Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong shares thoughts on Taylor Swift after attending Eras Tour and accepting friendship bracelets from fans
Green Day frontman Billie Joe Armstrong has shared his thoughts on Taylor Swift, after attending one of her ‘Eras’ tour dates.
The pop-punk icon took to Instagram earlier this week to share a photo of himself at one of Taylor Swift’s shows, as part of her record-breaking ‘Eras’ tour dates.
While at the show in France, he accepted friendship bracelets from fans and went on to share his admiration for the live performance.
“Just saw Taylor Swift eras tour in Lyon France!! Great production. Great voice. Great entertainer. Great songwriting,” he wrote in the caption. “Crazy crowd. People even shared with me some friendship bracelets. Thanks a million Taylor Swift. My bracelets say #sexybaby #assholeoutlaw”.
The process of trading homemade friendship bracelets at Swift’s shows has become a tradition for Swifties now, with countless fans arriving at gigs with handmade bead bracelets, which they then trade with people they meet in the crowd throughout the show.
Armstrong attending the show comes just days after Green Day kicked off their massive ‘Saviors’ world tour in Spain last week (May 30). The dates are a part of the major stadium shows that will take the band through the UK, Europe and North America. They continue up until September 28, and any remaining US tickets can be found here, while UK and Europe tickets can be found here.
As for Swift, following the completion of her US and Asia tour dates, she is set to begin the UK and Ireland leg of the tour in Edinburgh tomorrow (June 7). She’ll also visit Liverpool, Cardiff and Dublin as part of the run, and play eight sold-out concerts at London’s Wembley Stadium.
Paramore will open for Swift at every gig. Recently, the singer confirmed more support acts for the first three Wembley dates, and last month, it was reported that the upcoming shows will boost the UK economy by £1billion.
In other Green Day news, the band – comprised of Billie Joe Armstrong, Mike Dirnt and Tre Cool – dropped ‘Saviours’ at the start of the year. It marked their 14th studio album, and first full LP since 2020’s ‘Father Of All Motherfuckers’.
The album was given a glowing four-star review by NME, and described as some of “their best work since ‘American Idiot’”.
“Not only does ‘Saviors’ spiritually bridge the gap between [‘Dookie’ and ‘American Idiot’], but it uses the palette of the best of the band to tell us something else,” it read. “Look to the artwork: ‘Dookie’ was a cheeky carpet-bombing of shit, ‘American Idiot’ was a hand grenade, ‘Saviors’ is an act of defiance met with a shrug; a band saying, ‘We’re still here and we’re still fucked’”.
Since then, NME caught up with the band at the 2024 BRIT Awards and the members spoke about their longtime relationship with Courtney Love and the possibility of more surprise London live shows. It came off the heels of Armstrong performing two intimate shows across London earlier that week, breaking out some covers of iconic rock songs as part of The Coverups and bringing out Hole star Love during both shows.
“Playing at The 100 Club is legendary. We go in, play a bunch of covers. We do it at home, mostly for our friends, and I just love playing. Even if we’re just playing a really great Buzzcocks song, it’s a great time,” Armstrong said, going on to recall how the collaboration with Love arose.
“I was texting with her and I said, ‘Come on out, sing a song’, and she did. It was great. She did [David Bowie’s] ‘Suffragette City’, she did [Cheap Trick‘s] ‘Surrender’ and we got to do ‘Celebrity Skin’ – a Hole song – and the whole room freaked out,” he explained. “We’ve known her since ’94, she’s always great! She’s a wild woman, she has a lot of great stories and I love Courtney… She’s definitely like a rock n’ roll-er in herself. She’s got her sea legs back so we’ll maybe be hearing more from her.”
More recently, the band were amongst the the signees of an open letter calling for a bill to be passed to protect gig goers from ticket scams.
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Liberty Dunworth
NME
