Billie Joe Armstrong quotes:

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

Punk has always been about doing things your own way. What it represents for me is ultimate freedom and a sense of individuality.

If journalists ask you again and again about the same bands, you'll end up saying you hate them just because you're so fed up with being asked all those stupid questions.

I would definitely say the Oakland Raiders are the punk rock band of football.

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.

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.

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

School is practice for the future, and practice makes perfect. But nobody's perfect, so why practice?

What annoys the hell out of me is the arrogance of some people. They don't even listen to our music, they decided in advance that they don't like it.

I'd love to go to art school. I'd love to learn how to draw. I'd love to be fluent in Spanish. I'd like to be a brain surgeon.

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

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.

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

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

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

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.

The things that people do now in sports, you can't even believe. These are complete total athletes. To see what human beings can do in the highest level is amazing.

Moshing and broken glass just don't go together.

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.

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.

With the video for Boulevard of Broken Dreams we were going for something a bit like Ladykillers, you know? Pretty and demented at the same time...like me!

I think it's your own choice if you turn from an angry young man to a bitter, old bastard.

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

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.

We're not a political band. We don't want to tell people what to do or what to think. We just want to tell them to think.

There are always young bands playing in their garages. A lot of punk rock is not going to be in the mainstream. It's below the radar. The beauty of it is that you're not supposed to always know. It's subterranean.

I think people are born bisexual, and it's just that our parents and society kind of veer us off into this feeling of 'Oh, I can't'. They say it's taboo. It's ingrained in our heads that it's bad, when it's not bad at all. It's a very beautiful thing.

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.

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

I hate celebrities. I really hate them.

You can't change the wind but you can set your sails.

And for our fans, they're just crazy people anyway. I always look at people in a Green Day shirt, and I think, 'What's wrong with that person? What kind of hang-ups does that person have?' Obviously, it's not just the catchy songs, it goes deeper than that.

You want a drumstick? Like a ice cream cone or a chicken wing!?

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.

A punk concert isn't fun without a pit.

I'm not going to conform to some consumer need.

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.

If I look at my old lyrics, they seem to be full of rage, but empty. There was an emptiness in my life.

I love my friends and family, but playing, that's my DNA.

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?

Slipknot sounds like Tre choking on a hairball.

Punk is not just the sound, the music. Punk is a lifestyle.

Making mistakes is a lot better than not doing anything.

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.

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.

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

I never thought being obnoxious would get me where I am today.

I'm not as depressed as I used to be. The Prozac's working!

Music to me is the air I breathe it's the blood that pumps through my veins that keeps me alive

A guy walks up to me and asks, "What's Punk?". So I kick over a garbage can and say. "That's punk!". So he kicks over the garbage can and says, "That's Punk?", and I say, "No that's trendy!

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.

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

No one's really happy anyway, it's not human.

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.

When all else fails...be a rockstar

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.

I write everything on a xylophone!

Remember, do the things that you fucking believe in, alright? This is what it's all about right now. [MTV Awards 2005]

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.

I don't feel any shame I won't apologize if there ain't nowhere you can go running away from pain when you've been victimized tales from another broken home.

You have to search the absolute demons of your soul to make a great record.

I never thought being obnoxious would get me where I am today

It's ok to be a loser, it just depends on how good you are at being one.

Never run in the rain with your socks on.

A man once asked me, what's punk? I kicked over a trash can and said that's punk. He kicked over a trash can and then asked me again, Is that punk? I replied no. That's just trendy.

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.

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.

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

I sort of enjoy the fact that I'm misunderstood most of the time. That's fine.

I'm very monogamous.

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

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

I sound like an Englishman impersonating an American impersonating an Englishman.

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

To do something that you feel in your heart that's great, you need to make a lot of mistakes. Anything that's successful is a series of mistakes.

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.

It's better to regret something you have done than to regret something you haven't done.

â??The day you become old is the day you're not looking for new experiences anymore.

There are many things in life that you feel you need such as television, magazines, teachers telling that you have to make money and be successful, but if you have some kind of hope, something to hold onto, then all this will no longer be important. If you can make your next day better than the previous one, then you will see what it really means something to you and not everything that people think you need for your life.

It's fun until someone gets hurt...then it's hilarious.

Just because you're in the missionary position don't make you no missionary.

Coffee is the absolute most dependably ordinary thing I could have every single day.

I got body lice in Germany! I'd tell you they were crabs, but I wasn't getting laid.

Just about 99% of the population masturbates while the other 1% lie about it.

They have bad taste. I am not a good-looking guy.

Punk is always something that's going to be with us and to try and explain that would be stupid at this point.

I thought everybody was in on the joke. But I was the joke.

Do you have a problem? I have a gun. I'll shoot you. No problem.

Our passion is our strength.

You can't go voicing something if it's just not right.

We never fit in completely to [the punk] scene because we were writing love songs that were heartfelt and endearing. Some of the punks didn't know what to make of us, but I finally realized that was what made us punk. We sang what we meant, from the heart, and didn't worry about what anyone was going to think.

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?

Rock 'n' roll can be fun and dangerous at the same time.

Pretty and demented at the same time, like me.

I wrote a song called 'Green Day' because I was smoking a lot of dope.

Nobody leaves this band unless it's in a coffin

The bigger the risks, the better off you are. Otherwise you're just boring.

I like to keep my girlish figure

We put the fun back into dysfunctional

Punk is dead to anyone who didn't get it in the first place

If Britney Spears would paint her ass green, I'm sure you would spot green asses all over L.A., as soon as the word was out.

Every night I play as if my life depends on it.

Always move forward, going straight will get you nowhere.

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.

Life isn't pretty but it sure is beautiful.

If someone falls down, pick them back up. Just because there's not a frickin camera in your face doesn't mean you don't have to look out for each other.

My goal is to be one of the biggest bands in the world, and I have never been bashful about saying that.

You don't get nothing and like it.

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.

The darkness is coming now god dammit!

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

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.

Anything that is successful is a series of mistakes.

People think we really look good. I think that's the biggest misconception people have.

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!

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

I'm an idiot anyway, but sometimes you feel like an idiot times ten when you're stoned.

I just open my mouth and out it comes.

When I was done with the movie [Ordinary World], I felt really compelled to start working on another album. Little did I know, they were going to come out back to back.