Avril Lavigne: does this pop punkette deserve a Grammy, or to be grounded?

Interview, March, 2003 by Dimitri Ehrlich

Back when Iggy Pop was rolling around in broken glass, nobody imagined that punk rock could be a cash cow. Cut to last April, when a freshly scrubbed 17-year-old tomboy appeared on MTV, mouthing mock-angry lyrics. She looked so clean you could almost smell the Body Shop Dewberry Perfume Oil wafting off her.

The fact that Avril Lavigne, now 18, is being labeled the punk anti-Britney has the green hairs standing up on the back of punk purists' necks. Reading of her childhood in Napanee, Ontario, one gets the sense Lavigne spent more time playing hockey and hunting than collecting Bad Brains seven-inches. But despite a few nonbelievers, Lavigne's prickly-pop debut, Let Go (Arista) has sold close to 10 million copies worldwide.

So how to explain the cult of Avril? Her appeal is not so much her image (rebel-lite) or her voice (adequate without being showy), but her songs, supremely crafted pop with a thin crust of teen angst. These catchier-than-Ebola confections are hard to resist, not because of their aggression but because of their charming adherence to classic pop formula. You can't argue with those melodies, nor with the five Grammy Awards she was nominated for. As for the debate over her punk rock credentials, Lavigne is apathetic about punk despite being publicly associated with it. When she smashes her guitar in her videos it's as transgressive as someone blowing an air kiss. She sings with a look of studied boredom that says, "Whatever. Can I get back to shooting ducks?"

When you think about it, punk rock always was about flipping the bird to the world. And here she is, literally flipping birds out of the sky, making hits as if they were an afterthought, and yawning her way to the bank. What's more punk than that?

Dimitri Ehrlich is Interview's Music Editor at Large. Right: Avril Lavigne an the set of the video for her song "I'm with You."