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March 8, 2008

“I’M WITH THE SK8ER BOI”:  THE CONSTRUCTION OF AVRIL LAVIGNE’S TOMBOY ANTI-POP STAR PERSONA AND ITS REFLECTION AND ARTICULATION IN STYLISTIC ELEMENTS OF THE HIT SONG “SK8ER BOI”

Sundar Subramanian

Studies In Popular Music

6320.03

            Avril Lavigne, a teenage girl from smalltown Ontario, has been a hugely popular and visible pop phenomenon since last year, with the second best-selling album of 2002[1] and two number one singles, including “Sk8er Boi”.  This study will argue first that Lavigne’s persona, as has been constructed through channels of mass media and marketing, is one that has largely been constructed as that of a young female pop star who is oppositional to contemporary female pop stars such as Britney Spears.  She has been positioned as a youthful ‘tomboy’ figure who is less associated with glamorous, sexualized fashion or a ‘sex object’ type of image.  She has been associated with constructions of perceived ‘rock’ or ‘punk’ authenticity (albeit in a somewhat conflicted manner) as well as with certain aspects of traditional morality and community.  Reference will be made to coverage in mass media outlets such as Maclean’s magazine, Rolling Stone magazine, and MTV, as well as Lavigne’s offical web page.  Stylistic elements of “Sk8er Boi” will then be analysed to demonstrate that this is a distinctive piece of music which reflects and signifies all of these elements of Lavigne’s distinctive persona in its music, vocal delivery, and lyrics.  The instrumental track will be discussed to argue that the combination of a loud postpunk guitar rock idiom with a high level of studio production in the specific manner of the song implies a certain degree of ‘rock’ or ‘punk’ authenticity while at the same time contradicting certain elements of ‘rock’ or ‘punk’ ideals in a manner appropriate to a ‘tomboy’ pop star.  Similarly, vocal delivery will be compared to contemporary examples of both ‘pop’ and ‘punk’ voices to demonstrate its distinctiveness from both as well as its incorporation of signifiers from these idioms as well as outside sources to signify Lavigne’s distinct persona.  Finally lyrical style and content will be considered in terms of these elements. 

            Lavigne’s youth is one element of her image which is strongly emphasized in the media and marketing.  For example, her official web page contains a “Journal” section.  The first entry (“My first journal entry”) reads:

Howdy.

This is my first journal entry. Sorry I didn’t get it up earlier. I’m gonna try to get things up more often .(sic) My life’s been real crazy lately, but I’m gonna try to make time for this more often.

I’ve been starting to realize how special fans are lately. I get approached quite often now and am realizing that people do care, and people do want to hear from me. Sweet. I like writing and expressing myself, so this should be fun.

Right now I’m sitting in the Pittsburgh airport. I just finished eating a McDonalds crispy chicken sandwich,… I feel sick. Now a days it feels like half of my life is spent on airplanes and in airports ……..BORING!!! I’m going to Norfolk , VA for some radio promotion. Then I’m off to NYC for a couple of days. I’m doing TRL soon.

Today I was in Toronto making a cameo appearance in the new Treble Charger video for "Hundred Million" It’s a good song. Swollen Members, Gob, and Sum 41 were also making cameo appearances. We did a bit of stage diving and moshing. Good times.

Much Music came by and I did a little interview with them. I also had 2 photo shoots, and another interview. I felt bad cause I was really rushed and couldn’t stop to sign autographs and do pictures for every one who wanted them. I tried!! You know it’s really cool when people ask for a hug. I love it. Hugs are special. I think they are important.

I love hugs!!

I’m gonna go cause I’m tired k.

Avril

P.S. my cd comes out in like a week. June 4. all I can really say is…..Finally!

Peace.[2]

The diction used throughout is typical of the conversational tone of a Canadian teenager.  Examples can be seen in the use of the contraction “gonna”, the use of “real” as an adverb instead of “really”, the one-word declaration “Sweet”, the exclamation “BORING!!!!” with multiple exclamation marks, the descriptive phrase “really cool”, and the abbreviation “k” for “okay”.  Also notable are the references to “stage diving and moshing”, which remain popular youth activities at rock concerts.

