Longshot album Love is for Losers

[desertrose]

Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong gets back to punk roots with Longshot album

The Longshot Rock

Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong has got the itch. Earlier this year, he hit Bay Area dive bars with a makeshift band called the Coverups — aptly performing cover songs. Now, he has moved on to another side project, the Longshot, which unexpectedly dropped its debut album on April 20, “Love Is for Losers,” online and quickly followed it up with three EPs (“Bullets,” “Razor Baby” and the covers collection “Return to Sender”). After platinum sales, triple albums, a Broadway musical, induction to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and a stint or two in rehab, you can’t blame a middle-aged punk rocker for wanting to get back to his roots. But Armstrong can’t turn off his knack for writing hits, so as hard as he tries to work up that vintage rasp on songs like “Taxi Driver” and “Kill Your Friends” they still sound like blockbusters in the making.

https://www.sfchronicle.com/music/article/Green-Day-s-Billie-Joe-Armstrong-gets-back-to-12883234.php

[Hermione]

Wow I just love this album more and more. Cult Hero, Happiness and Soul Surrender, so wonderful  

[That Dude]

15 hours ago, Hermione said:

Wow I just love this album more and more. Cult Hero, Happiness and Soul Surrender, so wonderful  

Hey, we have the same favorites! Take THAT all your Turn Me Loose / Goodbye to Romance fans!  Haha.  

This album really made me realize how much early song releases take away from my enjoyment of a record as a whole.   I love every Longshot song, but I skip over all the ones that came out first now because  I played them non stop from the second they hit the internet until the album dropped.    I'm sick of them, and it's made my rating / ranking of this album so much harder, because I almost don't believe my own ranking.   

I'm going to start using a rule I heard Jon @ ARTV on youtube  talk about.  He tries and only listens to the first one or two pre-album singles.  That way he can appreciate the album once it's out.  

I've been rocking out to the new Shinedown record (took about 6 days for me to really start enjoying every song) and they did it right.  They released ONE single beforehand.  Sure they released a second music video, but those were the only songs before the release.   Two songs out of fourteen.   If you like Shinedown, you'll probably like their latest outing.....it does have some electronic elements, but overall it's got their hard rock sound, and their sweeter pop sound as well.   BACK TO The Longshot!!!!

In 2018, bands are releasing lyric videos by the truckload, and multiple pre-album singles and it does kind of ruin things.  I know I'm one of the people ripping the internet apart trying to find every little tiny piece of Green Day music I possibly can, but I need to stop.  I don't know if I can, but I'm going to try.  

When the rumblings for Album 13 start, it's going to be brutal.  

[LaughingClock]

Longshot is not gonna help the next album come any faster which is fine by me but is most likely actually pushing it back. Just sayin’.

[Melodyisdestiny]

3 minutes ago, LaughingClock said:

Longshot is not gonna help the next album come any faster which is fine by me but is most likely actually pushing it back. Just sayin’.

I'm loving the Longshot ride, the Hi Hat show made me want to see more! But isn't Prima Donna going to tour soon? 

[pacejunkie punk]

11 minutes ago, LaughingClock said:

Longshot is not gonna help the next album come any faster which is fine by me but is most likely actually pushing it back. Just sayin’.

And yet with new music by Billie Joe Armstrong, an album, a video, a single, 3 EPs and a tour, I can’t say I’m missing them. An album by early 2019 would still be great. With so many big anniversaries next year, they may be pushing things back on purpose with lots planned. It’s all good. 

[desertrose]

 

[LaughingClock]

4 hours ago, pacejunkie punk said:

And yet with new music by Billie Joe Armstrong, an album, a video, a single, 3 EPs and a tour, I can’t say I’m missing them. An album by early 2019 would still be great. With so many big anniversaries next year, they may be pushing things back on purpose with lots planned. It’s all good. 

I’m missing them but I do love The Longshot and especially Kevin right now.

 

[Hermione]

8 hours ago, LaughingClock said:

Longshot is not gonna help the next album come any faster which is fine by me but is most likely actually pushing it back. Just sayin’.

