Emily's Army
Oakland, California, United States | INDIE
Music
Press
Emily’s Army is a teenaged punk band that first made headlines because the drummer, Joey Armstrong, is the son of Green Day frontman Billie Joe Armstrong, but they have a lot to offer other than family connections. They play the kind of fast, loud, poppy punk rock that’s been making kids go nuts ever since the ‘70s and they have such a positive message—their debut album is called Buy Don’t Be a Dick, and they revel in raising awareness for Cystic Fibrosis research —that you can’t help but smile when you hear them. They’ve been touring up and down the West Coast (their home base is San Francisco), and they spoke to us about the appeal of punk, having fun, and being inspired by comedy.
Click URL for complete interview! - Converse
A foursome of youthful and exuberant punk rockers test their status amongst the big boys with their début Don’t Be A Dick. Produced by Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong and featuring his 16-year-old son Joey on drums, a novice band such as this will certainly pay dividends with such expert guidance.
Album Notes:
Familiar pop punk and garage rock flavors breeze by on an album composed of 2-3 minute fits. Themes of adolescent struggles are abundant, but signs of a band ahead of its teenage face surface with socio-political themes as well.
Why You Should Listen To The Band:
Frenetically-paced and straightforward, Emily’s Army is a rare case of raw and undeveloped talent that’s still good enough to be injected onto a mainstream setting. Participation by punk deity Billy Joe Armstrong makes for an intriguing subplot for a band without much of a background. Prime for younger demographics or the young at heart.
Why You Shouldn’t Listen To The Band:
For music fiends looking to transcend or transmute along an illustrious soundscape, Emily’s Army will flounder under your musical hopes and aspirations. More aligned with vanilla than Neapolitan flair.
Who They Are Influenced By:
The Clash, The Ramones, Rancid, Stiff Little Fingers
Who They Sound Like:
Green Day, The Clash, The Ramones
Read more: KROQ’s Summer New Music Mega Guide A-Z: Atari Teenage Riot To The Wonder Years http://kroq.radio.com/2011/07/06/kroqs-summer-new-music-mega-guide-a-z-atari-teenage-riot-to-the-wonder-years/6/#ixzz1uIne2gdY - KROQ
Entering your dad's business usually means working at a law office, dry cleaner, or busy corner deli. But for 16-year-old drummer Joey Armstrong (second from left), it means making punk rock records like his pop, Green Day frontman Billie Joe Armstrong.
With Billie Joe's help, Joey and his pals -- brothers Max (bass) and Cole Becker (vocals/guitar), and Travis Neumann (lead guitar) -- formed a band and recorded their debut LP, Don't Be a Dick, in just four days at Oakland's Jingletown Recordings -- near the epicenter of the East Bay music scene that birthed Green Day more than 20 years ago.
"The record has a lot of youthful punk rock attitude. They're raw," says Billie Joe, who produced Don't Be a Dick and will release it via his own Adeline Records on June 14. "It's well played, has great hooks and is catchy as hell."
Judge for yourself here with SPIN.com's exclusive premiere of "Broadcast This," a snappy and simple jam with lyrics that deride the state of radio today: "I don't want to listen to what's on the radio / Boring music, depressing talk shows... It would be nice to hear something that I musically enjoy / So I think you want to learn to broadcast this!!!"
Frontman and songwriter Cole Becker (far right) explains the song's meaning: "'Broadcast This' is an anthem of my position against what radio has become," he tells SPIN. "I was bored out of my mind one day and couldn't find anything that was worth listening to, so I wrote the lyrics to 'Broadcast This' as sort of a middle finger." - SPIN
If there’s ever a band who needed to be prepared to catch major shit upon their proclamation to the punk world, it’s Emily’s Army. Produced and released by Billie Joe Armstrong (yeah, him), and featuring four teenagers ranging from 15 to 17 years old—one of which just happens to be the son of Mr. Green Day himself—the upstart Easy Bay pop-punk group have some pretty big Chuck Taylors to fill. Now, the band’s uncanny resemblance to Green Day will also raise some pierced eyebrows; although Billie Joe’s brethren, Joey, is actually just the drummer and brothers Max and Cole Becker handle songwriting and vocal duties on the album. Don’t Be A Dick is overwhelmingly tight and poppy; quite impressive for the young pups they are, and shockingly similar to the early work of (here we go again) Green Day, and their pre-name change incarnation of Sweet Children.
