A voice of a generation doesn’t need to be so complicated. It can be straightforward, direct and, alternately, fun and poignant. It can be like overhearing a conversation from the teen next door, who is going through some life situations and simply trying to figure things out.
It can be Avril Lavigne. Thus who scoff at that notion certainly weren’t at the opening night concert of the 2024 Shoreline Amphitheatre season, when Lavigne drew a huge crowd of mostly 30- and 40-somethings who grew up on her music and still deeply adore her music. Not only adore, but clearly feel like her music still speaks to them.
That could be seen — heard — throughout this delightful Mountain View stop on Lavigne’s Greatest Hits Tour, as thousands sang along with passion and purpose to one likeable number after another. Yet, the moment that really crystalized the whole view came when the singer unleashed the massive 2002 smash “Complicated” and fans got behind every single word like their were belting out the anthem to their lives. Although it’s been more than a decade since Lavigne had a top 20 song in the U.
S. (“Here’s to Never Growing Up” in 2013), the Canadian star’s continued influence on pop culture should not be denied. She rose out of a small city in Ontario in 2002 with the full-length debut “Let’s Go” — built from a batch of songs she’d penned as a 16-year old — and proceeded to conquer the world with one bouncy fun tune after another.
She was peddling.
