Billie Armstrong Quotes & Sayings

I'm a father. It isn't just my life any more. I don't want my kid finding bottles in the house or seeing his father completely smashed. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I would definitely say the Oakland Raiders are the punk rock band of football. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Do you have a problem? I have a gun. I'll shoot you. No problem. — Billie Joe Armstrong

The thing is, acoustic could be like a four-letter word to a lot of kids. — Billie Joe Armstrong

School is practice for future life, practice makes perfect and nobody's perfect, so why practice? — Billie Joe Armstrong

Moshing and broken glass just don't go together. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Songs are like a form of chaos that you can control. It's a form of intelligence that maybe you only understand and you hope that someone else can understand. And you can be anyone you want: you can be as grandiose as you want or you can be as down in the gutter as you want. It's just sort of whatever emotional freeway you're on at the time. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Set lists are tough because you come up with this structure of how the songs are going to go from one to the next, but at the same time, you have to be spontaneous and take requests and change the set list at the drop of a hat. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Woodstock was about the closest thing to anarchy I've ever seen in my whole life, and I didn't like it. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I'm very monogamous. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Louis Armstrong on Mondays, Frank Sinatra on Wednesdays, Glenn Miller on Fridays, and Mozart on Sundays. Unless it was raining. If it's raining, it's always Billie Holiday. — Clare Vanderpool

Punk will never be dead to me. It's my life. I can never just drop this lifestyle. It embodies me. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Thats what Green Day is-there are no rules. — Billie Joe Armstrong

There are a lot of bands who claim to be punk and they only play the music, they have no clue what it's all about. It's a lifestyle. It's not about popularity and all that crap. — Billie Joe Armstrong

The darkness is coming now god dammit! — Billie Joe Armstrong

I think everybody should get married. Boys and girls. Girls and boys. Boys and boys! Girls and girls! Shouldn't we all be entitled to a family-Civil rights baby it's civil rights. It doesn't get any better here in Berkeley I'll tell you that. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Punk is dead to anyone who didn't get it in the first place — Billie Joe Armstrong

Pretty and demented at the same time, like me. — Billie Joe Armstrong

The first time that you escape from home or the small town that you live in - there's a reason a small town is called a small town: It's because not many people want to live there. — Billie Joe Armstrong

It's okay to grow up, it's just slowing down that's the scary part. Running out of time. It's okay to grow up, but it doesn't mean you have to become like your parents. — Billie Joe Armstrong

And you don't want to always write about politics just for the sake of writing about politics. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I just open my mouth and out it comes. — Billie Joe Armstrong

We pride ourselves on trying to put on the best show we can and we're not afraid to say that we happen to be the best live band in the world — Billie Joe Armstrong

If me and Mike Dirnt are in the same room, it's not quite right if he's not on stage with me. — Billie Joe Armstrong

You can't live on planet rock star 24/7; you have to be down and dirty and have some fun. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I don't want to live in an ivory tower, being the songwriter who just turns inward. — Billie Joe Armstrong

If you have children, you don't want to have drugs and drinks in the house. It's just not good. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I've been playing rock and roll since I was 16 years old, and now I have a 16-year-old. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I'm probably the only one in the world you can name that's worked with Billie Holiday, Louie Armstrong, Ella, Duke, Miles, Dizzy, Ray Charles, Aretha, Michael Jackson, rappers. 'Fly Me to the Moon' was played on the moon by Buzz Aldrin. Sinatra. Paul Simon. Tony Bennett. I'm the only one. — Quincy Jones

I don't like LA. The majority just seem to be so artificial. Look at how they worship everything they think is fashionable. Isn't it sick? — Billie Joe Armstrong

Controversy What controversy This is reality. What I see is that no matter if you're a conservative or a liberal or whatever side you stand on, this is the reality of the situation - that people's families and their young kids are being affected. — Billie Joe Armstrong

The first time I ever saw him play, Tre Cool was wearing a tutu and an old-womans swimming cap. — Billie Joe Armstrong

