Trilogy Discussion

[Hero_Of_The_Hour]

5 hours ago, Jenn. said:

I'm not sure what you mean by "shrugging off." Like, as opposed to what? Lyrics are there to be interpreted by whoever is listening. Billie Joe knows that too. Like Hermione says, not all the lyrics are meant to be taken literally. Sometimes they are, but sometimes it comes from a different place. It's not like he's writing them in his sleep and waking up to find the songs already recorded and out there for everyone to hear. There's a whole process going on, lines are re-written and whatnot. It's not always a stream of Billie's consciousness. We're meant to take different interpretations from the words.

I was quoting Maria Gloria who said "shrugging off". My point is that some fans pick what parts of lyrics to take literally and what parts to assume are fantasy and they tend to draw the line with what makes them feel uncomfortable. 

5 hours ago, Jenn. said:

As to whether lyrics are actually about Billie or not, the point is it doesn't matter. We can worry about him when shit gets real like it did during the Trilogy, but when all we're doing is analyzing his lyrics, that's just speculation about his private life which I'm not particularly into. If that makes me a bad fan, whatever.

Obviously you are entitled to your opinion however I do not believe analysing lyrics and wondering if the song I'm listening to is about the writer (in other words the thought that crosses my mind when listening to a song like the way I think about Wake Me Up When September Ends etc) or just a song with lyrics for the sake of lyrics (as in a story that isn't real). As you said Billie was aware he was putting the songs out there for people to interpret so if one is to "interpret" any song lyrics by Billie which are deeply personal heart on his sleeve then a cynical person could see that as speculation about his private life I suppose. Also this argument that actually assuming Billie's lyrics are about Billie is speculation about his private life is what I was complaining about earlier. Billie himself said during an interview when Nimrod was out that he always wrote from his point of view and about himself. He told Rolling Stone in 2013 that he'd been writing for years about his struggles with addiction. Over the years he's even mentioned that characters of St Jimmy, Christian and Gloria were aspects of his personality. Yet when he writes a simplistic song on the trilogy we are guilty of speculation about his personal life if we take it at face value? He put it out there. He, as you said, wrote multiple drafts etc. If he was worried people may speculate about his personal life he would very likely have been smart enough to write through characters and NOT claim that he was them after a short period. 

[DeJennsitized]

@Hero_Of_The_Hour I see where you’re coming from but to me, there’s a difference between analysing lyrics as they’re presented and relating them to Billie’s life outside the song. And of course people aren’t going to look too deeply into songs with subject matters that make them uncomfortable. The reason it’s uncomfortable is because it feels like we’re delving too deep into his personal life. And while it’s cool Billie feels he can share so much with a wide audience, it doesn’t change that fact that I don’t want to speculate about shit I only know through some lyrics that Billie himself admits can become about many things. 

1 hour ago, SHART said:

@Jenn. best future mod award 2017

page own

Stop it (but also don’t)  

[Hero_Of_The_Hour]

1 hour ago, Jenn. said:

@Hero_Of_The_Hour I see where you’re coming from but to me, there’s a difference between analysing lyrics as they’re presented and relating them to Billie’s life outside the song. And of course people aren’t going to look too deeply into songs with subject matters that make them uncomfortable. The reason it’s uncomfortable is because it feels like we’re delving too deep into his personal life. And while it’s cool Billie feels he can share so much with a wide audience, it doesn’t change that fact that I don’t want to speculate about shit I only know through some lyrics that Billie himself admits can become about many things. 

Stop it (but also don’t)  

Fair enough that you see it this way, I just see it differently. For example I listen to lots of artists and know absolutely nothing about their personal lives (if they are married, their sexuality, partying lifestyles, politics etc) so I hear their songs and take them at face value if they are written/sung in the first person context. It doesn't mean I'm speculating about a singers personal life, it means I'm taking what he or she is portraying at face value. If anyone turned on the radio who had no idea Billie was married or had substance abuse problems or any other shit, had barely heard of GD for example and listened to some track of the Trilogy they'd form an idea or opinion as to what the song was about but wouldn't be speculating about the singer who they can't even visualise personal life, they'd just be making sense of the song as it's playing without giving it too much thought (which I believe is part of the point...we aren't supposed to be so invested in Billie or care about his personal wellbeing to the point that it matters if the lyrics are true. If he'd been worried about oversharing he probably wouldn't have been so open about all his issues for years). Again it's fine we have different views on this but I just want to note when you say, "there’s a difference between analysing lyrics as they’re presented and relating them to Billie’s life outside the song." This is exactly what many fans and interviewers did to Billies face for years in relation to St Jimmy in particular but also in relation to the characters of Christian and Gloria.

