The year is 1999. “…Baby One More Time” is dominating the radio, Star Wars: Episode I is confusing a new generation of fans, and somewhere in Canada, Simple Plan is born.
Fast forward almost 26 years, with six studio albums and a bunch of platinum singles – Simple Plan is still going strong. Recently, they’ve been tearing it up in Australia with The Offspring and gearing up for a 25th birthday bash that includes new music, a documentary, and an anniversary tour. I had the absolute pleasure of chatting with lead guitarist Jeff Stinco ahead of all the chaos- and trust me, he’s just as pumped as we are.
Though they’re an extremely accomplished band themselves, touring with The Offspring has been a bit of a ‘pinch-me’ moment for Simple Plan, as Stinco explains, “It’s like sort of a childhood dream. It’s kind of funny saying that now, but that was the band that we used to listen to the most, I would say. When we started out, they were everywhere. Smash was everywhere. You could not go into a club or go to a party without hearing “Self Esteem”. And 30 years later we’re touring with them and we’re like, ‘Hey, Mr. Noodles, what’s going on?’ And all of a sudden, you know, it’s kind of cool.”
This unique pairing has definitely drawn quite a diverse audience, with The Offspring having a heavier sound and Simple Plan leaning more into pop. On how they tailor their setlist to resonate with audiences on this tour, Stinco shares, “I mean, it’s funny because I thought about this quite a bit. You have a decision to make at some point. It’s like, if you’re invited to a party and you’re in a rock band, do you wear a tux or do you wear a variation of your normal rock outfit? I think the answer is a little in between, you know? I think it’s important that when you showcase what the band is all about, you’re honest about presenting yourself as as the band that you are. So we are playing “Jet Lag”, we are playing “Summer Paradise”- the popular songs that I think that The Offspring crowd would not necessarily have been exposed to.” And whilst I understand the sentiment, if you were in Australia in 2011, I’d be willing to bet that no matter what music you’re currently listening to, you could sing these tracks from start to finish.
Stinco continues, “But then again, we have this mentality where we’re thinking like, ‘Oh shit, Offspring fans are full-on crazy rock people’, but I think that people are more agnostic about music than they have ever been. You know, I meet fans that are telling me like, ‘I’m listening to hip hop and I’m listening to Sleep Token’. So I don’t feel that we have to present ourselves any different than we usually do. I mean, we’ll leap into the rockier tracks, you know, to fill up the spots in between the singles. But it’s a great opportunity to sort of showcase the fact that when we play live, the songs are naturally heavier.”
Looking back over the last 25-plus years as a band, Stinco reflects on what aspects of their musical style have evolved and which have stayed the same, sharing, “When we started out, we set to achieve a thing where it was like melody first, and lyrics that are relatable even though they’re very personal. So I think that’s something that stayed throughout everything that we’ve done. And we like it fast, we like it a little heavier, I think it’s important- it has to have edge. And now, we listen to other bands, we listen to other genres and we try to incorporate elements of that within our music as we go without necessarily alienating our fans. So all these elements are taken into consideration when we make music, but at some point, like honestly, when we write or when we arrange songs, we kind of do it for ourselves first. And then what we’ll do is that we’ll write and arrange more songs than needed, and we’ll have to discard the songs that don’t sound like Simple Plan. There’s some great songs that we have not released that are just not really appropriate for Simple Plan, but that’s where the selection happens. But the process, the creative process is really very natural, there’s not a lot of thinking in doing it.”
To celebrate their quarter-of-a-century, Simple Plan are taking to the road later this year on their Bigger Than You Think! tour, but Stinco explains that this whole year, including their current Aussie tour, is really one big celebration of their massive milestone. Stinco reveals that this July they’ll be releasing a documentary on Amazon Prime before heading on tour and that new music is in the works. “I don’t know in what form, like who fucking knows how you do it nowadays, but there’s gonna be a new song for sure. Very soon, I would say.”
And speaking of new music, they’ve just dropped an absolute banger with Avril Lavigne titled “Young & Dumb”- a fun, carefree, nostalgic track that reminisces on the old days whilst embracing the present. “It was pretty sick to see how creative she is,” Stinco says of working with Lavigne, going on to say, “I had the memory of “Sk8er Boi” Avril, you know, like 20 years ago. And then I’m seeing this beautiful woman who’s super creative and knows exactly what she wants. She’s in a studio spewing out lyrics, it comes so easy to her and she just sings melodies and she’s very, very talented. She was always very talented, but you know, these talents need to be nurtured and she has done the work. You could tell that she sat on many writing sessions and she knows what she’s doing. Yeah, it was it was so cool to see, like, it was so cool to be there and experience it. She trusted us so much, she was like, ‘Infuse as much Simple Plan as you want into this track.’ She could have really gone super-pop over the years, but she decided to stay true to her roots, so I think that’s pretty courageous and cool of her.”
Simple Plan will join Avril Lavigne on her Greatest Hits tour next month, twenty-two years after they joined her on her first-ever arena tour, which “Young and Dumb” references. “Last summer we toured across the US with her and I feel that she loved the experience, I’m sort of talking for her but I think it was very brotherly, and the backstages were great, just such a cool vibe. And I think that’s what she wanted to portray within the lyrics and the music. So yeah, it’s nostalgic, but it’s also about friendship. She does talk about touring, but it’s not only about that, it’s about the long-lasting relationship that we’ve had over all these years.” Stinco says of the track, going on to share that they plan on performing it live with her during her Greatest Hits tour.
Speaking with Jeff, his love for Simple Plan is so apparent, and all the members seem to pour so much love into their music. They’re at such a fun time in their career right now- celebrating a monumental anniversary, touring with their best friends and releasing new music. Whether you grew up with Simple Plan or you’ve just recently discovered them, there’s no denying the impact their music has had on generations. Here’s to many more years of music that speaks to the heart.
There’s still a couple of dates left for The Offspring’s tour with Simple Plan- check out the dates and grab tickets HERE.
