Avril Lavigne back to making music

The once hailed “pop-punk princess” of the early 2000’s is set to return to the music scene with her fifth yet to-be-titled album. This  will be a follow up to her 2011 studio release “Goodbye Lullaby.” The track “Here’s To Never Growing Up”  has been announced to be the lead single. Although the whole track has yet to come out, a 13-second snippet has been made available and it serves as a hint to what musical direction the album will be. While Avril Lavigne is already 28 years of age, she isn’t exactly still a representation of the “teen angst” she once was. Neither is she that old  to be considered as just another artist trying to recapture her youthful appeal. There are other artists who are younger than Avril Lavigne but the immediate impression music lovers get is that they are much older than they appear to be. While I think it is no easy task for Avril Lavigne to reclaim the height of her popularity, she did make a few crucial career moves that should help raise her “stock” in the record industry again. Avril Lavigne is now signed to Epic Records and L.A. Reid is again under his tutelage the chances of making it big again

While we are looking forward to her new studio-release, I would like to give a brief background of her career thus far and some points worth enumerating. At the beginning of her rise to fame, a lot of young lesser-informed music lovers thought Avril Lavigne pioneered the whole “pop-punk” style. No, she did not. She is one of the artists, though responsible for bringing it back into the awareness of the mainstream consciousness of listeners in the early 2000’s. Again, you must be asking why with the word “mainstream” ? Because Avril Lavigne was one the most successful artists of that musical style, as also one of the main reasons millions of teens all over the world got into the whole pop-punk movement, in the first place. It doesn’t hurt either that her music is radio-friendly, readily accessible, and quite popular–all of these valid points making her a household name.

Another Canadian sensation

Not a lot of people realized back then that Avril Lavigne is Canadian, and not of American descent. Why so? It was because Avril Lavigne’s music was so ingrained in the pop culture in the States for a time that a lot of people simply assumed she was American. This has nothing to do with race and nationality. It is just that many music lovers are “programmed” and have a pre-set mental disposition that big artists originate from the States. On the other side, this proves that Canada is home to such an abundant number of young pop and rock stars. Avril Lavgine was one of those young stars from Canada who were coming out of the woodwork and making an impact overseas. That is a prime example of the crossover appeal of Avril Lavigne.

The ‘anti-Britney’ labelling

Around the same time of Avril’s rise to fame, Britney Spears was still ranked as the number one female pop star in the world. However, the whole “bubble-gum” pop movement was on its final leg and the music scene was drastically changing as well. There was a new influx of artists and Avril was one of them. Whether it was because of the timely debut of Avril Lavigne or, for no apparent reason, she was referenced to be the “anti-Britney” artist by many music critics which description really didn’t stick to Avril, nor did it do anything to affect her overwhelming popularity with millions of teens in the world over, the “anti-Britney” label kinda just flew over the heads of people because Avril never expressed any “real” resentment toward Britney Spears back then. All those appeared to be a marketing ploy to make Avril appear more credible as a “pop-punk” artist. A lot of music lovers then had a higher respect for any artist who didn’t like pop stars. That was the train of thought before and for many music lovers fed up with the “bubble-gum” pop movement, it was cool to dislike artists like Britney Spears.

From dating ‘Sk8r boi’s’ to becoming the future Ms. Kroeger

Avril Lavigne announced in 2012 that she is engaged to Chad Kroeger, the frontman for Nickelback which happens to be a Canadian-rock band.  Her professional career may not be as “high” as it was before but her personal life is going well and it is on a rebound. All she needs now is her soon-to-be-released fifth album to be a smash hit. That would be a nice advanced gift for the future Ms. Kroeger. It would be interesting to see the two will make beautiful music together and how marriage a second time (for her) affect this time the professional career of Avril Lavigne ?

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