[Hermione]

Why always take it at face value/literally when it's a fact that not all songs are written literally though? Why ignore that Billie actually said specific parts of the trilogy were his imagination? Just seems like an unnecessarily one dimensional way of looking at something that isn't always one dimensional. Point isn't whether it's literal or not, just that sometimes it's literal and sometimes it isn't and we don't always know which (and it usually doesn't matter).

[Hero_Of_The_Hour]

4 hours ago, Hermione said:

Why always take it at face value/literally when it's a fact that not all songs are written literally though? Why ignore that Billie actually said specific parts of the trilogy were his imagination? Just seems like an unnecessarily one dimensional way of looking at something that isn't always one dimensional. Point isn't whether it's literal or not, just that sometimes it's literal and sometimes it isn't and we don't always know which (and it usually doesn't matter).

The only quote I have seen where Billie suggested parts of the trilogy were his imagination was a strange translation from German which literally contradicts what we know to be factually true about his behaviour at the time. 

 

"Billie, what does your wife say about songs like "Nightlife"? I mean, you describe in that songs your fantasie about getting seduced from a stranger.
She thinks it cool. She says, I'm sounding young and fresh..just like how I am.
And "Nightlife" doesn't only describe the thing with girls, it's about stuff like
drugs, alcohol and bad influence.
Is it easy to seduce you?
In this song, I just show my fantasies. My home, my family is a safe place for me.
I would never risk to lose it. I live in a beatiful realationship with my wife
and that since 18 years. But as a musican, you need to think different. There
are things I wanna drink, thinks I wanna take and people I wanna look at. And my
wife bans stuff like that. Beeing a healthy person, a good husband, a good father
and to have fun in your job. That's the challenge I accepted."

 

So we are supposed to have read that and believed that any songs alluding to drinking or drugs was fantasy also? Because his wife banned it? Right Billie. Anything you say. This quote is fucking painful. 

[solongfromthestars]

There's nothing inherently wrong with people being uncomfortable with the themes on the Trilogy. What I think we were all originally saying is just that those themes aren't unique to it, so there's no need to be especially uncomfortable listening to it on the band's behalf, yet some people still are. If someone has personal discomfort with the era or themes that's totally fine. It just becomes unreasonable when those people insist things like "it's meaningless and about nothing but substance abuse" because the themes make them uncomfortable, or because they'd prefer him to write about something else (that's what I meant by "shrugging it off"). Billie has never actually said anything along those lines, so it's speculation in itself. No one is obliged to think about the lyrics or even listen to Billie's explanations if they're uncomfortable with them, but then there's no need to apply a blanket meaning to it all when he hasn't done that himself.

This hasn't happened on GDC for a while so I'm not calling anyone out or anything. I just distinctly remember it from the Trilogy era and still see it elsewhere sometimes. I think it's a shame because those statements are really just fan speculation, but lead to (some) people disliking the albums more than they actually need to.

[Beerjeezus]

And that's it again. Billie never says the truth. When he says his songs about drugs and cheating aren't about actual drugs and cheating, he most definitely cheats and does drugs and I feel obliged to take this on another level: Billie never tells the truth. The whole time he was speaking up against Bush he was in fact supporting Bush. American Idiot is in fact a very pro-Bush song but he lured us into thinking the opposite because that way he could sell more tickets. He's a strong Trump supporter now. Believe nothing he says. No Trump actually means, No, Trump! as in No, Trump is an awesome guy, vote Trump! That's a fact. Billie is a huge GOP supporter.

[Christian's Inferno!]

5 hours ago, Jane Lannister said:

And that's it again. Billie never says the truth. When he says his songs about drugs and cheating aren't about actual drugs and cheating, he most definitely cheats and does drugs and I feel obliged to take this on another level: Billie never tells the truth. The whole time he was speaking up against Bush he was in fact supporting Bush. American Idiot is in fact a very pro-Bush song but he lured us into thinking the opposite because that way he could sell more tickets. He's a strong Trump supporter now. Believe nothing he says. No Trump actually means, No, Trump! as in No, Trump is an awesome guy, vote Trump! That's a fact. Billie is a huge GOP supporter.

