With catchy songs like “Fat Lip” and “In Too Deep,” the Canadian band was part of a pop-punk wave that included Blink-182, Simple Plan, Good Charlotte and others.
The band Sum 41 announced on Monday that it was breaking up after 27 years, unleashing a well of nostalgia for the early 2000s, when pop punk seemed ubiquitous on MTV’s “Total Request Live” and in memorable scenes in blockbuster movies.
The Canadian group, fronted by the spiky-haired singer Deryck Whibley, was part of a pop-punk wave that included Blink-182, Simple Plan, Good Charlotte and Avril Lavigne. Their hits included “Fat Lip” and “In Too Deep,” which fans loved to belt out in their car or jump up and down to at shows.
The band’s music was also featured in popular movies from the early 2000s, among them “Spider-Man,” “Dude, Where’s My Car?” and “Bring It On.”
In a statement on Twitter, Sum 41 did not explain why it was disbanding. It said it planned to finish its tour this year and that it would release a final album, “Heaven :x: Hell,” and announce a final tour to celebrate the end of its run.
“Being in Sum 41 since 1996 brought us some of the best moments of our lives,” the band members wrote. “We are forever grateful to our fans both old and new, who have supported us in every way. It is hard to articulate the love and respect we have for all of you and we wanted you to hear this from us first.”
News of the band’s decision led fans to mourn the end of an era. While many punk fans scorned Sum 41 and other groups like it as safe and conventional, pop-punk fans said the music was part of the soundtrack of their youth.
“Fat Lip” reached No. 1 on Billboard’s Alternative Airplay chart after Sum 41’s breakthrough album, “All Killer No Filler,” was released in 2001. And decades later, fans still packed Sum 41’s shows clad in fishnet stockings or dark skinny jeans and heavy eyeliner, accented with tricolor wrist sweatbands.
“Sum 41 is most definitely on the Mount Rushmore of early 2000s pop punk,” said Finn McKenty, the creator of the YouTube series “The Punk Rock MBA,” which features an episode on “The Strange History of Sum 41.”
“To be able to ride the wave of the MTV-type hype that they had and turn that into a career with real longevity and respect is a rare thing that they were able to pull off,” Mr. McKenty said.
The band’s music seemed to capture the spirit of suburban teenage high jinks.
In an interview with Billboard in 2021, Mr. Whibley said that when the band, which formed in suburban Toronto in 1996, was trying to gain notice, its members filmed themselves “doing stupid stuff like drive-by water gunning people, egging houses, and cut it with some film of our shows.”
The band’s manager then sent a three-minute version of the video to record companies.
“And then, it was a matter of weeks,” Mr. Whibley said. “Every label in the U.S. was trying to sign us, and it turned into a big bidding war.”
Mike Damante, the author of “Hey Suburbia: A Guide to the Emo/Pop-Punk Rise,” said that Sum 41 was one of the first popular pop-punk bands to fuse metal and hip-hop and that it was disbanding during “a really nostalgic time period for this time in music.”
In recent years, Sum 41 had toured with Simple Plan and The Offspring.
Mr. McKenty said the band had recently been producing music that was “as good or better” than its music from the early 2000s.
“I always like to see people go out on top, rather than go out sad,” he said.
Source: Music - nytimes.com
