Good Man

I ain't gonna play no second fiddle
I'm used to playin' lead
- Bessie Smith, 1925



Studio A at Studio 880 was alight with so much activity it was as if there were an electrical storm swirling around at mach ten. Everyone who worked at 880, including in and around the overall complex, were struck dumb by the threesome who came through their doors on the 13th of August to lock out Studio A, long term. And no one was more surprised than John Lucasey, 880's CEO who was also a producer/mixer, and Brad Kobylczak, the studio manager as well as Chief Engineer/Mastering Engineer.

To have Billie Joe Armstrong and Tre Cool return to their longtime recording stomping grounds with Caroline Pritchard in tow was mind-blowing. Even more so when they learned the trio was there to utilize the space for recording purposes and not to get together for old times and reminisce.

Holy shit.

They were a new band?

Stop the presses! Alert the papers!

Was history in the making? Was this a supergroup in the works?

Within the first week of the threesome taking over Studio A, they had the full kitchen stocked with the food and beverages they wanted, along with some of their personal effects that they required while being in the studio, such as lugging their laptops and iPods around. They began bringing in their instruments and other personal equipment; getting comfortable in these familiar surroundings once more.

They were setting up shop to roost, so to speak.

But being at the studio 24/7 was not what they were doing either. They still had their home lives to attend to. Caroline was also busy with enrolling Mikey into kindergarten, which was freaking her out a little; knowing her oldest child was finally growing up some. Granted he was yet five years old, but the mere fact that he was starting a full day of school, five days a week, was just...surreal.

And saddening.

She wished Mike would be there on their son's first day of school when he hopped on the school bus with his little backpack and waved goodbye through the window from his seat as the bus began to pull away.

It's a good thing Caroline had three other little ones at home. She would be going through some serious empty nest syndrome then.

But she would cross that bridge when she got to it. Right now, she was set in knowing that all her kids were at home, until Mikey started school in a mere two weeks' time, and would be looked after by her mother when she was busy at the studio with Tre and Billie Joe.

Presently, however, the two men and their female bandmate, which was something that still felt weird getting used to, were sitting around the studio; Tre at his Leedy custom drum set, Billie Joe standing a few feet away with his signature Les Paul Junior, and Caroline bringing up the third point in their triangled stance with her yellow, Mike Dirnt Signature Fender Precision bass.

Well, it had been Mike's. But it was hers now. His will had allocated his bass collection specifically to her. But she was planning on giving all his children one of his many basses, when they got old enough, to play or mount for safekeeping.

Tre was fiddling about with his drumsticks, not actually playing anything; just lightly tapping the snare here, or a cymbal there. His left knee bobbed out of nervous energy as he watched Billie Joe tune his guitar while looking down at the strings and over at Caroline's bass, then to her as she plucked lazily at the same string over and over at random intervals.

"We gonna warm up to any particular song or just start playing something and we each take turns adding to it till we come up with something mind-blowing?" Caroline inquired, a hint of a smile in her voice, though her face was completely businesslike.

"I'm all for the latter," Billie Joe replied as he slammed his thumb down on the strings of his guitar and then windmilled one stroke like Pete Townsend while flashing a smile Caroline's way. Taking a step back, he hunched forward slightly and looked down at what he was doing as he began to play a simple melody. "This is something I've kinda been fucking around with for a few months. There's no words yet..."

And Billie Joe went into the melody as the other two watched and listened at first. They could tell there was one verse, then a chorus melody, before Billie Joe began to strum to another verse. It was then that Tre began to drum a little ditty. Nothing jumpy like he would normally do during a show; just enough to get the feel of where the song was going. Caroline trailed behind Tre, plucking out a few bass notes here and there, trying to guess where Billie Joe would go next. After the second verse and second chorus sections, their green-eyed friend went off on some sort of interlude that threw the other two for a moment, trying to figure out how the interlude fit with the rest of the melody, but as it sank in, they realized it was all good.

"That's all I got so far," Billie Joe mumbled as he let the interlude kind of die abruptly. He dropped his hands to his sides, the guitar just hanging there by way of its strap as he reached his right arm across his chest to scratch at his left elbow. He looked bashfully at Caroline first.

They'd never done this sort of thing in the studio with her before. Sure, he'd jammed with her before at her house or his, co-wrote a song here and there while The Sinners were recording their second album, but actually coming together in this particular setting...

