Last week, Encanto continued to dominate the Billboard charts . This is the 8th week that the soundtrack of this Disney animated film has held the No. 1 position. Luckily for audiences looking for new music, there are quite a few albums released in the Top 10, the most popular of which is No. 9 Love Sux by Avril Lavigne .
Love Sux earned 30,000 equivalent album units in the US in the week ending March 3, according to MRC Data. Of that, 19,000 were from album sales.
20 years of continuous operation
Love Sux marks Avril Lavigne’s first return to the Billboard 200 Top 10 since 2013 ( Avril Lavigne, No. 5). In total, this is the pop punk queen’s sixth Top 10. 2022 also marks the 20th anniversary of Lavigne’s chart entry. Her first was with her debut album Let Go , which peaked at No. 2 in 2002. She boasts two No. 1s, Under The Skin (2004) and The Best Damn Thing (2007).
Love Sux is Lavigne’s seventh studio album, consisting of 12 songs, released on February 25, 2022 through DTA Records and Elektra. In this first studio album since Above Water (2019), she collaborated with many names such as Machine Gun Kelly, Blackbear and Mark Hoppus of Blink-182. The album was led by 2 singles Bite Me and Love It When You Hate Me.
Avril Lavigne on the cover of “Love Sux”
Critics have been generally positive about Love Sux , with a Metacritic score of 74/100, based on 11 reputable sources. Love Sux can easily be dismissed as a throwback to Lavigne’s 2000s glory. But in truth, it shows her coming of age as an artist. It’s more of an antidote to pop than a throwback to the old days. Still, it has all the elements that made Lavigne so beloved. Catchy and powerful, the album delivers a 10-point energy almost immediately, and rarely falters over its 33-minute runtime.
Still, there were mixed reviews, and while the album was a lot of fun, especially for those who were in their teens at the time of Let Go , the 37-year-old Lavigne feels like a 2002 clone looking to make an impression in 2022.
Avril Ramona Lavigne was born in 1984 in Ontario, Canada. Lavigne’s parents soon noticed her singing ability when 2-year-old Avril could sing Jesus Loves Me on the way home from church. Her father, Jean-Claude, was also a music lover and often took the family to church where he played bass.
As a result, Avril’s parents enthusiastically supported her singing career. Her father bought her a microphone, a drum set, a keyboard, a few guitars, and turned their basement into a recording studio. At the age of 14, her parents took her to karaoke. Her first performances were at country fairs, covering songs by Garth Brooks, The Chicks, and Shania Twain. She later wrote her own music.
At the age of 15, Lavigne won a radio contest. The prize was to sing with Shania Twain in Ottawa, in front of 20,000 people. They sang What Made You Say That together and the young Lavigne revealed to her senior that she wanted to be “a famous singer”. Also in 1999, she was invited to contribute vocals to local country artist Stephen Medd’s album.
In late 1999, Lavigne was discovered by her first professional manager, Cliff Fabri, while singing in a bookstore. Fabri sent Lavigne’s performance tape to several potential music industry clients. During her 15-minute audition with Arista Records, she impressed them so much that the label signed her to a $1.25 million two-album contract. After signing the contract, with her parents’ approval, Lavigne dropped out of school to focus on her career.
Lavigne with producer Travis Barker, with whom she collaborated extremely well on “Love Sux”
Surpassing the expectations of her parents and label, her debut album, Let Go , debuted at number two in the US and number one in Australia, Canada and the UK – making the 17-year-old Lavigne the youngest solo female artist to have a number one album in the UK. By the end of 2002, the album had been certified four times platinum by the RIAA, and she was the best-selling female artist of 2002, with Let Go being the best-selling debut of the year. To date, it is the best-selling album of the 21st century by a Canadian artist.
From there, Lavigne became a key musician in the development of pop punk music, dubbed the “ Queen of Pop Punk ” for paving the way for female-driven, punk-influenced pop in the 2000s. Her subsequent albums also achieved impressive results. To date, she has released seven studio albums and many other products, receiving numerous awards and nominations, including eight Grammy nominations.
Despite the pressure of being successful at such a young age, Lavigne doesn’t put too much emphasis on Love Sux. In fact, this is an extremely easy album for her to make, it feels like “going back to high school, hanging out with the people I grew up with”. At the time she started making the album, she was not under any record label, had no manager, didn’t need a deadline, didn’t have to listen to anyone sigh or give opinions. Lavigne simply met like-minded, fun, interesting friends, didn’t need to hold back to make Love Sux really explode.
Putting aside the pop and ballad songs that could have been popular in her previous albums, with Love Sux, Lavigne only wanted pure pop punk and rock and roll – true to her nature. Lavigne also said that although there are still breakup and heartbreak songs, Love Sux is basically quite happy, carrying strength and a positive message to everyone to stand up for their own values. This is “the album that I wanted to make my whole career” – Lavigne proudly said.
Lavigne is in high spirits right now. She’s ready to tour for years to come and is still writing a lot. She’s written about 30 songs for this album and is still coming out with a lot of creativity . She’s so excited, she believes her next project will be like an extension of Love Sux.
