That is The Anthem, the place we’re telling tales behind basic albums and songs by interviewing the individuals who had been actually there. This week, we’re homing in on Sum 41’s everlasting 2002 single “Nonetheless Ready.”
Sum 41 grew up quick. Barely six months after dropping the ultimate single from their goofy, ever-so-catchy debut album, All Killer No Filler, the Canadian quartet reemerged with the lead single from its follow-up, Does This Look Contaminated? Fairly merely, “Nonetheless Ready” signaled their transfer from innocence to expertise. Vocalist Deryck Whibley, bassist Jason “Cone” McCaslin, guitarist Dave Baksh and then-drummer Steve Jocz had been coming into their 20s with 300 or so dwell exhibits and rather more musical expertise below their belts, but additionally with a far larger consciousness that the world was greater — and scarier — than it appears to be like outdoors the partitions of highschool.
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Does This Look Contaminated? marked a heavier flip for the band each sonically and lyrically, with their subject material changing into ever extra severe by concerning medication, insomnia, HIV and the more and more ugly state of the world. The band had been coming of age in a fraught post-9/11 local weather the place concern and jingoism bubbled below the floor as George W. Bush launched the Warfare On Terror — and an actual warfare towards Iraq was on its approach. It led Sum 41 to show their hand for the primary time to political songwriting, birthing a track whose immortal chorus stays depressingly related in 2023: “So am I nonetheless ready for this world to cease hating?”
The way it began
DERYCK WHIBLEY (VOCALS): The document [Does This Look Infected?] was just about written. We had been already within the studio making it, and for some motive, this little thought got here into my head once I wasn’t even attempting to jot down songs anymore. I believed I used to be carried out. I awoke with this refrain in my head. I went and sang it and abruptly had a riff immediately, which turned the verse riff. I knew I wished it to have screamy, shouty verses. I’m screaming as arduous as I can in these verses. It’s a type of songs that got here out precisely the best way I heard it in my head.
JASON “CONE” MCCASLIN (BASS): We had been in Toronto doing pre-production, and we had been wrapping up. It may need even been the final day. “The Hell Tune” was going to be [the lead] single. “Over My Head (Higher Off Useless)” was most likely going to be the second single. Deryck got here in with this little cassette tape, and he says: “I bought this tough new track.” All of us listened to it, and it was so tough and distorted, and we had been like, “That is actually good.” It was approach completely different from All Killer No Filler due to the screaming, it was in a minor key. It was darker. All of us agreed at that time that we needed to try to match that track in, so we took it to New York and completed it within the studio there.
WHIBLEY: There was simply a lot strain in these days, from myself, from the label, from all people concerned, as a result of we had been following up a document that had bought just a few million [copies]. [We] needed to ship to show that [we] weren’t this one-album band. Straight away, everybody agreed that the track, regardless that all I had was a verse and a refrain, was most likely going to be the primary single. You can inform that there was one thing particular about it, that it was higher than every little thing else on the document. Within the first week of recording in New York Metropolis, I stayed again on the lodge each day attempting to complete this track. Everyone was asking me, “Is it completed but?” I stayed within the lodge for per week until it was carried out. Looking back, it was fast, nevertheless it felt prefer it was taking a yr as a result of all people was hounding me for it.
[Sum 41 pose for their AP cover in 2002 / Photo by Chapman Baehler]
The lyrics
MCCASLIN: The Iraq Warfare on the time was such a giant factor. Although we had been Canadian, we spent a whole lot of time within the U.S. We had been solely like 22 years outdated on the time, however we’d speak amongst ourselves, and we [all thought] it was insane that this warfare was really going to occur. Even being 22 from Canada, we had been actually affected by it. We lived via the Gulf Warfare, and it was following the identical strains.
WHIBLEY: Touring the world on that tour for the primary time on the All Killer tour [gave us] extra of a way that there is this world on the market. It is not simply the place we grew up and our buddies in highschool and all that stuff. So that you’re beginning to actually take note of all this stuff which are happening on the earth and all these atrocities. We thought this warfare was very clearly not about what George [W.] Bush and his administration had been saying it was, and that is what the track turned to me. On the identical time, [with] a few of the lyrics, you virtually needn’t know what the track is about, particularly with the refrain, as a result of it’s simply relatable. It’s simply the best lyric. I bear in mind [producer] Greig Nori saying, “I do not know concerning the lyric ‘So am I nonetheless ready for this world to cease hating?’ It is slightly juvenile. It is slightly fundamental.’ I bear in mind considering, “I do not know the way to make it anything aside from what it’s.” It could be juvenile and easy, however that is what all this bullshit is on the earth — it’s all juvenile and silly.
The music video
MARC KLASFELD (VIDEO DIRECTOR): Sum 41 exploded in 2001, however then in 2002, the scene shifted, and indie bands just like the Strokes, the Hives and the White Stripes all turned in style. The video ended up changing into partly a satire of that complete band motion. We took components from one of many Strokes’ movies, a few of the Hives with what they had been sporting, making enjoyable of and commenting on the hip bands of the time. It feedback not solely on that pattern however tendencies basically and the way tendencies come and go.
MCCASLIN: We had been in England for Studying and Leeds, and we had been staying on the identical lodge because the Strokes. We went as much as Julian [Casablancas’] room, and we had a pair extra drinks. We stated, “Now we have this concept for the video. We wish to run it by you.” We advised him the entire thought: “We wish to costume up the identical and have the set such as you guys. You’re the brand new cool factor, and pop punk is getting pushed out.” He was like, “I like it. You guys need to do it.” We bought his blessing at six within the morning!
KLASFELD: The man at first, Will Sasso, he’s so phenomenally gifted. I simply gave him a briefing of what I wished the scene to be about, and he simply adlibbed the shit out of that scene. He was simply so humorous, and I feel the largest downside for the blokes was attempting to maintain a straight face throughout the entire thing as a result of the dude was so humorous.
MCCASLIN: The opposite factor that was humorous about it was the trashing factor on the finish. I bear in mind the entire crew was like, “Don’t contact the lights!” And I feel the signal was all the time gonna get pushed down, however the lights behind us, the lighting folks didn’t need them damaged. And, in fact, we broke them. At that time, we had been simply consuming rather a lot on a regular basis. In order the day went on, video shoots may be 20 hours lengthy. We had been annihilated by the top, completely hammered. That complete trashing scene ultimately. I imply, a whole lot of us could not even stroll. That is how we did it again then.
KLASFELD: The blokes have all the time stored a humorousness about their stuff. In my estimation, that’s what folks have all the time preferred finest. They’re actually good at it.