He was starting to feel a little self-conscious.

"I liked it," Caroline muttered with a nod of her head, stepping closer to him and gesturing to his Les Paul Junior. "The last part kinda seemed a bit, I dunno...lacking, maybe?"

Billie Joe looked from Caroline and over to Tre, who nodded. "Yeah, it kinda threw me. I wasn't expecting it." Then the drummer added, "Not that it wasn't good. It just seemed somewhat out of place, like maybe it would work better as an interlude for another song, a faster song. This melody you got isn't fast. I mean, we could always increase the tempo, like, eighth notes instead of quarter..."

Twisting his lips, the older man frowned. "I want this interlude with this melody," he insisted. "Let's work on it, beef it up or tone it down, but keep the same form to it, you know?"

"I think maybe instead of another verse or chorus right after this interlude, which needs fixing, for sure, that there could be more of a bridge---"

"I think the chorus again would feel better," Billie Joe cut in, looking at Tre, who just shrugged.

"I'm just the drummer." And while Tre was playing the aloof card, secretly he was wondering how two dominant band members would transpire.

Both Billie Joe and Caroline were used to being the lead singers and songwriters in their previous bands.

One would have to back down or they would have to share the duties.

And Tre could already tell by the look on Caroline's face that she was bidding her time before she snapped at Billie Joe for taking the reigns, more out of twenty-five years of habit.

Just as Caroline was about to open her mouth, Billie Joe spoke up again. "Actually, no. Bridge, then chorus. Maybe repeat the chorus a second time, then end it..." his eyes wandered toward the ceiling as four different radio stations in his head began to play at the same time. The fingers of his right hand began to dance in mid air as if he were calculating a mathematical equation before nodding his head and returning to his guitar. He shifted the neck in his left hand and looked off toward Caroline. "After I play for about two measures, can you come in with a steady bass line, like...doo, doo, doo-doo, doo..."

Biting her lips together, Caroline just nodded, and mimicked the sound Billie Joe was after with her bass.

"Yeah, like that. That same sound, measure after measure until the chorus, then...do what feels right," he commented, flicking his right hand at her to gesture he didn't care too much.

"Yes, sir," she bit out with a sugary sweet smile that Billie Joe caught but didn't overly delve into any context with.

Tre noticed it, though. He caught her gaze and he just shook his head and smiled.

"Tre, just...what you were doing. Loved it. But beef it up. More...uh...you know. Trilly? I dunno. Does that make sense?"

Tre nodded this time. "I read you loud and clear, Captain. Over."

Caroline smirked. And re-situated herself as she waited for Billie Joe to take the lead...



By the end of the day, and a long one it was turning out to be, the three of them had completed the song in its musical form. They'd come together with nary a squabble about how it should be played. Billie Joe had taken lead. The song was of his creation, after all, and he knew in his head how he wanted it to sound.

Of course there were the moments where he asked Caroline to borrow her bass from her, and when he did so, began plucking some notes out, to show her a part he thought could be done differently.

That was the one moment Tre was waiting for the other shoe to drop.

After all, he'd dated her and knew how she could be when people corrected or criticized her about anything. She didn't take well to negative criticism, even if it was meant to help or assist in making something a little better and not necessarily putting down what she was doing. Any nitpicking got under her skin and she silently seethed until she eventually exploded like a bat out of hell.

Though, it had been seven years since Tre had been in a relationship with Caroline. In seven years she could've learned to deal with her criticism issues.

She clearly wasn't about to sever Billie Joe's head at the moment, anyway.

Things were looking up.

Caroline even offered suggestions for lyrics and Billie Joe seemed happy with them and jotted them down along with his own ideas.

By this point, that particular twosome was sitting across from each other at the table in Studio A's full kitchen, each nursing a can of Sprite, while Tre wandered around the pinball machine, talking on his cell phone to his mom who was on Avarielle-watching duty for the day. Caroline's parents already had their hands full with the twins while Adrienne had offered to watch Mikey and Chloe.

The latter was no surprise, considering how much Adrienne loved and adored her goddaughter to bits.

"This girl I know, she sleeps with one eye open / Just can't trust the world tonight / It's fight or flight to keep his heart alive / But he's gone / He's been long gone..." Billie sang the lyrics to the first verse without the help of his guitar to accompany him. He tapped his pen on the paper laying on the table between him and Caroline; the pen touching down to each word he sang.

