These Elvis and Green Day Hits Have More in Common Than You Might Think

At first glance, there might not be many similarities to find between Elvis and Green Day. But upon closer inspection, two of these musical acts’ biggest hits have a thread of inspiration tying them together. Despite the decades between each track’s release, their connection proves that music—and, in a broader sense, the human experience—doesn’t change much.

When you move past the finer details and get into the essence of music, we’ve been singing about the same thing for centuries: heartbreak, loneliness, and broken dreams.

The Heartbroken Man Behind Heartbreak Hotel

Elvis’ 1956 hit “Heartbreak Hotel” was a groundbreaking success for his career and an equal inspiration to countless rockstars who came after him. The songwriters, Mae Boren Axton and Tommy Durden, long credited the inspiration behind their song to a man’s suicide note, published in a local paper, which read, “I walk a lonely street.” Axton told the Evening News in 1956, “Think of the heartbreak he left behind. Let’s put a heartbreak hotel at the end of that lonely street.”

In reality, the man who coined the metaphor of his life being a walk down a lonely street didn’t commit suicide. A store clerk murdered him after the man attempted to rob him. The “suicide note” in question was actually an excerpt from his unpublished autobiography, which read, “If you stand on a corner with a pack of cigarettes or a bottle and have nothing to do in life, I suggest you sit down and think. This is the story of a person who walked a lonely street,” per Rolling Stone.

The anonymous, heartbroken man in question was Alvin Krolik, an artist and author who turned himself in to the Chicago police after committing a series of armed robberies in the local city area. The surprise of his confession and poetic turns of phrase made headlines across the country. These headlines found their way into the hands of Axton and Durden, who used creative liberty to pen “Heartbreak Hotel.”

Now, let’s take a beat: “I walk a lonely street.” Remind you of anything?

The Connection Between Green Day and Elvis Presley

The opening lines of Green Day’s monumental hit “Boulevard of Broken Dreams” might implement different vocabulary, but the sentiment remains the same. I walk a lonely road, the only one that I have ever known. Later, the song continues, I walk this empty street on the Boulevard of Broken Dreams. Not quite a word-for-word match, but certainly close enough to evoke the same feelings of Elvis’ 1956 hit single.

Considering the inspiration behind Billie Joe Armstrong’s 2004 hit, the connection between Green Day and Elvis becomes even more uncanny. In a 2005 episode of VH1’s Storytellers, Armstrong revealed that he stole the title of the Green Day hit from a Gottfried Helnwein painting of the same name. In the painting, Helnwein riffs on Edward Hopper’s 1942 painting “Nighthawks.” But instead of random diner patrons and a server, Helnwein featured American celebrities James Dean, Humphrey Bogart, Marilyn Monroe, and, you guessed it, Elvis.

It’s unclear whether Armstrong consciously considered Elvis’ “Heartbreak Hotel” when he wrote Green Day’s “Boulevard of Broken Dreams.” Still, the common themes and inspiration serve as an important reminder that our relationship with each other and with music is more steadfast than the passing of time might lead us to believe.

Indeed, when Armstrong sings, Don’t know where it goes, but it’s only me, and I walk alone, one could easily imagine him walking straight toward the Heartbreak Hotel that Mae Boren Axton talked about nearly 50 years earlier.

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