GREEN DAY NOT AT WAL-MART

GREEN DAY REFUSED TO AUTHORIZE A CENSORED VERSION OF THEIR ALBUM . .

SO WAL-MART WON'T BE CARRYING IT:

GREEN DAY is upset with Wal-Mart, because the store refused to carry their new album, "21st Century Breakdown", unless the band offered them a CLEAN version.

The album has one of those old-school parental advisory stickers. And not only do those stickers still exist, but Wal-Mart actually has a BAN on albums that carry them.

(Singer) BILLIE JOE ARMSTRONG says, "Wal-Mart's become the biggest retail outlet in the country, but they won't carry our record because they wanted us to censor it. [But] there's nothing dirty about our record. "They want artists to censor their records in order to be carried in there. We just said no. We've never done it before. You feel like you're in 1953 or something." (--I haven't had a chance to hear the album yet. But supposedly it features some curse words . . . and some "references considered adult", whatever that means.)

"21st Century Breakdown" has been moving well, despite the fact that Wal-Mart isn't stocking it. Since it dropped last Friday, it's sold over 215,000 copies. But Billy Joe is more concerned about how the censorship is affecting smaller, newer bands. He says, "What does that say to a young kid who's trying to speak his mind making a record for the first time? It's like a game that you have to play. You have to refuse to play it."

Wal-Mart has issued this ROBOTIC response: Quote, "As with all music, it is up to the artist or label to decide if they want to market different variations of an album to sell, including a version that would remove a [Parental Advisory] rating. "The label and artist in this case have decided not to do so, so we unfortunately can not offer the CD."

HUGE props to Green Day for standing up to The Man. Not a lot of rock bands will stand up to Wal-Mart and fight for the integrity of their artistic vision these days, and that ain't very rock and roll. Let's see how they do!