            When Shanda Deziel wrote about Lavigne in the cover story for Maclean’s magazine’s January 13, 2003 issue, Lavigne’s youth was heavily emphasized.  After noting that Lavigne was in a “foul mood” on the day of the interview, she comments:

Has Lavigne already become a spoiled rock ‘n’ roll diva who considers it her right to mope through an interview?  She’s certainly rich and famous enough for that.  But after witnessing two concerts, watching her and her band’s innocent backstage antics, and grabbing some more one-on-one time which yielded brief moments of animated conversation, a couple of smiles and even one hearty laugh, I’m ready to give Avril the benefit of the doubt.  She’s probably just a typically moody young person – likeable when she’s up and trying when she’s down.  Her celebrity doesn’t seem to have hit yet, but what has struck is the teenage blues.  And she has to contend with them in that pressure cooker known as pop stardom.[3]

Lavigne is presented then as a ‘typical’ teenager, one who has not even been changed by celebrity.  Her irritability, which in another pop star might be ascribed to arrogance (“a spoiled rock ‘n’ roll diva”), is ascribed instead to “the teenage blues”.  Her mother, Judy, is later quoted:  “’She’s still a teenager’, says Judy.  ‘We have three teenagers.  We go through a lot of changes and mood swings.’”[4]

            Lavigne’s father John is also quoted:

He wishes she wouldn’t talk about drinking in interviews, but recognizes she’s 18 and has to experience things for herself.  He calls her a prankster:  “She can stir the pot if she wants to.  If she didn’t have this [career] she’d be in more trouble than you can shake a stick at.”[5]

It is notable not only that Lavigne’s youthful need for experience and rebelliousness are emphasized but also that her parents are still referred to as authorities in this context.

            Also important to consider is the construction of femininity that is presented and emphasized in coverage and presentation of Lavigne.  One archetype often used to describe her is that of the ‘tomboy’:  “. . . against a backdrop of hypersexualized stars like Britney Spears, she’s emerged as a tomboyish, skateboard-toting alternative for both boys and girls”[6].  After quoting her father John on Lavigne’s ‘prankster’ nature, Deziel also mentions Lavigne’s participation in a boys’ ice hockey league and her propensity for fighting:

But when asked about her self-perpetuated reputation for fighting, he [John] says, “I don’t think she looks for fights, but she can hold her own if she has to.  She’s had enough of those in hockey.”

At ages 10 and 11, Lavigne played in a boy’s league in Napanee.  “One time,” John recalls, “the two teams were coming off the ice and next thing you know there’s a great big commotion and moms and dads were pulling out.  I went to the dressing room thinking, ‘Who’s that rotten kid that started this?’ and . . . she started it.”  She also played baseball and was a pretty good pitcher.  In Grade 10, she discovered skateboarding.[7]

Lavigne’s participation in activities that are traditionally coded as masculine is emphasized here – not only did she participate in sports but she participated in violent (hockey) and dangerous (skateboarding) sports and was not only a participant in hockey fights but an instigator. 

She jokes, pointing out that touring with her own sk8er punk band of rocker boys probably won’t be all that different from her childhood, “I was always a tomboy and I guess I still am.  I played hockey during fall/winter and baseball in the summer.  I loved playing with the boys.”[8]

            A conservative element could perhaps be observed in this oppositional positioning.  Britney Spears is perceived as inauthentic because she “dresses like a showgirl” and “dances like a ho” – Lavigne even compares her to a prostitute, using a derogatory slang term, because she wears revealing clothing.  She loses authenticity (“She’s not being herself. . .”) by behaving in a conventionally sexually provocative manner. 

            And Lavigne’s Christian, traditionally moral upbringing has been emphasized in the media coverage:

Lavigne therefore also emphasizes her virtuosity, her facility as a songwriter, as another source of authenticity.

            The Matrix team, however, ascribe to themselves a greater role in the writing of the same song:

            Eliscu confronted Lavigne with the Matrix’s version of the songwriting process:

Salient points here are that Lavigne felt it important to present herself as a primary songwriter.  Even when a conflicting version of the songwriting process was presented to her, she perceived the songs she did with the Matrix as representing a ‘pop’ compromise she does not want to continue.  She sees songs she wrote herself as being more ‘rock’ and more authentic whereas the more ‘pop’ Matrix songs are less authentic, pressed on her by her label.  She presents her harder, more ‘rock’ songs as the ones with which she has greater personal investment.

One can observe that Lavigne’s image has been defined largely as oppositional to contemporary female pop stars.  Her identity as a teenage girl is important but the construction of femininity offered is that of a ‘tomboy’ who maintains ties to her community and traditional morality while remaining more authentic than other teenage female pop stars by the use of ‘rock’ and ‘punk’ aesthetic signifiers and collaborative affiliations, an anti-fashion statement, and concern with more traditionally ‘rock’ signifiers of authenticity such as personal involvement with songwriting.

“Sk8er Boi”

            Lavigne’s song “Sk8er Boi” will now be discussed in terms of these elements. Musically, the song is a piece of up-tempo post-punk ‘power pop’-like rock music with heavily distorted guitars.  This is worth considering in terms of both Lavigne’s concern with ‘rock’-identified authenticity and her ‘tomboy’ image.  She has clearly demonstrated an interest in associating herself with harder styles of rock music in terms of its value in terms of ‘authenticity’ – this can be observed in the choice of idioms for this song. 

