to apologise flat out afterwards.
★ What do you think is the album on repeat in Hell? He answered, "Probably the Black Eyed Peas album, right?"
★ Mike loves coffee. As long as it's coffee, it doesn't matter if it's hotel coffee or Starbucks coffee. And if there's a donut in it, he's more than happy.
★ All of Mike's religious beliefs are "based on Star Wars".
★ Mike's natural hair is brown.
★ He once tried milking a female dog there because he didn't have any milk to put in his coffee.
★ Tré only has one ball. When he was in high school, he was riding a unicycle on stage and fell under the stage. He then fell straight onto the unicycle and crushed one of his testicles.
★ Tré is the godfather of Billie Joe's sons.
About the trilogy “Uno!”, “Dos!”, and “Tre!”
★ The Occupy movement has been sweeping across the USA since last year. The Occupy Wall Street protests in New York City were the most well-publicised, but the demonstrations in Green Day's hometown of Oakland, California, saw some participants turn into rioters, leading to violent exchanges with police. The three Green Day members, who of course position themselves on the side of the 99 percent, are also hesitant to actively participate in the Occupy movement. "The best thing about the Occupy movement is that there is no leader, and that's also its biggest drawback" (Billie Joe). The new album ('Tre!') includes the song ‘99 Revolutions’, which touches on the difference between the 1 percent and the 99 percent, but they don't want to go so far as to join a demonstration and support it with a song.
★ The new album, a trilogy, is said to be mainly about love and sexual tension with girls. "I think we ended up bookending that era with (the politically charged) ‘American Idiot’ and ‘21st Century Breakdown’. So now we're entering a new era for us, and it's more about love and sexual tension than political stuff." (Billie Joe). At the end of ‘21st Century Breakdown’, the band was under a lot of stress and pressure, and that's when they needed to change gears and break new ground.
★ A clear explanation of the trilogy. Uno!’ is ‘an album that gets you in the mood to party’, ‘Dos!' is ‘Let's party!’, and ‘Tre!’ is ‘cleaning up’ (Billie Joe).
★ They wrote about 70 songs for this album. Demo recording was done in Berlin, Glasgow, Amsterdam, and London. Only 40 of the 70 songs were actually recorded. 37 songs will be included on the album.
★ The final chapter of the trilogy, ‘Tre!’ features an orchestra for some of the songs. The orchestral musicians read and play the music, but Billie Joe, the author of the music, cannot read the music. "It's a strange feeling when I look at the sheet music I've written and I can't understand it at all. It's like looking at Braille."
★ About ‘Tre!’, Tré was overjoyed, saying, "I finally got an album with my name on it. How cool is that? What's more, it's "Tre Cool" (super cool)."
Translator's Note: Finally back into the groove of translating stuff. Gotta say, listening to a 5-year old Billie Joe singing is actually super cute.
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