Sum 41 is currently gearing up to head out on the “Blame Canada” tour, with fellow Canadian rockers Simple Plan, bringing a big punk rock roadshow to cities all across the country. Recently, frontman Deryck Whibley sat down with PopCulture.com, via Zoom, to chat about the tour and what motivated the two bands to link up. “I think it’s something that we’ve talked about in the past and it’s kind of an obvious… like the fan base crossover is pretty obvious,” he explained.
Whibley continued, “It was just more of a timing thing of trying to work out when it would make sense for the both of us to do it and kind of coming out of the pandemic. We were both going to be talking about going on the road and we just decided why not just do it together? We thought this was probably a good time to do that.” When it comes to being prepared for traversing the nation while Covid-19 cases are still popping up, Whibley confessed, “I don’t know if you can really prepare for what could happen. Right? We hope that shows don’t get canceled. We hope that we don’t get sick and we hope that it doesn’t go into lockdowns. We hope all these things. It’s nothing you can really do, we got to a point where we just said, ‘We got to go out there and live our lives at some point.’ And now’s the time. We’re just going to do our best.”
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Previously, Pop Culture had the opportunity to speak with Simple Plan singer Pierre Bouvier, who also offered some perspective on how the tour came together, explaining that the name of the trek is a “tip of the hat” to South Park, referencing the animated franchise’s Oscar-nominated song. “Canadians, we don’t take ourselves too seriously. We love the joke and it’s funny because we both came out around the same time,” Bouvier said, noting that his band and Sum 41 have had very similar paths.
“Their first album came out in 2001, ours came out in 2002,” he recalled. “We’ve really had parallel careers. We were both riding the coattails of Blink 182 and Green Day who paved the way for us. And then we both had massive success throughout the world. And the cool thing is that we’re both bands still active, still together, still doing what we do.” Rounding out the “Blame Canada” tour lineup are Set it Off and Magnolia Park. The tour kicks off on April 29 in Raleigh, NC. Fans can get a full list of dates for the Blame Canada tour, as well as access to tickets, by clicking here.