That was the hard part of having kids: trying to be on their schedule, then fighting to get to sleep while they are sleeping. — Billie Joe Armstrong

When someone is in a car accident and they're driving at 100 mph, drunk, who's tape do you think his listening to at that time? Think about it. — Billie Joe Armstrong

We are not afraid to be entertainers. — Billie Joe Armstrong

It would be great to do a rock opera, but using more low-fi technology. I love shitty-sounding records. — Billie Joe Armstrong

The thing about punk is that there are purists. Once you start going outside of that, they don't think what you're doing is punk rock. — Billie Joe Armstrong

You don't get nothing and like it. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I just want to write good songs that people love, which is a tough thing to do. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I just wanted to get the hell out of my town. I wanted to leave with reckless abandon. I didn't care where I ended up, as long as I saw as much as humanly possible. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I'm not as depressed as I used to be. The Prozac's working! — Billie Joe Armstrong

We're gonna get high, high, high, when we're low. The fires burn from better days. She scream why, oh why? I said I don't know! — Billie Joe Armstrong

In every song I write, whether it's a love song or a political song or a song about family, the one thing that I find is feeling lost and trying to find your way. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Some times I need to apologize, sometimes I need to admit that I ain't right, sometimes I should just keep my mouth shut, or only say hello, sometimes I still feel I'm walking alone. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Music - that's been my education. There's not a day that goes by that I take it for granted. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Punk rock isn't supposed to be for everyone. There is that sort of private club mentality, which is necessary. It keeps things from getting watered down and boring. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I thought everybody was in on the joke. But I was the joke. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I can't sleep very well at night. It takes me a while to get to sleep. I could just be nocturnal. I have my nighttime witching hour where I hang out, listen to records or watch TV. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I'm a dirt bag rock and roller. I want to represent that before anything else — Billie Joe Armstrong

Formats are constantly changing, and there are really no rules for the way you put your records out anymore. — Billie Joe Armstrong

We've been together as a group for a long time so this means a lot ... we've done everything ourselves until this point, so thank you to everybody ... do everything you f
n' believe in, because this is what it's all about, — Billie Joe Armstrong

Rock 'n' roll can be fun and dangerous at the same time. — Billie Joe Armstrong

You can't go voicing something if it's just not right. — Billie Joe Armstrong

There's nothing wrong with being a loser, it just depends on how good you are at it. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Just about 99% of the population masturbates while the other 1% lie about it. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I think the little bush is a bit stupid and more or less the puppet of his old man. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I liked old time music but what i meant by that was the period from the 1930s through the 60s, nothing before and little after.
Performers like fats waller, Sinatra, billie holiday, louis armstrong, rosemary clooney, ella, sammy Davis Jr, dean martin ... If the lyrics weren't stupid. Words were important. — Jeffery Deaver

My brother David was a great athlete and I knew there was no way I could live up to that. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I'm not going to conform to some consumer need. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Intimate singing had a wonderful style in the '30s and '40s. It came out of Broadway and the jazz of Louis Armstrong and Billie Holliday. But Sinatra created the best romantic era that we've ever had. — Tony Bennett

History will tell if we were really a good band or just a one day fly. — Billie Joe Armstrong

They have bad taste. I am not a good-looking guy. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I think the working-class part of me comes out. Sometimes the people who have the loudest mouths are upper-class, upper-middle-class. The quietest are often working-class people, people who are broke. There is a fear of losing whatever it is that you have. I come from that background. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I love Ray Charles. He can still teach everybody a lot about how to make great music. Not necessarily how to make hits, but how to make great music. Of course, part of it is his incredible talent. Who are the greatest jazz singers in the world? Louis Armstrong, Billie Holiday and Ray Charles. — Ahmet Ertegun

To me, it doesn't feel like it's just another rock record that somebody put out. It feels like we taped into the culture a little bit — Billie Joe Armstrong

