Somewhere around the 11th March 2002, 17-year-old future megastar Avril Lavigne burst onto our screens with her debut single, Complicated.

Chill out, what ya yellin’ for?
Lay back, it’s all been done before
And if you could only let it be, you will see
I like you the way you are

I say “screens” because, given the year, Avril could probably lay claim to having been one of the original internet-first pop stars. Certainly, the video for Complicated was all over Yahoo Launch (remember that, kids?) at the time.

Parents might wish to look away now, while scary, dangerous Avril gets up to several mildly-annoying high jinks in a shopping mall:

Our new favourite Canadian saucepot rebel is suitably accessorised by three inoffensively photogenic teens. Presumably we’re to conclude that they’re her backing band, who are definitely either real musicians or close personal friends or both. And in no way unknown actors working for Oreos and Snapple.

But if you’re not a parent, shopkeeper, or exasperated security guard, it’s an insanely catchy pop-punk-lite sort of offering.

Imagine, if you can, Limp Bizkit but with even less Rock. That said, it’s a bit of a classic of the pop genre: teenage issues, singalong choruses, the key change before the final repeat of the refrain. It follows the formula to the letter.

The songwriting is in part credited to Avril, alongside a sizeable roster of professionals. How much creative input the teenage Avril would really have had is perhaps lost to the mists of time. I don’t think there are a great deal of hidden depths to the lyrics either way.

Why’d you have to go and make things so complicated?
I see the way you’re acting like you’re somebody else
Gets me frustrated
Life’s like this, you
You fall, and you crawl, and you break
And you take what you get, and you turn it into
Honesty and promise me I’m never gonna find you faking

And why should there be? The song is about keeping it simple, and being honest and true. Threehundredsongs fully approves of that sort of thing

Artist:	Avril Lavigne
Album:	Let Go
Writers:	Avril Lavigne, David Alspach, Graham Edwards, Lauren Christy (The Matrix?)
Producer:	The Matrix?
Released:	Arista, 2002