Album review: Billie Joe Armstrong, Norah Jones are like brothers

Close your eyes and imagine what a tribute to the Everly Brothers featuring Norah Jones and Billie Joe Armstrong of Green Day would sound like. “Foreverly,” Jones’ and Armstrong’s ode to the brothers’ work, sounds identical to the renditions of the imagination: clean, honest, simple in a beautiful way and, if you wear the cynic’s cap, pointless.

As such, it’s one of the most rebellious things each has done. Somewhat akin to director Gus Van Sant’s remaking Alfred Hitchcock’s “Psycho,” “Foreverly” pairs the singers in celebration of what Armstrong considers to be a buried classic: the 1958 Everly Brothers album of traditionals, “Songs Our Daddy Taught Us.”

PHOTOS: Unexpected musical collaborations

The original versions highlighted the razor sharp harmonies of Phil and Don Everly, best known for their teen hit “Wake Up Little Susie.” Jones and Armstrong’s update can’t possibly rise to that level of genetically rooted harmony. Still, in songs such as “That Silver Haired Daddy of Mine,” the devoted ballad “Oh So Many Years” and the gripping murder ballad “Down in the Willow Garden,” the pair makes a valid argument for the project. Essential? Hardly. But one listen to the lovely “Who’s Gonna Shoe Your Pretty Little Feet,” confirms that it’s also pointless to quibble with such an oft-blissful tribute to harmony and artistic curiosity.

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Billie Joe Armstrong and Norah Jones

“Foreverly”

(Reprise)

Three stars