\t\t\t\u201cI\u2019m trying to find an orange that doesn\u2019t fade,\u201d Avril Lavigne says with a laugh, stroking fistfuls of her hair.Her lower layers are dip-dyed pale citrus, sticking out from her otherwise bleach-blonde head. Her \u201chair girl\u201d did the dye job in her California home as Lavigne sat in the kitchen, ends covered in tin foil. Now the dye is fading like a sunset. Lavigne\u2019s hair has been a marker of her evolution as a musician ever since she rose to stardom in the early 2000s, as a pin-straight dirty blonde teen singing about Sk8er Bois. She\u2019s had black under layers in her Under My Skin era and streaks of hot pink on The Best Damn Thing album cover. She\u2019s done hints of green (even green and pink together), girly platinum curls, and blonde highlights so bright they\u2019re basically white. The orange, then, is a bold choice but still in character. New, but familiar. \u201cThese are the album colors, orange and black,\u201d she explains. The latter could refer to the black graphic hoodie she\u2019s wearing, or the Zoom background behind her, or her signature heavy eyeliner. Either way, she\u2019s committed to the color theme of Love Sux, her seventh album, which dropped Feb. 25. On the cover, she wears an all-black outfit and holds up black balloons against a red-orange backdrop. <\/p>\n
\tCourtesy DTA Records<\/p>\n
Love Sux is Lavigne\u2019s first album since 2019, and arrives almost 20 years after her smash debut Let Go, which gave us hits like \u201cComplicated.\u201d While her last project, Head Above Water, was a pensive reflection on her struggle with Lyme disease, this one finds her back in her rebellious pop-punk roots. One listen and you\u2019ll feel like flat-ironing your side bangs and lining your arms with rubber bracelets again. The 12-track LP bursts with breakup anthems and a high energy that manifests in hyper drums, head-bopping electric guitar, and don\u2019t-give-a-damn lyrics. \u201cI don\u2019t got time motherfucker, don\u2019t ruin my life,\u201d she warns potential suitors in \u201cBreak of a Heartbreak.\u201d Blink-182 lead singer Mark Hoppus and Machine Gun Kelly are featured on the record, and she wrote it with artists like Travis Barker, who launched the label she\u2019s now signed to, as well as now-boyfriend Mod Sun. If Avril Lavigne, now 37, was ever going to make a comeback, there\u2019s no better time than now. Nostalgia for Y2K and the emo aughts is at its peak, aesthetically and musically. The hottest celebrity couples are Barker and Kourtney Kardashian and Kelly and Megan Fox. (Both pairs were at Lavigne\u2019s concert on the album\u2019s release day.) Platform boots, rocker plaids, and leather pants are in again. Younger artists like WILLOW, Olivia Rodrigo, The Linda Lindas, and Meet Me @ the Altar are putting their own spin on the genre. And the explosive craze over the When We Were Young festival lineup\u2014which includes OG favorites like My Chemical Romance, Paramore, and Lavigne herself\u2014only confirmed that we\u2019re longing for that era more than ever. \u201cI feel like pop-punk is a spirit, it\u2019s an attitude, it\u2019s middle fingers up high in the air,\u201d Lavigne explains. \u201cIt\u2019s an aggressive music where you can just say whatever you want\u2014you don\u2019t have to hold anything in. It\u2019s a lot of fun, and that\u2019s always been the spirit and the tone and vibe of all my concerts throughout the years. Even if my style or music has pivoted a bit.\u201dThat\u2019s the thing about trends: Those of us in the mainstream have dabbled in punk, moved past it, and are only revisiting it now; \u201cBut for me,\u201d Lavigne shrugs, \u201cI\u2019ve always been kind of doing it.\u201d When she first came on the scene, naysayers would argue that Lavigne didn\u2019t write her own music or that she was just co-opting the punk rock sound and skater aesthetic, but two decades later, she\u2019s still standing. At the age when most girls are going to prom or learning to drive, Lavigne was making Let Go. When it was released in 2002, it would go on to peak at number two on the Billboard 200 chart\u2014somewhere alongside Eminem, The Chicks, Ashanti, and Michelle Branch\u2014and earn her eight Grammy nominations including Best New Artist. Her next two albums, 2004\u2019s Under My Skin and 2007\u2019s The Best Damn Thing, both debuted at number one.In the early 2000s, when the hottest girls in music were feminine pop stars like Britney, Christina, and Beyonc\u00e9, Lavigne made her mark as the tomboyish girl next door. The Napanee, Ontario native stood out in a white tank top, army cargo pants, and loose neckties. She sang about posers who pissed her off, star-crossed love between skaters and ballerinas, and longing for attention and love, all with the palpable angst, innocence, and desperation of a teenager. <\/p>\n
\t\tLavigne performing in New York in 2002.
