In her native Canada, Avril Lavigne is a big star. The 23-year-old punk-popster competes with Celine Dion for Juno Awards (Canada's Grammys), and the press gossips about her life (she's not pregnant) and a recent lawsuit over songwriting credits (she settled out of court after being accused of cribbing "Girlfriend" from the Rubinoos' 1979 tune "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend").
"Girlfriend" was a huge hit; in fact, it was named the top download of 2007 by International Federation of the Phonographic Industry.
Now she's finally getting around to touring behind "Girlfriend" and her third consecutive No. 1 album, "Best Damn Thing."
"Best Damn Thing" came out last April. Do you have any second thoughts about not going on tour right away and keeping fans waiting for almost a year?
I think it could have gone either way. I think it probably didn't really matter that much. You always have to do promo (promotion). I did promo all of 2007, I had to go to so many different places, including Asia, Europe and South America. I had a lot of places to go, a lot of TV shows to do, and a lot of photo shoots and all that stuff. It has to be done if you want to work a record really hard, and I chose to work this one hard.
Dancing? I thought you were the anti-Britney and anti-Christina. They do dancing and big production numbers.
My songs aren't bubble-gum pop dance songs, and I don't have background dancers on every single song like them. I'm not wearing a headphone microphone on my head. It's a totally different thing. There's dancing on maybe like four songs, and it's not really much dancing. It's very me; it's very kicking and punching and stomping and marching, stuff that I was always doing on stage. And then it's me playing my guitar, me on the piano, me with my band the entire show, and then at the end (the dancers) come in again, so it's not a lot. And I've been doing it at festivals and stuff like that, so I've actually been doing it for a year now, so it doesn't feel new anymore. But I guess it will be for a lot of people to see. It's not over the top too much. The show is very me; it rocks. It's just the next level.
You've said that you're more confident now. What brought that about?
Well, a lot of people don't know this about me but I'm actually shy around people I don't know. I would just say with my first tour, I didn't really talk onstage, I was like, "Thank you, I love you guys," or whatever. But now I've just kind of learned to work a crowd. I've played so many shows now - it's been five years - and I've just kind of learned how to talk to an audience.
"Best Damn Thing" is a return to the energetic punk-pop of your debut, which is quite a departure from its predecessor, the very serious "Under My Skin." Why?
I got off tour and I started writing right away, and all I wanted to do was just write really fun songs that weren't serious and like break-up boyfriend songs. Because my previous record was really dark and deep, and so I got that out and I spent a whole year and a half singing those songs, so now I wanted to go and write really fun songs, upbeat, so I could just have fun and just jump around on stage and not be so dark. So it always changes, yes.
You recently trademarked your name. Will that translate into any fun products?
I'm going to be doing a fragrance and I'm also going to be doing a clothing line. It's a clothing line I wanted to do for about three years. A lot of times what people do is they do a licensing deal, and I didn't want to do that; I wanted to own a company and really be able to be a designer and be creative. And I've finally found someone to partner up with, and I'm very excited about it because I love clothes. I love anything visual.
If you go
What: Avril Lavigne with Boys Like Girls
When: 7 p.m. Saturday
Where: Ford Amphitheatre, Florida State Fairgrounds, Tampa
Tickets: $45 general admission, $45-$15 reserved seats, $9 festival lawn
Information: (813) 287-8844
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