Linda Perry Slams Green Day For Dropping Her From Production Of American Idiot Follow-up “Because Billie Joe’s A Little Pussy And Got All This Backlash”

According to NME, Linda Perry has called out Green Day for dropping her from production of 21st Century Breakdown after receiving backlash from fans. Perry, lead singer and guitarist of alternative rock band 4 Non Blondes and producer, said that punk rock band Green Day had originally reached out to her to produce their next album following the release of their sensational record American Idiot. 

“I had a full calendar and cancelled six months of work to do it,” she said. “I met with Billie Joe [Armstrong], and we talked for three hours.”

However, the band ultimately changed their minds, and the record was ultimately produced by Rob Cavallo. Perry attributed this change of direction to fans’ overwhelmingly negative reactions after it was leaked that she would be producing. The leak itself, she attributed to fellow singer-songwriter and former lead singer of the rock band, Hole, Courtney Love. 

“Courtney blabbed her mouth that I was producing,” Perry said. “Suddenly they started getting backlash from their fans, upset they were ‘bringing in Linda Perry, who produced Pink and Christina Aguilera.’ And then those guys just stopped calling me. I would reach out to figure out what was going on. Nobody called. I lost six months of scheduled work. That was fucked-up—all because Billie-Joe’s a little pussy and got all this backlash from his fans and didn’t like it.” 

The backlash from fans, Perry credited to the fact that she was a woman, as well as her past experience writing pop songs—a vastly different genre from punk rock and a genre also distinctly dominated by women. 

“I was disappointed in those guys, and then I was mad at Courtney because if she would have just shut up, we would have made the record and it would have come out and it would have spoken for itself,” she said. “I had a vision and knew I was going to kill that record.”

At the time, Green Day released an official statement denying the claim that Perry was meant to produce at all. Perry said that she was fine with the decision, but called the dismissal itself “harsh and rude” as reportedly no one from Green Day spoke with her directly about it. 

“Just call me and say, ‘Hey, we’re going to go a different way. I’m not digging this backlash we’re getting,’ she said. “Just balls-up, man. Not returning my calls was such a pussy move, and I lost a lot of respect for Billie Joe.”