We've been a band for 16 years. This is what you dream about. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Just because you sing songs about a certain feeling doesn't mean you have to go feeling that way forever. You can sing about that for the rest of your life, but that doesn't mean things aren't going to change in your own life. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Never run in the rain with your socks on. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I'm always a work in progress. — Billie Joe Armstrong

For some young people, their first experience ever hearing punk rock music was playing the Green Bay Packers on 'Madden'. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Slipknot sounds like Tre choking on a hairball. — Billie Joe Armstrong

The thing is, my education was music. I knew I'd be playing music no matter what. That's all I thought about, I was obsessed with it. I'm still obsessed with it. It gets the best of me sometimes. — Billie Joe Armstrong

There's an honesty in our family - my kids and I are able to talk about things without me putting the fear of God into them. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I think I copied my style from Louis Armstrong. Because I used to like the big volume and the big sound that Bessie Smith got when she sang ... So I liked the feeling that Louis got and I wanted the big volume that Bessie Smith got. But I found that it didn't work with me, because I didn't have a big voice. So anyway between the two of them I sorta got Billie Holiday. — Billie Holiday

Dont test me, Second guess me, Protest me, You will DISAPEAR! (East Jesus of Nowhere) — Billie Joe Armstrong

When all else fails ... be a rockstar — Billie Joe Armstrong

I wrote a song called 'Green Day' because I was smoking a lot of dope. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Just because you're in the missionary position don't make you no missionary. — Billie Joe Armstrong

You want a drumstick? Like a ice cream cone or a chicken wing!? — Billie Joe Armstrong

What is going on in America is extreme. The youth cult, they worship youth so much it's almost paranoid. And LA is the Mecca of it all; they're taking it to the hilt. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Nobody leaves this band unless it's in a coffin — Billie Joe Armstrong

I think we have the worst name in rock, I really do. It's the worst name in the world — Billie Joe Armstrong

When I signed that major-label contract when I was 20 years old. I did it because I wanted to play music for the rest of my life. That's every 20-year-old's dream - to do whatever the hell you want. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I was on drugs when I wrote some of my songs. It was a rough time for me, but I'm lucky enough to be one of the people who learned from that experience and moved on, where other people just got addicted and more addicted and more addicted until it killed them. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I approach playing acoustic guitar more of as a percussive instrument. It's fragile. I don't have a lot of finesse when it comes to my guitar playing. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I like to keep my girlish figure — Billie Joe Armstrong

I'm a songwriter-I'm obligated to keep pushing myself. — Billie Joe Armstrong

One thing I want to teach my son is sensitivity to other people. I want to teach him not to be this macho freak. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Just seeing the things on TV and the things in front of you, the amount of information coming in, and the lack of information not coming in, how could you not help but write songs about it. — Billie Joe Armstrong

People are so damned afraid that one day they might wake up and discover that they've grown old. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I heard Davey Havok has a brand of eyeliner out now ... its AFI-liner — Billie Joe Armstrong

A lot of people, when they talk to me, I can't wait for them to shut up. Like, shut up. you're a moron. I have nothing to say, you know? — Billie Joe Armstrong

I'm not f-ing Justin Bieber, you motherf-ers! — Billie Joe Armstrong

I just plug in and let go. — Billie Joe Armstrong

I hate television. I hate the internet. I hate cell phones. I hate cameras. I hate everything that destroys creativity. — Billie Joe Armstrong

You don't mow another man's lawn! — Billie Joe Armstrong

That's where all good music comes from, I think - anything that's likely to have an impact on pop culture comes from a point where there's no expectation of it becoming anything other than personal. — Billie Joe Armstrong

Minority is about being an individual. It's like you have to sift through the darkness to find your place and be that individual you want to be your entire life. — Billie Joe Armstrong

You don't get Billie Joe Armstrong's autograph on your forehead without following your instincts. — Gordon Korman

I never thought being obnoxious would get me where I am today — Green Day