A Green Day Fan Site

Rumors had surfaced as early as August that Butch Vig, the producer of Nirvana’s Nevermind album and a member of the band Garbage, might be producing Green Day’s new album. The rumors seem to have been confirmed when Butch Vig’s Garbage bandmate Shirley Manson appeared on Last Call with Carson Daly on Oct. 2 and said, in answer to a question about Garbage’s future plans: “Butch is producing Green Day, so he’s busy.” That’s rather vague, and leaves somewhat open the question of exactly what role Vig will play, and whether other producers will also be in the mix (the original rumor had also named Joe McGrath as “assisting in the process as well.”). But the latest source (Shirley Manson) certainly seems to be a reliable one.

The clip of Shirley Manson on Last Call was posted on YouTube by Green Day Forum (another video of the same Carson Daly episode was deleted by Youtube “due to a copyright claim by NBC Universal”), and, as backed up by the video clip, the news was posted on the Green Day Authority. GDA was careful to say that details are not known, and to say that we don’t know if Rob Cavallo might play a role as well, but once the news was picked up by a major news outlet (Punk News), the info spread on from there, like wildfire, all over the net.

Punk News is a class act, that has been around forever. They were completely fair and transparent in their reporting, and they stated that the source of the news was Green Day Authority, so that anyone reading the news could see the original news item for themselves. Many other music news outlets ran the story, which as of now, as far as I can tell, is only based on that one short remark made by Shirley Manson.

Just to give an idea of what a big splash this has made, these are some of the many music news sites that have reported the info: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.

I like the take that Consequence of Sound has on the latest bits of news. Their only conclusion is that, based on the “recent scuttle” about Butch Vig’s involvement in producing the album, and on the info provided by the website for Warner Music’s mailing list for the UK, “it certainly appears as if Green Day has found its way into the studio. As of now, we’ll play the wait and see game.”

I don’t pretend to have the musical sophistication that would allow me to exactly distinguish how a Green Day album might sound different as worked on by Butch Vig or Rob Cavallo, or any other producer. But, out of curiosity, I thought it was interesting to watch some of the videos on YouTube in which Butch Vig describes the process of producing Nirvana’s Nevermind. In this one he talks about “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” Follow the links on YouTube for the rest.

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Oct. 9, 2008
Update: We received an email from Warner Music UK confirming that Butch Vig is producing Green Day’s album.