Biographic - Sunday May 16, 2010 Comic Strip Licensing and Permissions

Transcript

Billie Joe Armstrong was born in Oakland, California on February 17, 1972 the youngest of six kids, he was only 5 years old when he recorded the single "Look For Love" for a local label. He got his first guitar when he was 11, a blue Fender replica that he still plays to this day. In his early teens, he formed a punk trio called Sweet Children, with his best friend Mike Dirnt on bass. By 1990, Tre Cool occupied the drum stool and the group had taken the name Green Day. Constant touring, with the boys crammed into a converted bookmobile and Tre's dad on driving duties, helped Green Day graduate from cult status and the small indie label released to a major record deal. The "Dookie" album was released in 1994, and catapulted the band into the mainstream, selling 10 million copies in the U.S. alone and earning them a grammy award. The subsequent albums "Insomniac," "Nimrod" and "Warning" consolidated that success and spawned the chart-topping singles "Good Riddance (Time Of Your Life) and "Minority." But just as it seemed that Green Day's star might be on the wane, the trio roared back with the 2004's critically acclaimed "American Idiot" a worldwide smash that contained a string of chart-topping hits. The "American Idiot" album earned Green Day a grammy, as did the single "Boulevard Of Broken Dreams" lengthy tours and sundry side projects... including a cameo role in "The Simpsons" movie and an "American Idiot" stage musical... meant that the band didn't release a studio album until "21st Century Breakdown." In 2009, the grammy-winning album hit the top spot in more than a dozen countries. Summer 2010 sees the release of the "Green Day: Rock Band" video game.

Tags