            Hard rock music, especially in its classic form (which is, admittedly, somewhat  different from the idiom of “Sk8er Boi”), has traditionally been seen by many critics, such as Frith and McRobbie or Reynolds and Press[32], as heavily masculinist – Frith and McRobbie famously labeled the genre “cock rock” in “Rock and Sexuality”[33].  By associating herself with a harder style of rock, Lavigne may be helping to set herself up as a ‘tomboy’ in comparison to other female pop stars.  Frith and McRobbie did, however, see punk as having oppositional qualities to more classic forms of hard rock in this regard:

Punk involved an attack on both romantic and permissive conventions.  In their refusal to let their sexuality be constructed as a commodity some punks went as far as to deny their sexuality any significance at all.  “My love lies limp,” boasted Mark Perry of Alternative TV.  “What is sex anyway” asked Johnny Rotten, “Just thirty seconds of squelching noises.”  Punk was the first form of rock not to rest on love songs, and one of its effects has been to allow female voices to be heard that are not often allowed expression on record, stage, or radio – shrill, assertive, impure individual voices, the sounds of singers like Poly Styrene, Siouxsie, Fay Fife of the Rezillos, Pauline of Penetration. . .[34]

            The style of the song’s musical track is not exactly punk rock but does contain signifiers of the genre’s influence as opposed to other styles of hard rock – the absence of guitar solos or lead guitar parts at all, the use of palm-muted eighth-note strumming, the absence of overtly blues-derived harmonic or rhythmic elements.  While Lavigne’s voice is not being compared here to the classic punk rock singers discussed by Frith and McRobbie, the use of a similar or affiliated idiom can still carry connotations of meanings implied by or associated with the musics of these artists.  These can include a feminist reclaiming of a traditionally masculine aesthetic (that of aggressive guitar rock) as well as a rejection of traditional constructions of femininity.  Both of these are relevant here.  As well, punks’ “refusal to let their sexuality be constructed as a commodity” is comparable to Lavigne’s disgust with the displays of artists like Britney Spears and her emphasis on a less sexually provocative image.  To “deny [one’s] sexuality any significance at all” can, it can be remembered, carry a reactionary subtext and imply, even if unconsciously, certain traditional or conservative moral attitudes.  

            At the same time that the piece is loud guitar rock, the guitar texture is heavily produced and layered in a ‘pop’ manner which can be seen as oppositional to some traditional hard rock ideals.  A large part of the song’s distinctive nature and possibly its appeal might in fact be seen to lie in the production used on the guitars.  For example, at 0:26, the ‘punk’-style rhythm guitar strumming is overlaid with a brief melodic figure that appears in the left channel, distorted to created an almost organ-like timbre (though the attack of the plucked guitar string is preserved), followed by a reverberating ‘wind’-like sound effect that resembles, possibly, the fade-out of a distorted strum, possibly generated with a volume pedal.  At 0:35, these two effects are repeated, with the reverberating sound effect appearing in the right channel this time.  At 0:38, the sound of a scraped guitar string is laid over the track to introduce the chorus.  When the chorus begins at 0:40, a higher, lighter ringing drone-like guitar sound is laid over the track, like a synthesizer might be used in some other cases, to change the mood of the track for the chorus.  This effect moves from the left channel to the right and is repeated.  At 0:53, towards the end of the chorus, a high resonant guitar distortion sound appears and slides downwards to a degree, coinciding with the phrase “She needed to come back down to earth”.  During the second verse, the organ-like melodic figure is repeated at a louder dynamic level throughout the verse, repeating in strict stereo separation.  It sounds like chorus and a high level of compression are used as well as distortion, reminiscent of the guitar tone in Van Halen’s “Ain’t Talkin’ ‘Bout Love”.  The timbre changes slightly each time to allow more of the higher harmonics with each repetition, creating a sense of anticipation towards the chorus.  During this chorus, there are even more effects laid over the track, some like scratches on guitar strings, some more like electronic sound effects (such as ‘swoops’).  After the chorus, an electronic ‘swoop’ introduces a ‘break’ of sudden stopped chords and treated vocal samples.  At least three layers of guitars can be heard in the bridge, one strumming the muted eighth-note rhythm, one playing the main ‘riff’ of the song, one providing a higher drone-like effect.  In the next section, a more ethereal sound is used.  Guitars are fingerpicked with reverb and chorus while the vocals are delayed and reverberated.  It sounds like one track provides a ‘drone’-like effect while another features these arpeggiated guitars in the left channel.  Chorus-effected guitars are strummed in the right channel.  Then, a quieter verse begins.  The melodic verse progression is plucked with the strings muted, then the organ-like figure is superimposed to create greater density of sound.  A ‘hum’ grows in volume through this section, building to a high-pitched electronic ‘swoop’ that introduces the chorus.  After this final chorus, the song is ended with the sound of decaying feedback and a descending electronic tone.   