Looking at Caroline, she gave a nod of approval, then joined him by singing the harmony in the chorus.

"And it's goodnight moon / I'll be seeing you soon / When the sun sets / And my mind recollects / All the times we lied / To make the pain less bitter / Till then it's goodnight moon..."

"Sounds good," Tre called out from the lounge area, giving a thumbs up while also juggling a conversation over the phone with his mother.

Billie Joe smiled, and began to sing over the lyrics of the second verse. "This boy I know, he's staring out of his window / Just can't be with her tonight / It's fight or flight to keep her soul alive / But she's gone / She's been long gone..."

Once again, Caroline joined him on the chorus and they skipped over where the musical interlude would be and went right into him singing the bridge, with her joining in to echo certain words.

"Yes, I've sinned," Billie Joe almost snarled.

"I've sinned," repeated Caroline, trying to read the lyrics upside down as best as she could since he was looking at them more full on.

"But I repented / Yes, I live..."

"I live."

"While two hearts bled / And I'll survive / It's all that I can do / Without you..."

"Without you."

The two of them went into the chorus two more times, with Caroline providing the harmony and when they finished, they decided they should all head back into the live room and rehearse the song with the music and lyrics together. They got Tre's attention and the drummer wrapped up his phone call, telling his mother he wasn't sure how late he'd be that night, and if she and his dad wouldn't mind keeping Avarielle overnight so he didn't have to wake his little girl up and drag her home to bed at some ungodly hour.

That reminded Caroline to do the same thing, calling her parents to see if they wouldn't mind keeping the twins overnight. When she got her mom on the phone, Joanne Woods was happy to oblige her daughter and wished her luck with the guys, to give them her love and wish them all a goodnight. Caroline then called Adrienne's cell and asked the same question and Adrienne was more than happy to keep Mikey and Chloe overnight if Caroline didn't get home till late.

When all was said and done, Billie Joe rolled his eyes and joked about being glad he was out of that stage of having to find someone to look after his kids if him and Adrienne would be AWOL for a while.

The threesome then migrated into the live room and picked their instruments back up, or sat down at their instrument, in Tre's case. After a few moments, Tre counted off and they began the song from beginning to end, with the music and the lyrics, and everything seemed to fall into place.

They were so ecstatic that they had to grab John Lucasey, who was still at 880 that late, to assist in laying down the tracks. They started with Billie Joe recording the guitar, followed by Caroline recording the bass lines, then Tre on his drums.

By three in the morning, Billie Joe was in one of the isolation rooms to lay down his vocals, which took a few takes because Billie Joe was nothing if not a perfectionist. But then it was Caroline's turn, as she took a seat on a stool in the second isolation booth with a bottle of water. Her eyes were already drooping by this point and she did her best to be as alert as possible when she sang her harmonies alongside Billie Joe's voice singing the melody.

By four-thirty in the morning, they were all dragging their feet back into the tracking room where John was sitting at the controls. He was mixing all the parts together for them right there on the spot, playing certain parts back, with Billie Joe standing behind John, doing a bit of a sleep-deprived, exhaustion-induced crazy jig because of how stoked he was at how the rough cut of the song had come out.

Sniffing the air, he threw his arms around Caroline and Tre. "Smell that? That's the smell of a hit single, if I do say so myself!"

When the trio moved apart from each other, Caroline sank back on the couch behind the console and rested her head in the palm of her head, her eyes once again very droopy.



She wasn't sure what time it was when she opened her eyes, but Caroline was not surprised to see that Billie Joe was lounged out beside her on the couch, passed out and lightly snoring; one leg tucked up underneath him while the other leg dangled carelessly to the floor.

Caroline didn't see Tre or John anywhere, and not because they weren't in the room.

The tracking room was pretty much pitch black.

Blinking away some of the sleep in her eyes, Caroline gently stretched her arms and legs out and placed the her feet on the floor and pulled herself up into a standing position as carefully as possible without waking the sleeping guitarist.

Padding out of the tracking room, she walked toward the private lounge where, sure as shit, there was Tre, asleep, on the couch. She shook her head with a smirk as she continued on her way toward the kitchen and decided to start making a pot of coffee. She finally noticed the time on a wall clock that stated it was only eleven-thirty in the morning.

