When a visibly worse-for-wear Billie Joe Armstrong stormed off a teen pop show in Las Vegas last year, announcing soon afterwards that he was entering rehab, who could have suspected that the next we’d see of him would be as one half of a vintage country duo? Or that his partner in that enterprise would be easy listening songbird Norah Jones?
Aside from the curious miracle of its actual existence, what’s strangest about Foreverly, perhaps, is how seamlessly it all slots together. Armstrong’s husky croon smokily interweaves with Jones’ angelic whisperings and it feels almost natural. The best way to characterise the album is as a cover record of a covers record. The inspiration is the 1958 Everly Brothers LP Songs Our Daddy Taught Us, wherein the hearthrob siblings returned to the music of their childhood. Framed by appropriately dusky arrangements, Armstrong and Jones recreate that project literally song by song, the Green Day man assuming Don Everly’s lead vocals, Jones chipping in with Phil Everly’s sweet harmonies.
With its stripped-down arrangements and ghostly atmospherics, at moments Foreverly has the whiff of a mass-produced faux vintage piece of furniture: everything is lovingly aged and sepia tinted but, take a second glance and it’s obvious that it’s rolled off a very modern production line. Still, if you’re willing to overlook the curious and essentially artificial nature of the project, there’s a lot to swoon over.
A tender tilt at Gene Autrey’s ‘Silver Haired Daddy Of Mine’ features old-timey piano and shuffling drums; ‘Down In The Willow Garden’ is powder-dusted in steel-pedal guitar and creeping bass, a tune treading on tiptoes. While it isn’t obvious who exactly this record is for – Green Day fans will likely be horrified, Jones devotees a little circumspect – it’s clearly a labour of love, respect and passion. In the end, the glow of enthusiasm it radiates is deeply infectious.

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