            Movement, density, and character of the song’s musical track are therefore generated largely through change and development in timbres and production texture of the guitar parts (as well as vocal parts, which will be discussed later), in fact more so than through the employment of traditional melodic or rhythmic techniques on guitar.  This emphasis on production texture can be considered in terms of ideals of contemporary ‘pop’ music as opposed to more traditional ‘rock’ ideals.  Sympathetic discussion of contemporary ‘pop’ artists such as Britney Spears (as well as, for example, Justin Timberlake, Destiny’s Child and Missy Elliot, though it will be criticism of Spears that will be specifically discussed in this study) often tends to revolve around the sophistication of the electronic production of their music.  This can be traced back to the discourse surrounding disco producers like Giorgio Moroder and classic synthpop artists like New Order and Depeche Mode, even back to 50s and 60s pop producer Phil Spector.  Moroder will be specifically considered here.  With many of these musics, it is in fact the producer who is seen as the auteur at least as much as the performer, and sometimes even more. 

            On the other hand, there is a strain in ‘rock’ discourse that is extremely mistrustful of studio production, that sees it in fact as antithetical to ‘rock’ ideals.  Critic and former owner of independent punk rock label SST Joe Carducci is a principal exponent of the concept of postpunk rock authenticity.  He gives his definition of ‘rock’:

The music is rock when it is guitar, bass, and drums at the centre and they are played by musicians who know the language of the instruments enough to be expressive with them while playing hard . . . With the band’s individual musicians each aggressively supplying their element, the sound made together can become greater than the sum of its parts.  This surplus value is the jam and if it’s there in the performing then a rock band is effecting a transubstantiation nearly as sublime as any priest’s.  Rock reaches the spiritual by way of the physical; it requires an aesthetic of fully integrated completion.[35]

A number of criteria for rock authenticity are laid out here.  First, instrumentation is important – “The music is rock when it is guitar, bass, and drums at the centre. . .”  As well, technical proficiency as an instrumentalist is valued – “. . . and they are played by musicians who know the language of the instruments enough to be expressive with them. . .”  And then, a certain dynamic level of intensity is important – “. . . while playing hard”.  The process of technically proficient live performers creating the music amongst themselves in real time takes on near-religious significance – “. . . if it’s there in the performing then a rock band is effecting a transubstantiation nearly as sublime as any priest’s.”

            In comparison:

It’s the party next door, the pop party, where half-measure scams are rewarded, if the managers have sense enough to buy good songs, if the producer is hip enough to the current charts, if the engineer knows how to use the new technology, if the artist’s look can tap into the audience’s needs.  It’s that party where all the non-musical commotion is . . . If we accept that rock music is important as music, then we must insist on a credible aesthetic definition . . . Only then can our ability to discern the aesthetic reality of rock music in a pop world keep up with that pop world’s rapacious material evolution toward an obliterating hegemony over market and mind.[36]

First of all, ‘pop’, as distinct from ‘rock’, is defined in terms of the processes of generation and distribution involved.  Songs are purchased by managers (not, presumably written by the performers).  (Interestingly, Carducci does seem to allow for the possibility that the songs may still in fact be “good songs”.)  The music is engineered using up-to-date technology, not ‘jammed’ in real time by the performers.  The artist’s image is marketed.  Then value judgments are placed on these processes – they produce and reward “half-measure scams”.  (There is no discussion of why these are “half-measures” or explanation of what a full measure would be.)  This “pop world” is “rapacious”, using its economic power, evolving towards an “obliterating hegemony over market and mind” against which ‘rock’ must be defended. 

            Carducci illustrates by comparing Joy Division and New Order:

When the singer Ian Curtis left town for good the others cheated a bit and changed their name to New Order, and more tellingly made a dramatic switch from rock (art) to pop (craft).  The name change, reference-wise, switched from victim identification to perpetrator identification . . . On successive releases Joy Division had been pushing keyboards forward and guitars back in the mix – sweetening the sound – but they had still been playing a highly refined, yet Stooges influenced, rock music.  But rock rhythm was traded for an electro disco one and New Order went down the sophisto dance path emphasizing techno tricks and textures and eliminating guitars altogether.  Curtis’s lyrics had been straight and had emotional content; the remaining members could only substitute a canny, hip vacuousness in their place.[37]

Carducci’s conceptual distinction is clearly laid out here.  Rock music, played by a live band with confessional personal lyrics, is art.  Pop music, produced electronically in a studio, using drum machines, synthesizers, and electronic lyrics, with aphoristic lyrics, is craft.  (The idea is not entertained, for example, that artistry might be found in these “techno tricks and textures”.) 

