Green Day [ tickets ] has confirmed a persistent rumor of recent note, admitting in an email sent to MTV News that they are the secret identities behind retro rockers the Foxboro Hot Tubs [ tickets ].

The admission shuts the case on a suspicion held for months by many fans who noted a strong similarity between the California pop-punk trio and the mysterious Hot Tubs, who popped up out of nowhere last year and began hyping their debut album, "Stop Drop and Roll!!!," on their website.

"We think that the only similarity is that we are the same band," the band wrote in the email, according to MTV. "That is basically the only similarity."

"We are four guys who love to play music and be spontaneous, [and] after a few late night jams and a few too many bottles of wine, we were inspired to record some rockin' eight-track recordings."

The band didn't mention in the email if it has also been working on the follow-up to its most successful studio album ever, 2004's "American Idiot," but it did invite fans to purchase a digital download of the Hot Tubs' first single, "The Pedestrian," and wait for the album's release, which apparently will be limited to vinyl.

"The record goes up for sale any day. We hope people have a chance to pick up the soon to be released vinyl. If you want to buy it, buy it. If you already have it, buy it anyway!"

The group told MTV it named the side-project after "a place we used to sneak booze and chicks into late at night. But most of the time it was just 'dude soup.'"

The band pulled a similar stunt once before, posing as masked synth-rockers The Network and releasing an album, 2003's "Money Money 2020," on Green Day [ tickets ] frontman Billie Joe Armstrong's Adeline Records label.