Billie Joe on Green Day trilogy

QUOTE OF THE DAY: “Even my son asked me, ‘Dad, would you ever go back to playing songs like from [1994's] Dookie and [1992's] Kerplunk?’ I love those records. I love the punk stuff I grew up on. But there are so many bands who make the mistake—‘We're going back, old-school.’ Well, that's all you're doing. You already did it. So we're changing the guitar sound. We're not going with the big Marshall-amp thing. We wanted something punchier, more power pop—somewhere between AC/DC and the early Beatles. The last two records were studio albums. This one—we started rehearsing every day, constructing these songs together. It felt like we were all in a room jamming—everyone in the mix, throwing out ideas. If you listen to it, it feels grand. But it also feels like a garage band. The songs just kept coming, kept coming. I'd go, ‘Maybe a double album? No, that's too much nowadays.’ Then more songs kept coming. And one day, I sprung it on the others: ‘Instead of Van Halen I, II and III, what if it's Green Day I, II and III and we all have our faces on each cover?’… The last record got so serious. We wanted to make things more fun.” —Billie Joe Armstrong on Green Day’s upcoming trilogy, from a Q&A with Rolling Stone’s David Fricke. (6/20a)