“It sounds a bit stiff”: when Green Day tried to match The Rolling Stones
It is difficult to imagine the landscape of rock and roll without the influence of The Rolling Stones. From their formation back in 1962, the blues-rock disciples went on to define the sounds and attitude of modern rock music. The impact of seminal records like Exile on Main Street or Sticky Fingers will never fully dissipate within rock circles, and with good reason. Even during the 1990s, when The Stones were resigned to huge stadium shows and deluxe reissues, their influence over modern groups like Green Day persisted.
On the face of it, The Rolling Stones might seem a pretty unlikely influence on the California pop-punk progenitors. After all, Billie Joe Armstrong tended to draw more from the world of punk and alternative rock than the classic rock stylings of Jagger and Richards. It must be noted, however, that the attitude and sound of The Stones were instrumental in influencing the first wave of punk back in the 1970s. Mick Jagger’s rebellious persona and the band’s often anarchic performances largely predicted the operation of punk groups like the Sex Pistols or The Damned.
Furthermore, the adoption of hard rock on records like Exile on Main Street helped to lay the foundations for the abrasive sounds of the punk revolution, even if The Stones themselves weren’t huge supporters of punk. Truthfully, the vast majority of rock bands founded after 1963 have a lot to thank The Rolling Stones for, and Green Day certainly falls into that category. So much so that Armstrong’s band even attempted to replicate the power of The Stones’ early work, with fairly lacklustre results.
After rising to prominence during the 1990s with seminal hits like ‘Basket Case’ and ‘American Idiot’, the sounds of Green Day seemed to lean further and further into mainstream rock as they progressed. By the time the 2010s rolled around, the group were certainly at risk of losing relevancy. The answer to this decline in popularity, in the mind of Armstrong, could be solved with a trilogy of albums – ¡Uno!, ¡Dos! and ¡Tre! – taking on a power-pop atmosphere.
This strange trio of albums, released between September and December of 2012, are certainly not Green Day’s finest efforts. Dull production and flawed songwriting plagued the project, but according to Armstrong, it was The Rolling Stones who first inspired the idea in his mind. “I always wanted ¡Uno!, ¡Dos! and ¡Tre! to be our power-pop Exile on Main Street,” he once told Rolling Stone, comparing the trilogy to one of The Stones’ finest efforts.
Armstrong himself makes no excuses for the subsequent disappointment of the albums, which failed to live up to the standard set by Exile. The songwriter explained, “I understand it sounds a bit stiff, and the production isn’t great. I love those songs, but a lot of it feels half-baked. It was a weird time.” He added, “I sort of had my own private nervous breakdown. Well, it wasn’t really private. I think it was just a lot of exhaustion.”
While Green Day certainly failed in their aim to match The Rolling Stones – a difficult feat for any band to achieve, in fairness – there are still some positives to be found in the album trilogy. “There’s, like, 36 songs on that album. It’s insane,” Armstrong shared. “But when I revisit it, ‘Fell for You’ is what stands out. I was listening to a lot of power-pop music.”
The power pop influence of the albums certainly runs against the hard rock of Exile on Main Street, but Armstrong remains faithful to his love of the genre. “I always say that power pop is the greatest music on Earth that no one likes,” he said. “Whether it’s something like Cheap Trick or [another band]. That was like, ‘Let’s just write a gooey bubblegum song about dreams and love and crushes and all the stuff that kind of keeps us alive.’”
