Before the release of Dookie put him on the rock star treadmill of tour bus bunks and five-star hotels, Billie Joe Armstrong lived in the basement of a dilapidated student house in the Californian college town of Berkeley. The basement wasn’t just where Armstrong ate, slept and smoked – although the bongs, empty pizza boxes and sagging couch bore witness to the fact that it was used for all three.
Rather, this was the Green Day headquarters; the base from which the band fielded calls from record labels, and where they rehearsed their set and recovered from their touring schedule. It was also where Armstrong wrote Basket Case on his blue Fernandes Stratocaster. He was 22 years old.