He also supports KKK and Fascism in the USA, right?

[Hero_Of_The_Hour]

6 hours ago, Jane Lannister said:

When he says his songs about drugs and cheating aren't about actual drugs and cheating, he most definitely cheats and does drugs

Yeah you're being sarcastic but let me just remove the part about cheating and see if it really looks so sarcastic or just ridiculous 

6 hours ago, Jane Lannister said:

When he says his songs about drugs aren't about actual drugs he most definitely does drugs

 

[Beerjeezus]

2 hours ago, MysticManiac said:

He also supports KKK and Fascism in the USA, right?

Yes, he's basically a new Hitler 

1 hour ago, Hero_Of_The_Hour said:

Yeah you're being sarcastic but let me just remove the part about cheating and see if it really looks so sarcastic or just ridiculous 

 

What does this mean can you please explain in at least 4 paragraphs? 

[Hero_Of_The_Hour]

2 hours ago, Jane Lannister said:

 

What does this mean can you please explain in at least 4 paragraphs? 

 What indeed does it mean. You said it. 

[Beerjeezus]

3 minutes ago, Hero_Of_The_Hour said:

 What indeed does it mean. You said it. 

Please explain 

[Hero_Of_The_Hour]

2 hours ago, Jane Lannister said:

Please explain 

My wife bans stuff like that.

[Beerjeezus]

8 hours ago, Hero_Of_The_Hour said:

My wife bans stuff like that.

You're being such a grouch. Don't tease and tell us all your secrets 

[The Bellie]

On 19/10/2017 at 2:43 AM, Hero_Of_The_Hour said:

[...] It doesn't mean I'm speculating about a singers personal life, it means I'm taking what he or she is portraying at face value. If anyone turned on the radio who had no idea Billie was married or had substance abuse problems or any other shit, had barely heard of GD for example and listened to some track of the Trilogy they'd form an idea or opinion as to what the song was about but wouldn't be speculating about the singer who they can't even visualise personal life, they'd just be making sense of the song as it's playing without giving it too much thought (which I believe is part of the point...we aren't supposed to be so invested in Billie or care about his personal wellbeing to the point that it matters if the lyrics are true. 

I mostly agree with you. For me personally, I hear Billie's words in songs in a literal way. Even when a minority of lyrics may be somehow metaphoric, the meaning behind these lyrics is as strong as what the metaphor suggests. I have no doubt about it. The fact that I've felt saved by his music, until now, is because I connect directly with it, within a part of me that I myself could never put enough fair words on. I don't think everyone should or does relate to the songs the same way, our personal sensibility and story make our own listening to it individual. But if I (among many other people) can only hear the songs in the most direct way, touching the most drastic parts in me and my life, at the highest emotional level I can bear (and all this does so much good), it's obvious to me that the meaning behind it, for Billie, can only be at least as deep as what any fan / listener hears - and which is related to his own history.

Billie said he is as honest as possible with himself when he writes, even if "you may not like what you find when you go there". I don't try to figure out what are the facts in Billie's life behind all the heavy lyrics (and to try to tell what they could be, that would be speculation), I just stop to where the songs stop. And that's enough; the feelings he lets us know that he expresses are real. Furthermore I think Billie is absolutely not a liar when he's interviewed about songs, he says less than his songs say, often making quite vague and softened allusions, but that's just for the better in my opinion: even though he knows a fan would beg to hear what the songs really means, and what he has really felt to write it, Billie doesn't say more than the song, as to let the song keep having the personal meaning the fan feels about it. And Billie also said in the 2013 Rolling Stone interview, the last thing he wants is to be considered with pity. 

@Hero_Of_The_Hour Apparently on the contrary of you, I'm not the least worried for Billie these days, and for a little while now. He has changed, he has got over something, he is happy. He may be still holding beers sometimes, that doesn't mean to me that he hasn't definitely got out of the tunnel. I don't believe in a desirable, happy recovery of addictions when you keep depriving yourself all the time, anyways. Billie has got over his addictions in the only way I believe to be true. 

[Justin1]

I recently came across an article on the trilogy, about the retrospective feeling on the albums.. I think it was ‘Sputnik’ but I’m honestly not too sure. It was about how the Trilogy could develop a ‘cult following’ down the line, considering how obsurdly underrated it was, and how they are treating the songs as if it was a side project.. also comparing it to Weezers ‘Pinkerton’. It was saying that when and if Green Day decide to include the songs in the set list, it will be a treat for the fans.. it was a great read! 

