Billie Joe Armstrong (born February 17, 1972, in Oakland, California) is best known for his role as the main songwriter, lead vocalist, and guitarist for the punk rock band Green Day.
Early Life
Armstrong grew up in Rodeo, California, the youngest of six children. The official name on his birth certificate is "Billie Joe". In a 1995 interview he stated that his name is Billie Joe and not William Joseph. His father, Andy, was a retired Minor League Baseball catcher, who worked as a jazz musician and truck driver for Safeway to support the family. He died from esophageal cancer on September 15, 1982 when Billie Joe was ten. His mother Ollie worked as a waitress at Rod's Hickory Pit, where Billie Joe and Mike Dirnt got their first gig during their teen years.
Billie Joe's interest in music started at a young age. He recorded a song titled "Look For Love" at the age of 5 on the Bay Area label "Fiat Records".[1] As a teenager he originally was into metal music, but got into punk after hearing the Sex Pistols song Holidays in the Sun.[2] He attended high school at John Swett High School, later attended Pinole Valley High School, and dropped out on February 16, 1990, to pursue his musical career. While in high school he was nicknamed "Two Dollar Bill", because all his concert tickets were always 2 dollars.
Guitars
Billie Joe received his first guitar, a Fernandes Stratocaster copy that he named "Blue", when he was eleven. He modified the guitar to have a humbucking pickup in the bridge position. He initially installed a Bill Lawrence pickup but later switched to the Duncan JB model. He toured with this guitar from the band's early days and into their first few major-label tours. "Blue" also appears in several of their music videos starting with, Longview, and appearing most recently in Minority. Billie has made several replicas of this guitar and uses them at concerts.
Today Armstrong mainly uses Gibson and Fender Guitars. Twenty of his Gibson guitars are Les Paul Junior models from the mid to late-1950s[6]. His Fender collection includes: Stratocaster, Jazzmaster, Gretsch, Telecaster, and his Fernandes, "Blue". He states that his favorite guitar is a 1956 Gibson Les Paul Junior he calls "Floyd". He bought this guitar in 2000 just before recording their album Warning:.[7]
[edit] Personal life
In Minneapolis, in 1990, Billie first saw his future wife, Adrienne Nesser (Adrienne Armstrong). They dated for a while and were married on July 2, 1994 in a 5-minute ceremony. The day after their wedding, Adrienne found out she was pregnant. Their son, Joseph Marcicano Armstrong, was born in March 1995. Three years later on September 12, 1998, another boy, Jakob Danger, was born.
Armstrong has stated that he is bisexual[8] although he has not been in a relationship with a man. He has however, kissed men in concert.[9]
Armstrong also suffers from panic attacks which have been the source of many Green Day songs such as: "Basket Case", "Panic Song", and "Armatage Shanks".[10]
2007-03-17 15:30:04
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