            One can also consider the comments of critic Joe Harrington on late 1970s AOR, with specific reference to the band Boston.  Harrington is an American critic who ahs written for the Boston Globe, Boston Phoenix, New York Press, Seattle Stranger, Lowell Sun, Wired, Reflex, Raygun, High Times, Seconds, and Rollerderby.  In Sonic Cool:  The Life and Death of Rock ‘n’ Roll, he wrote:

At that time, the realm of popular Hard Rock consisted of bogus corporate-Rock bands with innocuous one-name monikers like Boston, Foreigner, Toto, Styx, Queen, Kansas, Triumph, and Heart.  As their names imply, their music was sterile, to say the least.  The first Boston album had been a phenomenon, if only because it proved that a group could become a serious commercial entity without actually having cut any chops at all.  In this case, the mastermind behind the group, Tom Scholz, quietly earned his degree at MIT while recording his elaborate demo in the basement with his cohorts.  After Scholz sold the tape to CBS, the subsequent album went on to become the biggest-selling debut in Rock history.  Tight as a drum, Boston’s sonic assemblage of ten thousand overdubbed guitars and whooshing synthesizers was the perfect formulaic backdrop to all those “good times” in the late 70s.  It also established a precedent in which a “Heavy Metal” band didn’t have to have any grit, balls, or stage presence – or identity.  The only requirement was that the sound was dense and clean. . .[38]

There is much to unpack here.  It is worth noting first of all that while Harrington does acknowledge that the recording was “tight as a drum” and was an elaborate “sonic assemblage”, incorporating a dense layered combination of guitar and electronic sounds, he dismisses the band as not “having cut any chops at all”.  “Chops” are not exactly defined here but it is clear that skill in dense, meticulous production is not considered a legitimate form of “chops” for a hard rock artist.  The music is not even seen as authentic rock music but as “bogus corporate-Rock”, presumably because of the emphasis on studio production texture over more naturalistic live band sensibilities.  There also seems to be perhaps a mistrust of pleasure, at least that which is acquired through mainstream channels, in the patronizing reference to ‘good times’.  Importantly to this discussion, a masculinist aspect can be observed to this critical perspective:  a band of this nature is perceived to not have any ‘balls’.

            This is illustrated further by Harrington’s next paragraph, in which these AOR bands are compared unfavourably to “two groups [who] were adding something new to the same tired old formula”[39], Van Halen and AC/DC.  His comments on AC/DC are particularly relevant:

. . . AC/DC. . . hailed from Australia and dealt ferocious staccato blows based on the most simplistic rhythms, albeit accelerated to absurd levels of testosterone overdrive.[40]

This band, which places less emphasis on studio production, which plays ‘raw’ live band-based rock music “based on the most simplistic rhythms”, is seen as more authentically ‘rock’.  It is significant that ‘testosterone’ is also central to their aesthetic.  The ‘primitive’ and the masculine are valued 

            Harrington’s subsequent comments suggest that this approach is also influenced by the affiliation of rock criticism with 1960s countercultural ideals.  (The ‘serious’ rock press, after all, has its roots in that same movement):

A lot of the glory had disappeared from the Hard Rock ethic.  In the 60s, rent was cheap – ten hippies could live in one ‘crash pad’ and basically do nothing but devote their time to the lifestyle of spiritual fulfillment (sex) and self-expression (drugs, or vice versa).  In the 70s, with inflation (not to mention drug prices) on the rise, the burnouts – who were the younger, more disaffected siblings of the hippies – were forced to take some dead-end job to support their indulgences, which included expensive concert tickets to see groups like ELO and Boston.  This put them on the same timetable as the ‘squares’ – only with less education.  The lines weren’t quite so clearly drawn anymore.  The music became more conservative.  For the first time in Rock’s brief history, the mainstream American teen wasn’t necessarily rebelling against anything.  To the contrary, teens were actually quite content with a basically apathetic existence that included smoking lots of pot and watching Saturday Night Live every weekend.  From Saturday Night Live to Saturday Night Fever [which is also pilloried in Harrington’s book], everything centred on the weekend.  In the realm of Heavy Metal, it took on an almost mythic significance, as epitomized by Boston (“Smokin’”, “Party”), Ted Nugent (“Weekend Warrior”), and Loverboy (“Workin’ For the Weekend”).[41]

While Harrington does approach the 1960s counterculture with some cynicism as well, when one considers these comments in light of the earlier derisive reference to ‘good times’, it appears that part of the hostility towards heavily produced mainstream guitar rock is associated with a hostility towards mainstream consumer culture and its values.  Adolescent rebellion against the status quo (which, Reynolds and Press have argued, is traditionally constructed in a fundamentally masculinist manner) is viewed as an essential aspect of rock’s meaning.  Without it, teenagers are held to be “apathetic”, their music “conservative”.