Does anyone else remember reading that article? If so, can you provide the link because I lost it.. thanks! 

[Beerjeezus]

Hahahaha Russian fake news trying to trick people into believing Trilogy was good

[UNICORN VOMIT]

53 minutes ago, Jane Lannister said:

Hahahaha Russian fake news trying to trick people into believing Trilogy was good

You are on fire😁

[Hermione]

2 hours ago, Justin1 said:

I recently came across an article on the trilogy, about the retrospective feeling on the albums.. I think it was ‘Sputnik’ but I’m honestly not too sure. It was about how the Trilogy could develop a ‘cult following’ down the line, considering how obsurdly underrated it was, and how they are treating the songs as if it was a side project.. also comparing it to Weezers ‘Pinkerton’. It was saying that when and if Green Day decide to include the songs in the set list, it will be a treat for the fans.. it was a great read! 

Does anyone else remember reading that article? If so, can you provide the link because I lost it.. thanks! 

I don't know the article but I enjoy hearing of trilogy appreciation. I guess it does kind of have a small cult following in that there's a minority of GD fans who are very into it (myself included), but that's not on a big scale. I think most GD fans who like it just think it's good but not as good as most of their other albums, which doesn't really constitute cult following, and I doubt that'll change much.

[Beerjeezus]

This is a myspace message from Billie where he posted about being naked in a pool with Lady Cobra I can't believe HOTH was right the entire time

[Hermione]

I thought all those messages were lost when everything got deleted from Myspace! And it's the I got you on my mind England one (which was heartbreaking at the time because it didn't happen but that they would eventually fulfill a year and half later) . Nice to see it again. 

[Beerjeezus]

36 minutes ago, Hermione said:

I thought all those messages were lost when everything got deleted from Myspace! And it's the I got you on my mind England one (which was heartbreaking at the time because it didn't happen but that they would eventually fulfill a year and half later) . Nice to see it again. 

There's another one

[Hermione]

1 hour ago, Jane Lannister said:

There's another one

 

Omg thanks! He did one after every show on their mini tour in 2008. I love how into the Rev character he got  

Oh and seeing STING STING reminds me there was an article about the FBHT tour at the time (I think it was NME) that was the most terribly researched thing ever. Purely because of the Rev always going STING!!! they actually reported that the band were hanging out with Sting at the show  

[That Dude]

Just poking my head back in to see what's going on.....must not be much for us to be discussing the Trilogy again, haha.  

 

[The Bellie]

Even though I tend to listen more to the Green Day stuff I have the less listened to until now and there are many songs that I'm sort of rediscovering, the trilogy is still among the Green Day stuff I listen the most to and love the most. I didn't like when Green Day, especially Billie, in a 2016 interview said that these albums had no directions to them and some other things (not every time he's spoken of them, but sometimes) that tended to think he doesn't hold these albums in his heart. And they've ended not playing much of any of them. I know these albums well and get what Billie means each time he speaks of them even if I don't always agree. And I don't want to be selfish by saying these albums are perfect as they are when I know that what they cost humanly being done that way at that scale. But if there's something fucked up with these albums well that must be something that makes them great. At least for me it most often fits my mood and it's because I feel bored, edgy and fucked up a lot. What's great with Green Day is every album is part of their evolution and has its own soul and every album is important to them in first, and I don't want the trilogy to be considered by themselves as less valuable. Billie playing trilogy stuff lately, on Instagram, Walk Away partially during the South American leg of the RevRad tour, and of course a few songs with The Longshot relieved me as there's no doubt now that the trilogy has its special place, for himself, like any other album among GD's discography. Maybe not an easy place, but an important one. From listening only to what Billie had to say about them around 2016 it wasn't obvious. (and it surprised me that he said once, I don't recall in which interview, they aren't playing much of the trilogy during the RevRad tour because these albums are among the less popular to the fans. Well, I'm sure of one thing even if I wasn't there: every fan who witnessed a trilogy tour gig must've fallen in love with the songs as much as RevRad era new fans such as myself have fallen in love with the RevRad songs. Trilogy songs live kick ass.) I'm not really worried about what will be played in the future from the trilogy, as I'm not a setlist-worried fan anyways, I guess what mattered most to me is to get closer to how Billie really feels about Uno, Dos and Tre and with the past year I can say I got that.