At least two Las Vegas radio stations have removed Green Day from their playlists after frontman Billie Joe Armstrong called the city “the worst shithole in America”.
Speaking on stage on 20 September during a performance at San Francisco’s Oracle Park, Armstrong complained about the decision of John Fisher, the current owner of the Oakland Athletics baseball team, to move it to Las Vegas.
“We don’t take no shit from people like John fucking Fisher who sold out the Oakland A’s to Las fucking Vegas,” Armstrong, an Oakland native, reportedly said. “I hate Las Vegas. It’s the worst shithole in America.”
The decision to more the Oakland A’s from California to Nevada has been controversial among the team’s fans, with some heard chanting “fuck John Fisher” at the team’s final game in Oakland last week, where they have played for nearly 60 years. The A’s will play in Sacramento for the next three years before moving to a stadium on the Las Vegas Strip – that has yet to be built – in 2028.
After Armstrong’s comments, Las Vegas rock station KOMP 92.3 announced they were pulling all Green Day music. “KOMP 92.3 has pulled any and all Green Day from our playlist,” they wrote on Instagram. “It’s not us, Billie … it’s you. #vegas4ever.”
Alternative rock station X 107.5 shared a statement announcing their own ban on their website, with the decision also announced on air. “Well, Sin City heard [Armstrong] loud and clear – and X107.5 is not having it,” they wrote. “In response to Armstrong’s inflammatory comments, the station is banning all Green Day music, effective immediately … we’re breaking up with Green Day completely. Bye Bye, Billie!”
But also in the days after Armstrong’s comments, Fisher released a letter apologising to Oakland A’s fans, saying the team had tried to find a new home in the Bay Area but “we came up short”.
“I know there is great disappointment, even bitterness,” he wrote. “Though I wish I could speak to each one of you individually, I can tell you this from the heart: we tried. Staying in Oakland was our goal, it was our mission, and we failed to achieve it. And for that I am genuinely sorry.”
Armstrong and Green Day have not yet commented on the reaction, but the frontman subsequently shared a picture of himself aged six in an Oakland A’s hat on social media, describing the team’s move as “devastating”.