\n\tScott GriesGetty Images<\/p>\n
Her influence on young women, most of whom are now grown millennials, was undeniable. (The lyric, \u201cHe was a boy \/ She was a girl \/ Can I make it any more obvious?\u201d is ingrained into our minds like a core memory.) But 20 years later, Lavigne still can\u2019t fathom the impact of Let Go. \u201cPeople bring it up to me in my interviews and stuff recently. And I\u2019m just like, I don\u2019t know if it\u2019s ever really sunk in,\u201d she says, throwing up one hand as the other holds a cup of tea. \u201cI don\u2019t think it really has.\u201d I attempt to explain why her album meant so much to girls at the time, including myself, but the message doesn\u2019t quite come across. \u201cIt means a lot to hear that. And it\u2019s, again, it\u2019s really hard to believe,\u201d she nearly guffaws here, \u201cthat something I went through that I wrote about, people were connecting with; and it\u2019s just such a beautiful thing that music can do. It\u2019s really dope.\u201d She\u2019s also grateful \u201cthat any of my music has touched so many people.\u201d Lavigne adds, \u201cI just think about my different tours worldwide\u2014China, Japan, Europe\u2014and I\u2019m just this girl from Canada.\u201d But that is, in a sense, the point: Her image as a \u201cregular girl,\u201d even a bit of a troublemaker, was what made her so relatable. She continues to appeal to the young crowd today: \u201cSk8er Boi\u201d has gone viral on TikTok. (Lavigne even joined the app with a video where she lip-synced the song and featured Tony Hawk.) And last year, she also collaborated with 20-year-old WILLOW (Willow Smith), an Avril Lavigne fan herself, on a song called \u201cGrow,\u201d which sounds like it could soundtrack a coming-of-age movie from the \u201800s. \u201cI love what she\u2019s doing; I love that she\u2019s a female in the alternative lane,\u201d Lavigne says, now a fan of WILLOW, too. <\/p>\n
\t\u201cPop-punk is a spirit, it\u2019s an attitude, it\u2019s middle fingers up high in the air.\u201d<\/p>\n
She feels similarly about Olivia Rodrigo. \u201cHonestly, it was really cool meeting Olivia, because she\u2019s having such a huge impact and people are really relating to her because she\u2019s a young songwriter writing about what she\u2019s going through, where she\u2019s experiencing young heartbreak. And I think she\u2019s so real and raw in her lyrics. And when you do that and you do it right, people really connect.\u201d It\u2019s hard not to see the parallels between the success of Rodrigo\u2019s Sour and Lavigne\u2019s own debut. \u201cShe told me she was a huge fan and that was super flattering; it\u2019s crazy that I\u2019m at that point in my life where I\u2019ve been around that long,\u201d Lavigne says in disbelief. \u201cI see so much of myself and my own journey through what she\u2019s doing. She\u2019s her own person, but writing songs at 17 and the first album exploding and then it\u2019s this crazy whirlwind.\u201dLavigne doesn\u2019t listen to her old music unless she\u2019s performing it. I mention that I\u2019ve seen fans tweeting a clip of her singing at the top of her lungs from the \u201cI\u2019m with You\u201d video. The caption is usually saying something about the power of her voice and her talent at such a young age. Lavigne hasn\u2019t seen this tribute specifically, but memories of making the song are still fresh. \u201cI remember being in the booth, I remember recording it. I remember singing the yeah-yeahs.\u201d Admittedly, she isn\u2019t listening to \u201ca whole lot\u201d right now, but she loves playing country artists like Miranda Lambert, Dan + Shay, and Florida Georgia Line when she\u2019s driving in her truck. As one might guess, Lavigne wrote Love Sux after a breakup. (She doesn\u2019t say with whom, though reports broke in late 2019 that she and businessman Phillip Sarofim split after two years together. She was also linked to musician Pete Jonas in early 2020.) \u201cI had plenty of time over the pandemic to reflect on myself. And the album is trials and tribulations of love and that sort of set the tone,\u201d she says. The title track was one of the first songs she wrote for the album. \u201cI was feeling like love sucked and I was feeling exhausted and jaded [about] it. And like love was overrated. And that was the first time I\u2019d ever really felt that way.\u201d You can hear that bitterness in the lyrics. \u201cNot another breakup \/ When I think of you, I just want to throw up,\u201d she says in the chorus of the title track. It\u2019s cathartic and petulant and even a little silly, which Lavigne freely acknowledges. \u201cIt\u2019s a fun record and it helps you laugh about all the messed up things that love can do to you.\u201d Even with her\u2014and the album\u2019s\u2014tough exterior, there are moments of vulnerability, like the piano-led \u201cDare to Love Me.\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s about, \u2018Okay, don\u2019t tell me you love me unless you mean it.\u2019\u201d