            Another example is seen in his comments on the Velvet Underground and the Stooges, whom he favours:

The urgent primal need for scraping noise was not being satisfied except by a handful of groups. But these groups would spawn the future, because in their rejection of the gloss they were letting their basic musical instincts run wild.  This is the only way a legitimate Rock movement can grow – by accident . . .

Punks were buttheads – they butted their heads against the cultural elite:  the big-name critics and record companies.  They weren’t commercial [42]

Again we can see what is valued – the ‘primal’, “scraping noise”, “basic musical instincts” that can only be released when “gloss” is “rejected”.  To adopt this sort of aesthetic is not only “the only way a legitimate Rock movement can grow” but appears to be held to be anti-commercial.  (Even though both of these bands were in fact on major labels and were always recipients of generally favourable critical reception, these aesthetic qualities are still perceived as oppositional.  To adopt a more disciplined, production-intensive approach to musicianship is associated in this view with commercialism as well as apathy.  However, judging by the responses of critics such as Harrington, it would appear that it was in fact Boston and not the Stooges who butted their heads against big-name critics!)             These attitudes were also demonstrated by responses to a presentation this term in graduate level course 6320.03 (Studies in Popular Music).  Both Led Zeppelin’s “Babe I’m Gonna Leave You” and Boston’s “More Than a Feeling” were played in class to demonstrate the use of homologies in discussion of popular music.  The Led Zeppelin song, from 1968, when hard rock music still had associations with 1960s counterculture, was rough in its recording quality and sloppy in its guitar playing, with the vocals almost totally unconcerned with classical standards of pitch and tone, culminating in a ‘primal scream’, reflecting countercultural Romantic glorification of the ‘primal’ and immediate, of the rejection of traditional values of restraint and discipline.  The Boston song, from 1976, when hard rock music had become the music of mainstream America, contained similar stylistic elements in the interplay between fingerpicking and distorted power chords to create dynamic change, in the use of the high male voice which went from a softer ‘murmur’ to a louder ‘wail’ when the guitars went from fingerpicking to power chords.  However, the performance values were flawless in the classical sense – there were no muted or missed notes in the guitar playing.  (These had been observed to be abundant in the Led Zeppelin song.)  The production values were very different – the guitars were heavily treated, layered, and harmonized in a ‘chorus’.  The voice was also perfectly in key, with a full tone, and accompanied by the rest of the band in perfect four-part harmony in the chorus.  Structural elements of the music were more consistent with mainstream values of control, precision, and technical mastery.  Prof Rob Bowman agreed with this homology and stated that in fact it was the reason for his hatred of Boston (compared to his love of Led Zeppelin) – he felt an opposition to constructions of control and mastery in dominant cultural institutions, such as political ones, and this music was reminiscent of those elements.  He felt greater sympathy with countercultural ideals and thus preferred music that reflected those – this music was more authentic to what he values in ‘rock’. 

            In much of the discourse surrounding ‘pop’, on the other hand, it is the producer who is seen if not as the principal auteur at least as central to the artistic process – the art of the music is seen to lie at least partially in the production itself.  The aesthetic of the ‘raw’, the ‘primal’, as defined by the absence of high production values and the emphasis on the live band dynamic, is less important.  Outlets that cover both genres might even apply one criteria to one ‘genre’ and the opposite one to the other.  Rolling Stone’s review of Britney Spears’ Britney (to which they gave three stars – “fair”) reads in part:

This producer is not only an auteur in his own right – he is even “one of the principal architects of the disco sound”.  He was a respected, pioneering artist – he extended the boundaries of the genre in terms of track length and sound texture (“shimmering sound”, “futuristic, computerized sheen”).  Harrington tends to be dismissive of disco for just this emphasis on the producer, because “black music went back to being a producer’s art, much to the detriment of the music”[45].

            While studio production on the instrumental track is used on the music of contemporary pop-punk artists like Sum 41, whose music is somewhat comparable to “Sk8er Boi”, it is believed here that “Sk8er Boi” emphasizes this quality to a substantially greater degree.  Sum 41’s “Still Waiting”, provided on the accompanying disc of musical examples, incorporates overdubbed guitar melodies and scratches.  However, the timbre of the guitars in these layers is less treated – it rarely strays from the norms of the distorted guitar timbre in ‘harder’ forms of rock music, never approaching the ‘organ’-like timbres, ‘wind’-like sound effects, or harmonics or chorus-treated ‘drone’-like effects in “Sk8er Boi”, also never incorporating sounds that could not be easily duplicated by a live guitarist, such as the electronic ‘swoops’.  There also appear to be fewer layers.  The track is much truer to what a live band could reproduce on stage without electronic aid.

