Song of the Week: "Platypus (I Hate You)"
By Aska /Feb. 13, 2012 / Comments
To put a slightly different spin on Valentines day tomorrow, this week's Song of the Week is the spitting, hate-filled, profanity-laden Platypus (I Hate You), track 8 off 1997's Nimrod, Green Day's 5th studio album.
Billie Joe tweeted on February 17th of 2011 (and deleted the tweet a few hours later) "Platypus was written for tim yohanon. And i prey to god I misspelled his name. Rest in shit you fucking cunt". Tim Yohannan (he did misspell his name) was a founder of 924 Gilman Street and Maximum Rocknroll magazine who openly 'disliked' (probably too light of a word) Green Day, a feeling that was clearly mutual from the band's perspective. Yohannan died in 1998 of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, hence the 'I heard you're sick...' verse. If I remember correctly from books I've read, Yohannan believed that Green Day's sound was far too pop for the punk scene, so it's pretty ironic that one of the most straight-up-punk songs that the band has ever written was dedicated towards him and his demise. The lyrics to Platypus aren't featured inside the Nimrod album inlay, which according to Billie was due to "lawyer problems due to my potty mouth".
This week's video is from the Montreal stop of the 21st Century Breakdown Tour in 2010 - the first show Platypus had been played at since 2002. Tre's reaction to Billie asking "how about Platypus?" was completely priceless, you can see him saying "really!?" and miming the opening to the song. Billie also gets the words hilariously completely wrong.
Lyrics for the song can be found here, and this is Platypus's Song of the Week thread, where you'll find some member-discussion. Feel free to stop by and post your opinion or nominate next week's song.
Billie Joe tweeted on February 17th of 2011 (and deleted the tweet a few hours later) "Platypus was written for tim yohanon. And i prey to god I misspelled his name. Rest in shit you fucking cunt". Tim Yohannan (he did misspell his name) was a founder of 924 Gilman Street and Maximum Rocknroll magazine who openly 'disliked' (probably too light of a word) Green Day, a feeling that was clearly mutual from the band's perspective. Yohannan died in 1998 of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, hence the 'I heard you're sick...' verse. If I remember correctly from books I've read, Yohannan believed that Green Day's sound was far too pop for the punk scene, so it's pretty ironic that one of the most straight-up-punk songs that the band has ever written was dedicated towards him and his demise. The lyrics to Platypus aren't featured inside the Nimrod album inlay, which according to Billie was due to "lawyer problems due to my potty mouth".
This week's video is from the Montreal stop of the 21st Century Breakdown Tour in 2010 - the first show Platypus had been played at since 2002. Tre's reaction to Billie asking "how about Platypus?" was completely priceless, you can see him saying "really!?" and miming the opening to the song. Billie also gets the words hilariously completely wrong.
Lyrics for the song can be found here, and this is Platypus's Song of the Week thread, where you'll find some member-discussion. Feel free to stop by and post your opinion or nominate next week's song.
