The Darkness singer Justin Hawkins is back with a new video on his YouTube channel, but this time his words were not so good.
In his new video, the rocker shared his thoughts on Green Day’s new song, ‘One Eyed Bastard,’ and pointed out how it sounded like Pink. In fact, he went on to say that the song was a rip-off and the band achieved nothing original.
After listening to both ‘One Eyed Bastard’ and Pink’s ‘So What?’ the rocker made his choice between the two songs:
“The trouble is, the Pink one’s better. I mean, it’s all generic, similar-sounding stuff; it’s in the same key, which is a bit bloody weird. Pink one’s better, sorry guys.”
The band has also been accused of stealing the melody from Deep Purple as well. Commenting on the Deep Purple hit, he continued:
“I think you can argue that the Pink one wasn’t ‘Black Night’ by Deep Purple. I’d be inclined to say it’s different enough. The trouble is that the Green Day one is the same key and just not quite as good.”
Hawkins then touched on the originality of the song. Claiming that there is not one original thing in the song, he explained further:
“There isn’t an original thought in this f*cking song [from] beginning to end. There just isn’t. But does that matter guys? Is there such thing as originality? This is something we always discuss, in fact we did a long form podcast about this. The quest for originality and what you sacrifice in order to actually achieve that. I think Green Day have sacrificed nothing and they’ve achieved nothing original in this. It’s either Deep Purple or Pink.”
The Ripping Off Accusations
The band’s latest single bears an impossible-not-to-notice resemblance to Pink’s 2008 hit by many people. The initial guitar riff in ‘One Eyed Bastard’ shares a similar melody with the synth-driven ‘na-na-na’ introduction of ‘So What,’ and the two songs are in the same key.
Despite these comparisons, the Green Day frontman Billie Joe Armstrong claimed his inspiration for the song came from an entirely different source:
“‘One Eyed Bastard’ started off as just a riff that I had — a shuffle, almost like a Black Sabbath kind of riff. Lyrically, I was just reflecting on bad times in life. That’s the thing about nostalgia, sometimes you think, ‘That was an awful time.’”
Hawkins Thinks Armstrong’s Vocals Are ‘Consistent’
Other than this recent video, where he made sure he did not find any originality in the song, the rocker has commented on Green Day’s tracks in his earlier videos, too.
Listening to the hit song ‘American Idiot,’ the frontman watched clips from the music video and analyzed the singer’s voice. He stated that the frontman’s voice has a ’70s rock vibe, and though it is easy to achieve, one would have to be consistent. He also stated that Armstrong’s vocals were solid and precise and that he did reach the consistency of sounding good.
You can watch the whole video below.
