"She's kind of a loser"

I saw Sum 41 open for Social Distortion at the House of Blues on Sunset Boulevard in 2000, and they blew me away. This is from 2001.

Deryck Whibley/Sum 41

If Sum 41's Deryck Whibley began dropping the names of all of the rock stars he has met recently, he would really hurt himself. In the past year, Deryck and Sum 41 have shared stages with none other than Mike Ness (Social Distortion), Dexter Holland (Offspring), and Dave Grohl (Foo Fighters). So, Deryck, what's it like rubbing elbows with the rich and famous?

"Dexter had a Fourth of July party at his house," says the Sum 41 singer-guitarist, rather matter-of-factly, as he speaks to me on the phone. "We all just went and hung out at his place. It was cool."

Yes, the members of Sum 41 have definitely come a long way in a short amount of time. Deryck and the rest of the band originally hail from Ajax, a small town located right outside of Toronto. But don't be fooled by the way Sum 41 describes Ajax in the song, "Fat Lip." Not everyone in Ajax has a mullet and listens to Iron Maiden and Judas Priest.

"Well, we all actually love Iron Maiden and Judas Priest," Deryck explains, while still not dispelling the myth that Ajax is more than a one-horse town. "I really didn't grow up in Ajax, though. I grew up in Toronto. There's much more going on in Toronto. If I had grown up in Ajax, I don't think I would be writing music today. Ajax is just a small suburb of Toronto. It's so boring there."

To date, Sum 41 is best known for Half Hour of Power, which is both: 1) The highly entertaining EP the band released last summer. 2) The best way to describe the band's super tight and energetic live performances. Unfortunately, for Deryck and Sum 41, the carefree days of last summer are far behind them.

"Now we spend eight hours a day in the van, driving," Deryck says, describing one of the downsides of being in the music business. "I'm talking to you from a club in Fort Collins, Colorado called the Starlight. We're on tour with Reel Big Fish. We used to be able to practice a lot, but you can't really practice when you're on tour. You just get better by learning onstage."

Besides currently feeling the effects of living life on the road, the members of Sum 41 were also really under the gun while making their debut full-length album, All Killer, No Filler. According to Deryck, it is no coincidence that some of the songs on the Island Records release have titles like "In Too Deep," "Motivation," and "Handle This."

"There was a lot of pressure on us while making All Killer, No Filler," Deryck tells me, as he lets out a nervous little laugh. "We started recording All Killer, No Filler only two months after we had finished recording Half Hour of Power. For All Killer, No Filler, we had to come up with twelve new songs in a really short period of time. Every single morning we had to wake up and work on new songs. It was a lot of pressure, but I think All Killer, No Filler came out great in the end."

After they complete their tour with Reel Big Fish, Deryck and Sum 41 will play a few dates on the East Coast with another group of famous rock star friends -- Travis Barker and Blink-182. While Blink-182's female fans will undoubtedly fall under Sum 41's spell, they probably are not going to appreciate one of Deryck's new tunes, "Crazy Amanda." "Crazy Amanda" is the polar opposite of a valentine-shaped Blink-182 love song.

"Amanda is this ex-girlfriend of mine from a long time ago," Deryck says, sounding just a tad bitter. "She's kind of a loser. I went out with Amanda like four years ago. I don't even know why [memories of her] still come into my head."