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Lavigne\u2019s gripes about heartbreak didn\u2019t last long after she started writing the album. \u201cAnd then a couple days later I had a new boyfriend,\u201d she says, laughing at herself and referring to Mod Sun (whose real name is Derek Smith). In addition to working on Love Sux together, the two musicians released the collab \u201cFlames\u201d in January 2021 before going Instagram official in April. So at this point, does she feel like love still sucks? \u201cI mean, love can be hard, love hurts, it doesn\u2019t always end well. It usually doesn\u2019t,\u201d Lavigne adds with an almost-cackle. She\u2019s been through two marriages, the first with Sum 41\u2019s Deryck Whibley and the second with Nickelback\u2019s Chad Kroeger, which ended in 2015. But Lavigne is a libra; she loves love, she says. \u201cI definitely want to be in a relationship and I am; I\u2019m super happy and I\u2019m in a really good place in my life now,\u201d she continues. \u201cAnd I think love is what ultimately keeps you coming back for more.\u201d Lavigne started making Love Sux without management or a record label and ended up with what she calls her \u201cdream album.\u201d Two decades into her career, she just wanted to have fun on her own terms. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of business stuff that can always get in the way and record labels that chime in and give you direction and deadlines and tell you what way your music needs to be, what direction you need to go in,\u201d she says. \u201cI\u2019ve always had to fight for my own sound and the vision of my record.\u201dLater on, looking back at her early days, she adds, \u201cI\u2019ve been in situations where I\u2019ve been uncomfortable with the direction they want to push me towards or the people they want me to work with. There\u2019s definitely been battling over the years.\u201d But she clarifies: \u201cI had a lot of support early on from songs to image and everything.\u201d She shouts out L.A. Reid, who signed her to Arista back in 2000, for letting her \u201cdo my thing.\u201d Not a lot of people let her do that back then. When she was making her first album, she remembers getting in the studio and the first batch of people she worked with in New York \u201cweren\u2019t really listening to me.\u201d (She recalls thinking of the songs they offered her, \u201cThis shit\u2019s terrible.\u201d) Eventually she clicked with Clif Magness and the songwriting team The Matrix (Lauren Christy, Graham Edwards, and Scott Spock) in L.A., and the rest is history. <\/p>\n
\t\u201cI\u2019ve always had to fight for my own sound and the vision of my record.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lavigne pushed to write or co-write her own songs, and pushed back against \u201cbubblegum pop\u201d\u2014that \u201cwas not my style at all,\u201d she recalls. Even if her music was pop-adjacent, it still had edge; it was all a balancing act. After all, she was a high schooler listening to the Goo Goo Dolls, Matchbox Twenty, Blink-182, Green Day, and Alanis Morissette. \u201cSo when I made my album, I just wanted to fucking rock and I wanted my music to be guitar-driven. I definitely had to express that over and over and over because it wouldn\u2019t have gone that way.\u201d Despite the clashing opinions, Lavigne is ultimately \u201cproud of all the albums and the songs on them.\u201dWith 20 years under her studded belt, where does Lavigne see herself in the next 20? She first pauses to do the math. \u201cThat\u2019s old,\u201d she realizes. \u201cI don\u2019t know, honestly, still doing this, probably.\u201d She mentions Paul McCartney, who\u2019s almost 80 and is still making music and touring, and imagines a similar future for herself. \u201cI think that I\u2019ll write songs for the rest of my life and I think I\u2019ll always record music,\u201d she says confidently, the hood of her sweatshirt now covering her head. Surely, a career like Lavigne\u2019s must have required some leaps of faith, so I ask her about the biggest risk she\u2019s ever taken. She takes a moment to search for the answer. \u201cUm\u2026\u201d her voice trails and her eyes drift off-screen. \u201cI don\u2019t really think it\u2019s that deep,\u201d she replies. \u201cIt\u2019s just rock and roll, baby.\u201d<\/p>\n
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