“Like a ticking time bomb, I'm about to explodeeeeeeee. And motherfuckers let's go!” 

And so begins Avril Lavigne's seventh studio album, Love Sux, out now. The line—from the song “Cannonball”—is angsty and maybe even a little rude, but you can't miss the joy in her voice as she shouts over a drumbeat that's so driving it sounds like the heartbeat of someone who just downed three espressos, a Red Bull, and an unknown number of green tea pills. It's everything we've asked Lavigne to be, sonically, since she first came on the scene at 17 years old back in 2002.

If you're reading this, you probably don't need to hear from me how impactful her debut song “Complicated” and its accompanying album Let Go were in the early aughts. Lavigne's image as a pop-punk princess smartly capitalized on the era's trends—a time when the original run of Jackass was on TV, professional skateboarders were the celebs of the moment, and bands like Blink-182 dominated the radio. But it went deeper than that: Speaking from personal experience, I'll say that Lavigne was the first woman whom I—an awkward preteen experiencing a lot of rage I didn't know how to name or understand—saw in the mainstream embrace her angst with glee. Screaming along to hits like “Sk8er Boi” was an incredibly refreshing outlet, and her record sales from the time tell me I can't have been alone. 

Over the course of her decades-long career, Lavigne has found ways to stay relevant and switch up her sound and image without every straying too far off course. She might dye her hair pink for an album or embrace a moodier tone, but she always knew her point of view: It's rock and roll—it's not meant to be that deep. 

Love Sux keeps on with the tradition. “I kind of just got together with my friends and made a really fun record,” she tells me over Zoom. “I didn't want it to be serious or anything…. I just wanted it to be a good time and write songs for the live show.” 

Much like her debut, her timing is impeccable. Pop punk is having a resurgence again thanks to artists like Machine Gun Kelly, who Lavigne recruited to feature on her song “Bois Lie.” Travis Barker, future Mr. Kourtney Kardashian, is a producer. 

“I'm happy that people are loving and appreciating [pop punk] music right now,” she says. “It's always been a part of who I am and where I started, musically. This has been my vibe, always, and it's cool to see a younger generation discovering the O.G. bands and seeing all the collabs that are happening right now. It's a really fun time in music, for sure.”

And for Glamour's latest installment of 5 Songs, 5 Stories, we dive deeper with Avril Lavigne into how, exactly, that vibe has evolved over the years. Read on.

“Complicated”

The debut single off her debut album, this was the song that introduced Lavigne to the world. The 2002 hit was well received and peaked at number two on the Billboard Hot 100. It also scored two Grammy nominations: Song of the Year and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance. 

“Complicated” has a lot of meaning to me. It was a life-changing experience. I sang the song one time, in one take. [Producer Lauren Christy] was like, “Cool, you're done.” That's really rare. It was just Lauren and myself. No one else was there. 

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