Billie Joe Armstrong’s Park 75

Billie Joe started using a Park 75 during the American Idiot sessions. Guitar World reported that “a 50-watt Park 75 fitted with a version of the Dookie mod was the second principal amp on American Idiot.” That meant it stood next to his modded Marshall Super Lead as one of the main sounds on the record

A few years later, when 21st Century Breakdown was being tracked, Butch Vig explained how it was used. In a 2009 MixOnline interview, he said Armstrong double-tracked rhythm guitars with his Les Paul Junior “Floyd” through a Park amp, calling it “like a Marshall, only more dialed up.” For extra overdrive, they layered in a second pair of guitars through a Marshall head.

We did a process where we’d do cleaner guitars — like a Tele — as a left-right pass all the way through the song; then he’d do Floyd, which is one of his Les Paul Juniors, into a Park amp, which is sort of like a Marshall, only more dialed up, left and right. And when we really wanted to hit overdrive, he would go back and do a pair of guitars with a Marshall — they used that for a lot of the big guitars on American Idiot.

Butch Vig – Music: Green Day, Mixonline

The amp never showed up as a regular live amp, but in the studio, it played a significant role in shaping the sound of the two records that pushed Green Day into stadium rock.