The time of the Avril Lavigne renaissance is here and I could not be more excited about it. On Friday the 5th she posted a teaser image for her next single, “Bite Me” which she will release under Travis Barker’s DTA Records. The Canadian legend signed to the label earlier happened this week and she has been teasing new music on social media since then, and on Saturday she posted a TikTok video of her playing a snippet of the song alongside Barker on the drums and it really made my mid-2000s inner child cry tears of joy, I love Avril Lavigne and I love Travis Barker and to see these two pop-punk titans working together like this is amazing.
@avrillavigne Baby you can BITE ME #TravisBarker
I also think Avril’s usage and popularity on TikTok have been something really fascinating to watch, especially as she picks up with gen Z artists like WILLOW and Billie Eilish. It’s exciting to see artists you liked growing up influence a whole new generation of artists, but she also posted a video with Tony Hawk on TikTok a couple of months ago so there’s very much some 2000s nostalgia coming back and I’m savoring every moment of it.
The social media element and “doing it right” seem to be the key to success for both emerging and established artists in 2021, but capturing the hearts and minds of TikTok is REALLY key.
Travis Barker has also had a really interesting resurgence in the 2010s and the way he’s managed to keep up beyond pop-punk and collaborate with artists in hip hop and rap has been cool to see, and I think his influence really is there even before 2019-2020 when the pop-punk revival really picked up with artist like Yungblud and Machine Gun Kelly releasing projects with Barker.
Either way I really look forward to hearing more from Avril Lavigne, and I’m looking forward to hearing what she and Barker have been working on.