Picture this, it’s the year 2002, and the music industry is jam-packed with superstars. Jennifer Lopez became the first female recording artist to have a number-one film and album simultaneously, Eminem is rap’s best-selling artist, the Neptunes are the hottest producers on the scene, Destiny’s Child are riding high as a trio, and Madonna and Janet Jackson are still on top of their game. Not to mention that there was a brand spanking new generation of pop divas in Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, and Pink.
In March of that year, an unknown 17-year-old singer from Belleville, Ontario, Canada, named Avril Lavigne would kickstart her own rise to superstardom with her first single, “Complicated.” The Matrix-produced track, co-written about people who feign in front of others, was an instant hit with listeners and quickly paved the way for the punk-pop sound that would later dominate the charts. Lavigne’s debut studio album “Let Go,” which continued to boast the hits “Sk8er Boi” and “I’m With You,” sold a hefty 16 million copies around the world, welcomed a whole wave of guitar-driven female rockers, including Hayley Williams (Paramore), Jenna McDougall (Tonight Alive), and The Veronicas, and helped mold the refreshingly raw sound for albums from the likes of Kelly Clarkson, Ashlee Simpson, Miley Cyrus, and Demi Lovato.
What made Lavigne’s come up so alarming was that she was debuting after an era of manufactured pop groups and squeaky-clean teen idols. She played instruments, wrote her own music, and had an uncompromising attitude that didn’t feel forced — which would be why critics referred to her as the “anti-Britney” or the “female answer to Blink-182.” Managing to capture the hearts of a young audience who had her posters on their walls, it wasn’t just her sound and attitude that was getting all the attention. Lavigne’s tomboyish sense of style was a wardrobe revolution in its own right. The singer sported her trademark baggy jeans, camo pants, studded bracelets, and her necktie-and-tank-top-combinations, and set an immediate trend and allowed her to be embraced as a fashion icon, resulting in fans rushing to their nearest Hot Topic store as a means to emulate the same look.
Reflecting on that time period, Lavigne admits it’s a cultural moment that still takes her by surprise today as she didn’t realize that her authenticity would then be reproduced by fans who wanted to be just like her. “It was really flattering. I was always just being myself and dressing how I wanted to, so to see others taking on my style, I really couldn’t believe it,” she tells MOOD. “I remember showing up to morning shows, award shows, or talk shows and seeing girls dressed like me with the tie or the baggy pants and thinking, ‘Wow, that’s crazy.’ It was all happening so fast that everything at that time was a surprise.”
With such a distinctive look so early on, Lavigne jokes that her dad, Jean-Claude Lavigne, was her first fashion icon. “The first tie I ever wore I took from my dad, so I guess he was?” she says. But really, it was being “drawn towards the skate culture” during high school that she states helped find her identity, and would shape an entire generation’s fashion choices.
In all honesty, very few musicians have been able to shift music and fashion culturally with just one album release. Lavigne, however, is among a short list of artists that can actually brag about doing so. She was what label executives would refer to as having “the full package.” But while enjoying a lot of success can be really validating, taking in the whirlwind as a teenager was a lot for Lavigne to digest, especially when everything was so new to her. “I don’t think I totally realized what was going on,” Lavigne admits. “I always had so much purity and love for music, but to be honest, I was relieved it was working so I didn’t have to go back to school,” she adds with a laugh. “I definitely had no idea what my future had in store and every day I am so grateful for this experience.”
With the industry being so fast-paced and creatives always working on what’s to come, it’s not often that artists are able to look back and indulge in nostalgia for very long. For “Let Go’s” 20th anniversary last year, Lavigne made sure to find the time to celebrate with fans. To honor its milestone, Lavigne recreated the album artwork by posing on the exact same crossing in New York where the original was taken. “I was on the way to Madison Square Garden to play with Machine Gun Kelly and we stopped by the spot where we took the original photo,” Lavigne says. “It was like stepping back into a time machine and recreating the moment, it was super sentimental to me.”
