Billie Joe Armstrong's 2 Kids: All About Joey and Jakob
Billie Joe Armstrong shares two sons with his wife Adrienne Armstrong
Billie Joe Armstrong may be a rocker in the public eye but at home, he is a dad to two sons, Joey and Jakob Armstrong.
The Green Day frontman was 22 when he married his wife Adrienne Armstrong in July 1994, and a day later the couple discovered Adrienne was pregnant. Their first son, Joey, was born the following year, while Jakob joined the family in 1998.
"As a young parent, it's like you always want to have the right answer or come up with the right solution, and that's difficult to do," Billie told PEOPLE in 2024. "But then all of a sudden, they get to an age where they have their own wisdom and their own solutions, and they're able to share them with me.”
“So it's like you come full circle in a lot of ways. It's like friendship, but it's a bigger, broader bond, which I'm really proud to have with my sons,” he added. “They're really smart people."
Here's everything to know about Billie Joe Armstrong’s children, Joey and Jakob.
Joey Armstrong, 29
Billie and Adrienne welcomed Joey on Feb. 28, 1995. The couple learned that they were expecting their first child the day after they tied the knot.
Speaking to Rolling Stone in 1995, Billie revealed that Adrienne said she’d been “feeling weird lately,” so they picked up a pregnancy test. “We’re at home waiting for the results and each wanting the other one to go check,” he recalled. “Finally I said, [F---] it,’ and went into the other room. Sure enough, we had the big purple line.”
Billie continued, “It was so bold, just staring me in the face. Purple! Baby! I walked out and said, ‘Hi, Mom.’ I was glowing. I said, ‘Are you happy?’ and she said, ‘Yeah, totally, are you?’ And I said, ‘Yeah, totally.’ We just got married and find out the next day she was pregnant. What a high.”
The "American Idiot" singer's firstborn grew up to be a musician like him. During an appearance on The Trap Set in 2019, Joey shared that his dad pushed him to “study as much and different varieties of music as possible.” He acknowledged that he’s fortunate his father encouraged him to “explore music and have just an appreciation for all music.”
Discussing having “a family that supports the arts," Joey said in a 2019 interview with Jon Foss, “For me, it was a no-brainer. It’s like ‘Yeah, I’m gonna pick up drums and, you know, play music and share that with the world’ and my parents like, 1. like both supported me, but then 2. ... every day I was getting a music history lesson from my dad and from my mom.”
Joey and his younger brother Jakob have jammed with their famous dad. In 2020, Billie and his two sons covered Tommy James & the Shondells’ song "I Think We’re Alone Now" for The Late Late Show With James Corden.
Billie's elder son was also a drummer in the band SWMRS. According to his website, he and Cole Becker decided to form the band after being inspired by the 2003 movie School of Rock at a young age. During his interview with Foss, Joey revealed that he later had the chance to go up to Jack Black, who starred in the film, and told him he’s “the reason I do what I do, right now.”
Becker confirmed in a video message in 2022, via NME, that Joey and another band member had “stepped away from the band to grow their personal lives.”
Jakob Armstrong, 26
Billie and Adrienne welcomed their second son, Jakob, on Sept. 12, 1998. He is often referred to as “Boo” on his mom's Instagram account.
Like his older brother and father, Jakob is also a musician. Reflecting on his childhood surrounded by rock stars, he told Total Guitar, “Looking back on it, I can see that it’s absolutely a large part of the reason I wanted to play guitar and be in a band.”
Jakob admitted in the interview that he didn’t know that music was his “vocation” until his late teens. “I had already graduated high school and I’d been playing with the guys in my band for a long time,” he said. “I tried going to college, but after about a year I realized that I did not enjoy it. I missed playing music so much.”
In 2015, Adrienne shared a photo on Instagram of Jakob from his “first show.” Per Rolling Stone, he and his band, Jakob Danger, released their debut EP in October of that year.
Jakob pointed out to NME that his music is “not at all related to” his father. He explained in 2015, “It’s my own personal thing. I don’t really worry too much about that. I just think: this is my music, it’s different from my father’s, and if people want to listen to it, they can.”
While his dad is the frontman for the rock band Green Day, Jakob told NME that his two favorite bands, The Strokes and Beach Fossils, are his biggest influences. He confessed to Total Guitar that there was a time when he did not want to make punk music because his “dad makes that type of stuff,” but noted now he doesn’t “really care anymore.”
“I’m doing what interests me and what’s going to keep me wanting to be in a band,” he said. “There are absolutely going to be tracks that remind people of that, but it is what it is.”
Jakob is now a member of the band Ultra Q, formerly known as Mt. Eddy. In addition to jamming on the Late Late Show with his brother, Jakob has rocked out onstage with his father. At the Shaky Knees Festival in 2022, Billie gave his son a shout-out saying, “Hey, it’s my son Jakob on guitar right there.”
On his Instagram page, Jakob regularly shares posts from Ultra Q performances and tours, as well as photographs he has taken of himself and the band.
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