Could be but it depends where they are with it. Could be the alternative was just a long holiday for all of them before getting started, could be that doing this helps get the creative juices flowing for it (a la The Network/AI and FBHT/21st CB). Who knows! I think Billie experimenting and creating can only be a good thing for it either way though, whether it holds it up a bit time-wise or not.

[MillenniumFan]

Honestly, If I were their manager, I‘d schedule the album release for 2020 or later to give them enough time for writing and recording. I‘d use 2019 as a good year for plenty of anniversary re-releases (for example box sets) and also unreleased material (b-sides, demos, artwork, live shows etc.): just some fan goodies. Then towards the end of the year, they could do the kind of thing Sum 41 have been doing: a short, limited (to the US) anniversary tour. The only problem here is, they‘ll have 3 coinciding album anniversaries, so they’d have to figure that out.

Then after another pause, use all the build up, momentum and hype created throughout 2019 and finally release the new GD album a few months later in 2020 and go on another world tour. 

[Chin for a Day]

Could it be that The Longshot and the release of the next GD album are totally unrelated?

[MillenniumFan]

Sure, but it's fair to say that if Billie's going on tour promoting this side-project, he's not going to be releasing a GD album immediately afterwards and going on another world tour with GD. Not that I think that another album release and world tour was ever going to happen in 2018 anyway. So, technically yes, but in practice this might set back the release of the next GD album a bit. That would of course be for a very good reason and I have absolutely no problem with that what so ever. In fact, I want Billie to get some rest, he definetely needs and deserves it. To say the most obvious thing ever: we as fans aren't entitled to anything. 

[Christian's Inferno!]

A lot of The Longshot material were songs from other projects (i.e Ordinary World, These Paper Bullets) and covers anyway so I doubt the writing for the next album will be delayed that much from this side project. But yeah, I doubt Billie will want to go into the studio too soon after this project, I think it'll be at least another year before the recording for album 13 begins

[gaslight13]

15 hours ago, Too Dumb to Die(s) said:

....

In 2018, bands are releasing lyric videos by the truckload, and multiple pre-album singles and it does kind of ruin things.  I know I'm one of the people ripping the internet apart trying to find every little tiny piece of Green Day music I possibly can, but I need to stop.  I don't know if I can, but I'm going to try.  

When the rumblings for Album 13 start, it's going to be brutal.  

You’re totally right. It’s an issue that’s been getting worse and worse. One of my favorite artists released two songs in advance, and that was pretty normal, but then two more a few weeks out. I listened to the first two a lot but the 3rd one only once and the 4th not at all. It does ruin it because you’ve heard almost half the album by the time it’s out. As stressful as this longshot release was, it was still so much quicker than most are these days. But labels love plenty of time and content to build the hype. They don’t care if it lessens the experience ultimately for fans, they only care about sales/streams. I’m glad Billie released this album the way he did but he probably only could because it wasn’t GD.

 

As for this affecting the next GD release. I doubt that Billie’s going to put that off if he has an idea and the songs are coming. I’m guessing he didn’t wanna rush it regardless and this project was a pressure free way to keep his creativity flowing. 

[LaughingClock]

3 hours ago, Grubby Poop said:

Could it be that The Longshot and the release of the next GD album are totally unrelated?

No.  I don’t just post something willy nilly. I do it with cause and usually some knowledge.

[Christian's Inferno!]

I really hope the next album doesn't sound like The Longshot. I think the whole point of the side projects is that it's supposed to be completely different to what came before/after it. The Network was completely different to everything they've done, Foxboro was completely new at the time and while The Longshot is a familiar GD sound (i.e the trilogy), I really hope the next album sounds unlike it.

The side projects I think are really good for getting the best music out of Green Day. My two favourite GD albums were preceded by side projects so that might be the secret to a fantastic GD record

[LaughingClock]

1 minute ago, Christian's Inferno! said:

I really hope the next album doesn't sound like The Longshot. I think the whole point of the side projects is that it's supposed to be completely different to what came before/after it. The Network was completely different to everything they've done, Foxboro was completely new atm and while The Longshot is a familiar GD sound (i.e the trilogy), I really hope the next album sounds unlike it.