Tracks such as “Asslete,” “Broadcast This” and “Statutory Brainrape” (yeah, even the song titles sound like Green Day) are tight, catchy and perfectly harmonized. When considering that these songs were written by kids barely in high school, it’s a bit of a jaw-dropper. Even the mid-paced quasi-ballad “Burn Apollo” is handled with poise and the right amount of endearment. The only real clunker is “Ho-lloween,” an ode to the disturbing trend of skanky Halloween costumes, which sounds like the Misfits meets Old Skull (sorry, the Old Skull reference was gonna show up somewhere in this review). This one is a fail. The rest of the album, however, is pretty solid. - Alternative Press
Meet Green Day: The Next Generation. Emily's Army, a new band comprised entirely of teenagers from Oakland, California, keep the sound of Green Day's California pop-punk roots alive on their debut album Don't Be A Dick. The musical connection to Green Day goes beyond musical influence – the band just happens to include Billie Joe Armstong's son Joey on drums, and the Green Day frontman produced their record. "Broadcast This," the band's first video, shows the boyish rockers ripping through a tune that declares their boredom with all of the music that they hear on their radio. Except for Green Day, of course. Those guys rule.
Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/videos/emilys-army-broadcast-this-20110627#ixzz1uImKdvzI - Rolling Stone
Green Day frontman Billie Joe Armstrong has already influenced and turned on a new generation of teenagers to punk, and now he's doing the same for Generation Y.
Emily's Army, a pop-punk group made up of four Bay Area teenagers, is set to blow up with the June 14 release of their debut album, Don't Be A D***. On the drums: Armstrong's 16-year-old son Joey. Side note: A 16-year-old rocks harder than you. Deal with that.
But Billie Joe's hardly just attaching his name to a vanity project. He produced the 14-song album, a mix of proto-punk, pop-punk and garage rock, and is releasing it on his own Adeline Records. (Coolest. Dad. Ever.) Expect to hear a mix of politically conscious and personal lyrics, with the group -- made up of brothers Max and Cole Becker, Joey Armstrong and Travis Neumann -- presumably taking a few pointers from the king of pop-punk himself.
Emily's Army range in age from 15 to 17 -- the perfect age to be starting a punk band -- but have already spent the past two years touring up and down the West Coast. Once known as Raining Souls, the group took their name Emily's Army from the Cystic Fibrosis fund-raising organization as a way to honor the Becker brothers' 15-year-old cousin Emily, who was diagnosed with the disease in 1998. - MTV
Discography
Regan McNeil EP (2010)
Don't Be A Dick LP (2011)
The Thing That Are Larry Livermore Compilation (2012)
Photos
Bio
Don’t Be a Dick! Words of wisdom from the mouth of new teenage pop-punk band Emily’s Army. Influenced by the rich East Bay music scene, Gilman Street, classic power pop, and garage rock, Emily’s Army craft heartfelt teenage anthems dealing in cautionary tales, politics, and the pressures of adolescence.
The band members have known each other for most of their lives and discovered their passion for music together. From four year olds hitting piñatas to little league baseball to surfing to collecting punk rock records; Max, Cole, and Joey formed the band in 2004 as Raining Souls. The name didn’t stick but it wasn’t long before inspiration arrived for one that would. Brothers Max and Cole’s 15-year-old cousin Emily was diagnosed with Cystic Fibrosis in 1998 and has suffered from the disease her entire life. In tribute, the band adopted the name Emily’s Army, which also happens to be the moniker for a fundraising organization in their cousin’s honor.
The prolific song-writing brothers Max and Cole Becker write songs and play guitar as if it was attached to them at birth. Travis, who joined the band in 2009, brings forth a guitar swagger that compliments the Becker boys and can serve as an anchor to the tumultuous brotherhood of the band. Joey hammers the drums with such energy; you’ll rarely find him sitting on his drum stool.
The band has been playing clubs and all ages shows up and down the California coast for 2 years—even getting a chance to open a gig at the infamous Bowery Electric in New York City. The boys hit the studio in November 2010 at Jingletown Recordings in Oakland, with engineer Chris Dugan and producer Billie Joe Armstrong. The entire album was recorded and mixed in 4 days…capturing the spirit and passion of a teenage rock n roll machine! More recently, the band contributed a new song, "Good Looks," to the highly anticipated Adeline Records Compilation The Thing That Ate Larry Livermore. The comp features 16 underground pop-punk bands hailing from various parts of North America hand picked by the legendary Lookout Records (Green Day, Rancid, Operation Ivy) founder Larry Livermore.
This summer the band will be embarking on their second trek of the East Coast as a part of the annual Vans Warped Tour and several headlines shows in between. The tour can't come soon enough--at a time when young bands are homogenized and tailor made for consumption and eventual regurgitation, Emily’s Army is a breath of fresh air – rocking out together for the pure fact that they love playing music and they love playing together. From piñatas to punk rock, Don’t Be A Dick by Emily’s Army is the sound of the torchbearers to come.
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