            The use of extensive studio production in the creation of a popular music recording can therefore be associated with ‘pop’ ideals rather than traditional ‘rock’ ideals.  Particularly in the area of ‘harder’ guitar ‘rock’, this is often seen as antithetical to ideals of the genre.  (There are cases where rock artists have used extensive production and have received critical acclaim, such as Pink Floyd or Radiohead.  In these cases, however, the artist is first of all rarely one that performs ‘harder’, more up-tempo distorted guitar rock.  As well, these artists are generally acclaimed in terms of being more cerebral and avant-garde than the mainstream of rock artists – the use of extensive studio treatment of music might still be seen as oppositional to rock ideals even in these cases, though it might be interpreted by critics in a more positive light.)  There is also a strong masculinist element to the ‘rock’ hostility towards this kind of elaborate studio production.  “Sk8er Boi” is notable in this regard – while it is a piece of ‘harder’ guitar rock, oppositional stylistically to the pop of artists like Britney Spears, it is also a heavily produced studio creation, with decided ‘pop’ elements in this regard, and therefore oppositional to certain masculinist traditional rock ideals.  It is perhaps in this regard suited perfectly to a ‘tomboy’ figure.

            Lavigne’s voice on this song should also be considered.  It is first of all obviously young and female, as is suggested by its pitch and timbre.  While it is clearly female, it may also be perceived as being less overtly ‘feminine’, in some traditional senses, than that of a traditional female pop star.  The vocal on Madonna’s “Die Another Day”, included on the accompanying CD, can be compared.  Madonna’s vocal emphasizes her feminine sexuality in traditional ways, whispering at points, with the voice sometimes trailing into a ‘sigh’, singing in a higher register, with a clean hard head tone.  She can be considered in terms of the “woman as sex object” in Shepherd’s typology of popular music singing styles.  He compares this vocal style to the other female singing style he identifies, the “woman as nurturer” (e.g. Anne Murray):

The softer, warmer hollower tones of the woman singer as emotional nurturer become closed off with a certain edge, a certain vocal sheen that is quite different from the male-appropriated, hard core of timbre typical of ‘cock’ rock.  Tones such as those produced by Shirley Bassey in “Big Spender”, for example, are essentially head tones, and it could in this case be argued that the transition from woman the nurturer to woman the sex object represents a shift, physiologically coded, from the ‘feminine heart’ to the ‘masculine head’, with its stress on a cerebral, intellectual, controlled view of the world.[46]         

While many aspects of Shepherd’s analysis are debatable – the assumption of a literal correlation between physiological means of production of vocal timbre and signified or articulated world views, the premise that a “woman as sex object” would necessarily signify the type of world view he suggests – what is useful is to recognize this type of female voice as applicable to the traditional female pop star, exemplified by Madonna in this example, and to understand this possible signification of “woman as sex object”.

            Lavigne’s voice on “Sk8er Boi” is distinctly different from this type of singing.  The “vocal sheen” noted by Shepherd is notably absent.  The voice is more flat and nasal, without the ‘sexy’ embellishments of whispers or sighs.  Sometimes pitch is compromised to give a sound closer to that of speech, e.g. the words “his baggy clothes” at the end of the first verse.  At some points, where embellishments are used, for example, when the first syllable the line “Rockin’ up MTV” is emphasized, almost yelled, they are more typical of the exclamations of enthusiastic youths.  The word “enough” in the line “He wasn’t good enough for her” is emphasized with a delivery resembling a youth’s sarcastic taunt.

            In some of these respects it might be believed to be contain similarities to a ‘pop-punk’ vocal style, even a masculine one.  But again, one can compare it to the vocal on “Still Waiting”.  While there are some similarities in the flat, nasal tone and clipped delivery approaching the cadence of everyday speech during the more melodic parts of the song, the delivery on “Still Waiting” is even more clipped than Lavigne’s, has even less of a ‘sheen’.  As well, the verses are more screamed and shouted than sung, which never happens in “Sk8er Boi”.  The vocal delivery on “Sk8er Boi” can be seen to perhaps contain elements of the ‘pop-punk’ vocal style but in a manner that is more moderated, with more ‘feminine’ aspects, while still avoiding the overtly sexualized ‘feminine’ aspects of the typical female pop star voice.  It is perhaps again well suited to a persona that is “girly and tomboyish at the same time”, that is distinctively young and female while avoiding a number of the trappings of contemporary female pop stars. 

