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BIOGRAPHY

Avril Lavigne
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Avril Ramona Lavigne, born September 27, 1984, is a Canadian pop punk singer-songwriter who is well known for her "skater punk" persona.

Her two albums to date, Let Go (2002) and Under My Skin (2004), have topped the charts in numerous countries, yielding four top ten singles on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100.

Born in Belleville, Ontario, Canada, to conservative Franco-Ontarian Christian parents John and Judy Lavigne, Avril grew up in Napanee, where she sang country music and in a church choir and taught herself to play guitar.

She was discovered by her first professional manager while singing country covers at a Chapters bookstore in Kingston, Ontario. By the age of sixteen, she was signed by Ken Krongard, the artists-and-repertoirte (A&R) representative of Arista Records, who invited his boss, Arista head Antonio "L.A." Reid, to hear her sing in a New York City studio. She then completed work on her first album.

Apparently, early attempts to co-write songs for her failed to meet her approval; and Lavigne eventually moved to Los Angeles, California, and co-wrote her album with Clif Magness and the songwriting team The Matrix, whose previous work included songs for Sheena Easton and Christina Aguilera. She described her first album, Let Go, as a pop album with "a couple of rock songs on it", and has indicated a desire to write more rock-oriented songs in the future. It was released by Arista on June 4, 2002 in the United States, reaching number two there and number one in Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom (making Lavigne the youngest female solo act ever at the time to have a number-one album in the UK). It was certified four times platinum less than six months later by the RIAA, and had sold fifteen million copies worldwide as of December 2004.

Four singles from the album were released, all of them hits. "Complicated" went to number one in Australia while reaching number two on the U.S. Hot 100, and was also one of the best-selling Canadian singles of 2002. "Sk8er Boi" reached the top ten in the U.S. and Australia and number one in Canada, "I'm with You" reached the top five in the U.S., while "Losing Grip" reached number one in Canada, the top ten in Taiwan, and the top twenty in Chile. The media have often compared Lavigne to Alanis Morissette (one of her favourite artists alongside Coldplay and The Goo Goo Dolls), who is also Canadian, as well as singer-songwriters such as Vanessa Carlton and Michelle Branch, who emerged at about the same time and were popularly credited, with Lavigne, as part of a trend towards more genuine creativity in the teen pop-music market. Lavigne was named "Best New Artist" at the 2002 MTV Video Music Awards, won four Juno Awards in 2003 (out of six nominations), a World Music Award for World's Best-Selling Canadian Singer, and was nominated for eight Grammy Awards.

Lavigne's second album, Under My Skin, was released on May 25, 2004 in the U.S. and went to number one in several countries, including the UK, USA, Canada, and Australia. Lavigne wrote most of the album with Canadian singer-songwriter Chantal Kreviazuk, though some tracks were co-written by Lavigne and Ben Moody (formerly of Evanescence), Butch Walker of Marvelous 3, and the rest with her former lead guitarist Evan Taubenfeld. Raine Maida of Our Lady Peace Kreviazuk's husband, co-produced the album with Butch Walker and Don Gilmore.

Lavigne's current band consists of the following: Devin Bronson (lead guitar), Craig Wood (rhythm guitar), Charlie Moniz (bass) and Matt Brann (drums). Departed members from Lavigne's band consist of the following: Evan Taubenfeld (lead guitar, 2002 – 2004), Mark Spicoluk (bass, 2002) and Jesse Colburn (rhythm guitar, 2002 – 2003). In 2003, it was reported that Lavigne was romantically involved with Colburn. Lavigne is engaged to be married to Deryck Whibley of the pop punk band Sum 41, and Mark Spicoluk was a former member of that band.