Green Day is an American punk rock band formed in 1986 by lead vocalist and guitarist Billie Joe Armstrong and bassist and backing vocalist Mike Dirnt. For much of their career the band has been a trio with drummer Tré Cool. In 1994, its major label debut Dookie released through Reprise Records became a breakout success and eventually sold over 10 million copies in the U.S. The band’s rock opera, American Idiot (2004), reignited the band’s popularity with a younger generation, selling five million copies in the United States. In 2010, a stage adaptation of American Idiot debuted on Broadway. They are one of the world’s best-selling bands of all time, having sold more than 75 million records worldwide. In 2014, it was announced that the band would be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame of 2015 class, in their first year of eligibility. (More from Wikipedia)
Opposition to the unfair imprisonment of two women in Pussy Riot became a cause célèbre of many Western celebrities plus musicians from every genre imaginable: Bryan Adams, Beastie Boys, the Black Keys, John Cale, Peter Gabriel, Green Day, Nina Hagen, Kathleen Hanna, Paul McCartney, Moby, Yoko Ono, Pet Shop Boys, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Patti Smith, Sting, Pete Townshend, etc. Pussy Riot was featured on 60 Minutes as well.
For their part, the bandmembers in Pussy Riot that were not in prison distanced themselves from all of this attention and were quoted as saying: “We’re flattered, of course, that Madonna and Björk have offered to perform with us. But the only performances we’ll participate in are illegal ones. We refuse to perform as part of the capitalist system, at concerts where they sell tickets.”
(December 2013)
The truly heartbreaking part of his Alzheimer’s diagnosis is that Glen Campbell had just launched a comeback a few years before, with his 2008 album Meet Glen Campbell that features Campbell covering songs by U2, Foo Fighters, Tom Petty, and Green Day – “Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)” being the latter song – plus one of the last songs written by John Lennon, “Grow Old with Me”, and an early Jackson Browne song, “These Days” that was first recorded by Nico in 1967.
(February 2015)
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