The side projects I think are really good for getting the best music out of Green Day. My two favourite GD albums were preceded by side projects so that might be the secret to a fantastic GD record

It’s not a bad point. However, The Trilogy came after and even pulled songs from the Tubbies touring but not when they were formed. Fuck Time if memory serves was a Tubbie song first for example.

No, simply the act of forming and creating an album and then touring it for a period of time slows down other things in the machine.  Just does.

[MillenniumFan]

14 minutes ago, Christian's Inferno! said:

I really hope the next album doesn't sound like The Longshot. I think the whole point of the side projects is that it's supposed to be completely different to what came before/after it. The Network was completely different to everything they've done, Foxboro was completely new atm and while The Longshot is a familiar GD sound (i.e the trilogy), I really hope the next album sounds unlike it.

Agreed. Even though some of the Foxboro sound eventually made it onto the trilogy (which should have been a side-project right from the start), I'd really like to see them take a risk with the next album and mix it up. The advantage of rapidly dropping album sales figures is that in theory they have more freedom to record what they like. Most bands make the bulk of their money through touring these days. So if it flops, they just play largely the standard GD show, as always. That is if they have any money problems to begin with lol. It's definitely worth taking the risk. The trilogy was a risk to a certain extent, so was the ambitioness of 21CB. But they've never quite gone back to American Idiot level risk. And that's what I'd welcome them doing. 

[Montclare]

6 hours ago, MillenniumFan said:

Then after another pause, use all the build up, momentum and hype created throughout 2019 and finally release the new GD album a few months later in 2020 and go on another world tour. 

Come on, we all know 2020 is for Omega 3000. 

21 minutes ago, gaslight13 said:

One of my favorite artists released two songs in advance, and that was pretty normal, but then two more a few weeks out. I listened to the first two a lot but the 3rd one only once and the 4th not at all. It does ruin it because you’ve heard almost half the album by the time it’s out. 

My issue with releasing singles far in advance of an album also is, what if they don't appeal to fans?  At least with an album, you're most likely going to like at least one or two songs, but if a band releases singles you don't like, you're going to be less likely to listen to the album when it does come out.

[IcyMoffatt]

Any words/clues if we will ever get a cd format of the album?

[Hermione]

1 hour ago, LaughingClock said:

 

No, simply the act of forming and creating an album and then touring it for a period of time slows down other things in the machine.  Just does.

If the machine was already going. What if the alternative was just having a long holiday like Mike and Tre before getting started on GD again? 

Also previous side projects The Network and FBHT didn't slow down the following albums, they helped provide creative inspiration to work on them. I mean it could slow it down but just saying it's not certain, it depends where they are with GD stuff.

[pacejunkie punk]

4 minutes ago, Hermione said:

If the machine was already going. What if the alternative was just having a long holiday like Mike and Tre before getting started on GD again? 

I don’t think Billie knows how to take a long holiday 😄

[Hermione]

6 minutes ago, pacejunkie punk said:

I don’t think Billie knows how to take a long holiday 😄

Evidently . I guess if the rest of the band is taking one (totally reasonably) he might as well fill his time.

[Jirachi]

I dunno. Hot Tubs and Network didnt slow down AI or 21CB from what I can tell, and Longshot's stuff is a lot of covers and shorter songs so i kinda doubt it was THAT draining and such, i dunno.

[pacejunkie punk]

6 minutes ago, Jirachi said:

I dunno. Hot Tubs and Network didnt slow down AI or 21CB from what I can tell, and Longshot's stuff is a lot of covers and shorter songs so i kinda doubt it was THAT draining and such, i dunno.

Not draining, just that you can only work on so many things at once. If he’s on tour with the Longshot, he simply can’t be in the studio with Green Day. Time spent recording and touring past side projects had to push off those other albums but then that was deliberate beause they were giving themselves more space to create something great and I get the feeling they’re doing that again here.