Green Day Won't 'Censor' Album; Wal-Mart Won't Sell It

Wal-Mart isn’t selling Green Day’s new album because of explicit lyrics, and the band isn’t happy about it. “They won’t carry our record because they wanted us to censor it,” frontman Billie Joe Armstrong tells the AP. 21st Century Breakdown merits a parental-advisory label, and Wal-Mart won’t stock CDs with that dubious honor. “You feel like you’re in 1953 or something,” Armstrong said.

Wal-Mart often carries “clean” versions of such albums, but Green Day isn’t budging. “They want artists to censor their records,” Armstrong adds. “We just said no. … There’s nothing dirty about our record.” Wal-Mart isn’t swayed. “It is up to the artist or label to decide if they want to market different variations of an album,” a spokeswoman said. “The label and artist in this case have decided not to.” (More entertainment stories.)