In another reality, the follow-up to Green Day's pivotal album American Idiot would have been produced by lauded songwriter and 4 Non Blondes vocalist Linda Perry. But in this reality, Perry thinks Armstrong is "a little pussy."
In a recent NME interview, for a segment called Does Rock ‘N’ Roll Kill Braincells?! where the publication quizzes the musician on their own history, Perry was asked about the celebrity that she allegedly referred to as "a power bottom." The answer was Hole frontwoman Courtney Love. "Courtney acts like this tough person – and she is. She’s very intimidating, but really she is a bottom. She wants to be kind and wants a hug and she’s very gentle, but she has an armour she puts up," Perry said.
Interviewer Gary Ryan then inquired about when Love spilled the beans on Perry working with Green Day in 2007. In early June 2007, Love was out of rehab and talked to 6 Music about her next solo album which was then called How Dirty Girls Get Clean. (It later turned into Hole's 2010 final LP Nobody's Daughter.) "This is my best record," she said. "Corgan's on it from the Pumpkins, and Linda Perry, who out of my record got the Green Day record. That's a scoop. I just gave that away with my big mouth."
Within 24 hours, Green Day’s camp disputed the report, saying the band’s follow-up to 2004’s blockbuster American Idiot would be helmed by their regular producer, Rob Cavallo. But the follow-up, 2009’s 21st Century Breakdown, was not produced by Cavallo. Instead, it marked the first time the band worked with Butch Vig, who produced Nirvana’s Nevermind. 21st Century Breakdown, which spawned the major singles “Know Your Enemy” and “21 Guns,” was well received, though not as highly acclaimed as its predecessor. It debuted at number one on the Billboard 200, selling 215,000 copies in its first week, and won a Grammy for Best Rock Album. Green Day did work with Rob Cavallo again for their 2012 album trilogy — ¡Uno!, ¡Dos!, and ¡Tré! — and again for 2024’s Saviors.
In this interview, Perry maintained that there was pushback from Green Day's fans, and that the trio basically ghosted her about the project. “Then Courtney blabbed her mouth that I was producing. Suddenly they started getting backlash from their fans, upset they were ‘bringing in Linda Perry who produced Pink and Christina Aguilera,'" she said. "And then those guys just stopped calling me. I would reach out to figure out what was going on. Nobody called. I lost six months of scheduled work. That was fucked-up – all because Billie Joe’s a little pussy and got all this backlash from his fans and didn’t like it.”
She continued:
Whatever! I’m good with it, but it was harsh and rude to do that. Just call me and say, ‘Hey, we’re going to go a different way. I’m not digging this backlash we’re getting.’ Just balls-up, man. Not returning my calls was such a pussy move, and I lost a lot of respect for Billie Joe.
It happened because I was a woman and I’d written pop songs. I was disappointed in those guys, and then I was mad at Courtney because if she would have just shut up, we would have made the record and it would have come out and it would have spoken for itself. I had a vision and knew I was going to kill that record.
It's disappointing that we'll never know what could have been between Perry and Green Day. But both have succeeded without each other. Last week, Perry received the Special International Award at the Ivor Novello Songwriter Awards. Also, 4 Non Blondes' first new album in 33 years is on the way and they even have some tour dates lined up for June.
Meanwhile Green Day are busy with some side projects. A few weeks ago Nimrods, the coming-of-age film inspired by Green Day and co-produced by the band, got a release date: August 14. At this weekend's BottleRock, Tre Cool co-hosted the Williams Sonoma Culinary Stage and played in his wife Sara Rose Wright’s band the Chin Chins. On Thursday, Armstrong's other band Pinhead Gunpowder announced a US tour. Pussy or not, they're both doing just fine.