Yawning, Caroline stood there, probably looking like hell warmed over, as the coffee percolated.

"I hear coffee..." Tre groaned from the direction of the lounge.

"You hear correctly," Caroline replied, grabbing three mugs from the cupboard in front of her.

"My head hurts and I didn't even get drunk last night," came Tre's voice, much closer than before and it caused Caroline to jump. "Sorry. Didn't mean to scare you."

Caroline turned and shrugged at Tre who was standing in the archway. "Ain't like me getting scared easily is this new thing."

Once the coffee was brewed, she poured them both a cup and they made their respective cups of Joe the way they each preferred it and as they took their initial sips, Caroline spoke up once more.

"So, who's gonna wake up Sleeping Beauty?" she inquired in regard to Billie Joe.

"Eh, let him sleep. He was up later than either of us."

"Really? I don't even remember when I fell asleep."

"Just after four-thirty you nodded off. John and Billie went off to the control room to fuck around some more but I was exhausted so I went into the lounge and puttered around with my laptop, checking my email and Facebook account real quick before passing out on the couch out there," the drummer informed. "I can only imagine what time Billie finally passed out, himself. Where did he fall asleep?"

"Next to me on the couch in the tracking room."

"Oh."

"So, you think the song we did is the hit single Billie thinks it'll end up being someday?"

Tre took another sip of his coffee, leaning his lower back against the counter. He shrugged casually. "I dunno. Maybe. It's hard to tell." Another sip. "One thing I do know, is that those lyrics...d'you notice how the first verse is obviously about you, and the second about me?"

Caroline hesitated, then nodded slowly. "Yeah, I kinda picked up on that." She smiled a little as well and added, "At first I was pissed that he was taking over our very first song as a group, but when the lyrics spilled out, I was touched. A nice tribute to our losses, I gotta say."

"Yeah," Tre agreed. "Billie's good like that."

With an abrupt sigh, Caroline seemed to perk up like a woman on a mission. She set her coffee mug down and grabbed the third, empty one and filled it and didn't bother to put anything in it; choosing to leave it black.

"I'll be right back," she told Tre, carrying both her mug and the third one out of the kitchen and back toward the tracking room. Once within said room, she kicked Billie Joe in the shin, causing him to stir awake and sit straight up, muttering a few, choice swear words under his breath.

"The fuck...Care?" he focused his droopy green eyes on the brunette woman before him. "What time is it?" he groaned, tipping his head back and running his hands over his face. Then, "Ugh, my foot's asleep."

Caroline laughed as Billie Joe leaned forward and grabbed at his foot which had been tucked under him and was clearly full of pins and needles now. Since he was shoeless and his Chucks were somewhere else, he was able to rub his foot and wait for the tingling sensation to die away.

"Here's your morning pick-me-up," Caroline informed, holding out the extra coffee for the dark-haired man, who let go of his tingling foot with a slight wince and reached out for the cup rather graciously, but was surprised when Caroline snapped the cup back without spilling its contents. "But I have a bone to pick with you first."

Frowning, Billie Joe sat back, resting his left arm on the couch's armrest. "Okay," he began cautiously. "What'd I do?"

"You and me? We're lead singers. We're both songwriters. We're both used to taking the reigns and leading a band, so there can't be you dominating the songwriting, song-crafting, song-whatevering process. Okay?" Without missing a beat, she continued on. "You will be the Lindsey Buckingham to my Stevie Nicks. We both write songs, we both take turns singing lead, singing the harmony, or sharing a song by singing different verses in a song, and so on, so forth..."

Billie Joe just stared at Caroline, almost like a kid being reprimanded by his mother or schoolteacher for hogging all the toys, while at the same taking it all in stride. "Is that what I was doing last night?" he questioned, feeling a bit guilty.

"Uh, yeah. But I forgive you on the grounds that you've got a 25-year-old habit to break."

Billie Joe laughed. "I have several 25-year-old habits to break."

Sharing in the laugh, Caroline finally handed the man his coffee. "So, am I understood?" she asked, serious once more and looking very much like a mom in that moment.

Nodding solemnly, Billie Joe complied, lest his balls be extracted by Caroline with something sharp, jagged and rusty. "I do so solemnly swear not to be a song mooch," he responded, holding up his left hand as if about to be sworn in to the presidency.

"Good," Caroline spoke with a nod. "'Cause I ain't gonna play no second fiddle."