Avril Lavigne has hailed Travis Barker a “studio wizard”.
The ‘Complicated’ hitmaker recently signed to the Blink-182 drummer’s DTA Records for her comeback album, ‘Love Sux’, which he contributed to, and Avril says there is “so much more to him than being a drummer”.
She told Uproxx: “It’s just been really great to see him evolve. He’s so much more than a drummer. He has a great sense of production. He knows a lot about songwriting. He’s a businessman. He’s a studio wizard. Like, there’s so much more to him than being a drummer. He spends every waking moment — like, he’s always working, he’s always in the studio. He loves music, he’s so passionate about it, and really shows. I’m really enjoying working with him, because he’s also an artist, so he understands. He’s been around for a long time and doing his thing for a long time, and so have I, and so we can really relate to each other.”
The 37-year-old pop-punk icon admitted it’s important that she makes the music she wants to make, as she hinted fans can expect more music in her signature style.
She said: “I was like ‘I want to make a pop-punk record, let’s f****** go.’ I didn’t have a label at the time, I didn’t have managers. I’m like 20 years into my career and it’s like, I’m just doing this s*** for me now, and I want to make the music I want to make. This is where my heart is, and what I’m feeling. I think it’s like my favourite record.”
‘Love Sux’ also features Machine Gun Kelly, who is among the current generation of pop-punk stars alongside the likes of Olivia Rodrigo and Lil Huddy, and she’s “excited” to see the genre in the mainstream again.
She said: “I’m so stoked to see my friends doing so well in music, and the new generation discovering rock music. If you look at the success of the When We Were Young festival (Las Vegas emo festival), it shows the appetite for this type of music is the strongest it’s ever been. I love that people identify with my music, and I love that it’s come back around. This is the music that I grew up listening to, and that helped shape me as an artist, so I’m really stoked to be a part of it.”