            Also notable is the level of production on the voice.  It is double-tracked during the chorus.  After the second chorus, the stopped power chords are interspersed with cut-up vocal sounds resembling “ow, ow, ow”.  During the ‘ethereal’ section after the bridge, the reverberating guitars are complemented by a delay effect on the last word of each line Lavigne sings.  When she sings “We are in love” (using a gentler, ‘sweeter’ tone on that one line than she uses for the rest of the song), there is briefly a track of a backing singer singing “ooh” in a stereotypically ‘sweet’ fashion – a surprising appearance of irony and pastiche in this song!  In the final chorus, after the narrator’s triumphant conquest of the “sk8er boi” has been announced, there is a track of a ‘chorus’ of ‘glossily’ produced female voices chanting “Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!” alongside Lavigne’s main vocal.  This level of production on a voice that is in some ways more ‘rock’ than the usual female pop star voice is in keeping with the previously noted comments on the production of the instrumental tracks of the song and in keeping with Lavigne’s whole persona.  Lavigne’s distinctive persona – the teenage tomboy anti-pop star – is signified in part by the distinctive vocal employed on “Sk8er Boi” that combines elements of different ‘pop’ and ‘rock’ archetypes with references to habits in everyday speech, pastiche, and irony to signify its identity and narrative.

            Finally, an analysis is incomplete without consideration of lyrics.  (An appendix with lyrics printed is provided.)  First of all, the vocabulary used in the song is casual and simple, using some slang expressions connoting youth such as “rockin’ up MTV”.  The song is clearly from the perspective of a young woman.  It is significant that the narrator positions herself in opposition to the shallow ‘girly girl’ who “did ballet” and rejected the skater because his “bad clothes” were unacceptable to her friends.  This can be considered in terms of how Lavigne’s persona has been positioned in opposition to contemporary ‘feminine’ female pop stars and their glamour and fashion, as well as their departure from some traditional values – the narrator of this song is after all sticking up for the old adage of “don’t judge a book by its cover”.  Her embrace of the rejected skater – a member of a youth ‘subculture’ which positions itself as oppositional to the mainstream in some ways - is also consistent with Lavigne’s association with signifiers of non-mainstream youth ‘subcultures’ and opposition to what are perceived as dominant values in pop music.                                                                                                                               

            (On a somewhat tangential note, it is interesting to consider the lyrics from a feminist perspective.  While empowering qualities may be seen in the fact that Lavigne is singing from the perspective of a young woman who is not a victim or sex object, other aspects of the song may be problematic in this regard.  For one thing, the boy appears to become almost a status symbol of sorts, a prized object of competition through which the woman can achieve pride.  As well, the song can be read as an extended taunt of a poor single mother – “Five years from now/She sits at home/Feeding the baby/She’s all alone”.)

            Avril Lavigne’s persona has been constructed, using the media, as that of a teenage girl pop star with a ‘tomboy’ image who is oppositional to her contemporaries in terms of her rejection of traditional feminine glamour and sex object status, who has associated herself with greater ‘rock’ or ‘punk’ authenticity, and who maintains ties to small town community and traditional morality in some areas.  Music, vocal delivery, production, and lyrics of the song “Sk8er Boi” all tend to signify these qualities.  Music and vocal delivery are distinctive by being neither purely ‘pop’ nor ‘punk’ or ‘rock’ but by combining various elements that signify elements of both genres as well as perhaps drawing from other sources such as everyday speech and pastiche in a manner that is appropriate to the persona of a ‘tomboy’ pop star.  Lyrical themes of the song similarly suit the constructed persona in their positioning of the narrator as oppositional to the conventionally feminine, shallow, fashion-obsessed girl in the song.

AVRIL LAVIGNE – “SK8ER BOI” LYRICS

He was a boy

She was a girl

Can I make it any more obvious?

He was a punk

She did ballet

What more can I say?

He wanted her

She'd never tell secretly she wanted him as well

But all of her friends

Stuck up their nose

They had a problem with his baggy clothes

He was a skater boy

She said see you later boy

He wasn't good enough for her

She had a pretty face

But her head was up in space

She needed to come back down to earth

Five years from now

She sits at home

Feeding the baby

She's all alone

She turns on tv

Guess who she sees

Skater boy rockin’ up MTV

She calls up her friends

They already know

And they've all got

Tickets to see his show

She tags along

Stands in the crowd

Looks up at the man that she turned down

He was a skater boy

She said see you later boy

He wasn't good enough for her

Now he's a super star

Slamming on his guitar

Does your pretty face see what he's worth?

He was a skater boy

She said see you later boy

He wasn't good enough for her

Now he's a super star

Slamming on his guitar

Does your pretty face see what he's worth?

Sorry girl but you missed out

Well tough luck that boy's mine now

We are more than just good friends

This is how the story ends

Too bad that you couldn't see,

See the man that boy could be

There is more that meets the eye

I see the soul that is inside

He's just a boy

And I'm just a girl

Can I make it any more obvious

We are in love

Haven't you heard

How we rock each others world?

I'm with the skater boy

I said see you later boy

I'll be back stage after the show

I'll be at the studio

Singing the song we wrote

About a girl you used to know

I'm with the skater boy

I said see you later boy

I'll be back stage after the show

I'll be at the studio

Singing the song we wrote

About a girl you used to know

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