GREEN DAY's Billy Joe Opens Up About The Addictions That Nearly Took His Life

Last year, GREEN DAY were performing at the IHeartRadio music awards and allegedly, the promoter cut the bands set in half in order to give USHER some extra time during his set. As a result, Billie Joe Armstrong had an onstage melt down when the band is prompted that they have 1 minute left during their hit song "Basket Case".

Following this incident, Billy Joe checked himself into rehab due to substance abuse. As a result, the bands was forced to postpone their North American tour. The good news is that Billy Joe is out of rehab and ready to hit the road in support of the bands NEW music trilogy: '¡Uno!', ¡'Dos!' and '¡Tré!' (available now via Reprise Records). The bad news is that they did had to cancel a bunch of tour dates due to scheduling conflicts.

On the upcoming issue of Rolling Stone magazine (in stands this Friday), Billie Joe Armstrong talks about his years of alcohol and prescription drug abuse and his stint in rehab following his onstage meltdown.

"I couldn't predict where I was going to end up at the end of the night," he tells Rolling Stone senior writer David Fricke. "I'd wake up in a strange house on a couch. I wouldn't remember how. It was a complete blackout." He finally confronted his problem after the Vegas radio festival, where the frontman smashed his guitar onstage and shouted, "I'm not fucking Justin Bieber, you motherfuckers."

"I remember tiny things," Armstrong says of the Vegas incident. "The next morning, I woke up. I asked [my wife] Adrienne, 'How bad was it?' She said, 'It's bad.' I called my manager. He said, 'You're getting on a plane, going back to Oakland and going into rehab immediately.'"

Read the full story tomorrow, Friday, March 1st.
The postponed tour dates are as follows:

- 3/28 - Chicago, IL - Allstate Arena
- 3/29 - Moline, IL - Wireless Center
- 3/31 - Pittsburgh, PA - Consol Energy Center
- 4/1 - Rochester, NY - Blue Cross Arena
- 4/3 - Philadelphia, PA - Liacourias Center
- 4/4 - Fairfax, VA - Patriot Center
- 4/6 - Uncasville, CT - Mohegan Sun Arena
- 4/7 - Brooklyn, NY - Barclays Center
- 4/9 - Providence, RI - Dunkin Donuts Center
- 4/11 - Toronto, ON - Air Canada Centre
- 4/12 - Quebec City, QC - Quebec Colisee

Related links:
GREEN DAY's Official Site