Avril Lavigne

The latest album by Avril Lavigne, “The Best Damn Thing,” seems like it has a lot going for it. Brought to you by the producers behind Kelly Clarkson, Daughtry, Green Day, and My Chemical Romance, the album has all the behind-the-scenes muscle to make it exactly what it endeavors to be: fun. However, the brand-name brains settled for a spotty pop mixture based on the sounds of their former clients, and “Damn Thing” retains little of what used to be amusing about Lavigne’s music.

The up-tempo punk-pop tunes that put Lavigne on the map seem to have devolved–something one would have thought impossible–into even simpler, standard fare.

On this, her third solo album, Lavigne aspires to the same fuck-you pretension that marked her past two discs, but the sound is ultimately too polished to pull it off. Sure, overproduced music can be fun, but it has to full-throatedly embrace that spirit of plasticity. Lavigne has abandoned her formerly rambunctious ‘tude for something lifeless and much less dynamic.

Transformation has often made for interesting pop stars. Christina Aguilera’s metamorphosis from “Genie in a Bottle” pop-schlock to “Xtina: Warrior Princess” resuscitated her career. Recently, Lavigne has been documented in the press trading in her “JNCOs” for more upscale duds. In January, she attended the Chanel couture show in Paris, and has reportedly been signed to Ford Models.

But musically, Lavigne’s not showing any growth. Simply put, “The Best Damn Thing” isn’t bold enough to explain to her fans the dichotomy between the old and new Avril. Perhaps she should heed her own lyrics from her 2004 hit “Complicated”: “Take off all your preppy clothes / You know you’re not fooling anyone / When you’ve become somebody else round everyone else.”

Speaking of fooling people, a simple glance at the album’s lyrics may fool Lavigne’s fans into thinking the track “Hot” was written by Fergie: “You make me so hot / Make me wanna drop / It’s so ridiculous / I can barely stop / I can hardly breathe / You make me wanna scream / You’re so fabulous / You’re so good to me baby.” All appearances aside, it’s Avril Lavigne singing with complete disregard for her old “Boys suck!” mantra.

The rest of the album is mainly composed of similarly predictable insta-songs. The phrase (if you can call it that) “Hey, you!” seems to have been cut and pasted into as many of the album’s tracks as possible. The title track finds Lavigne singing, “Let me hear you say hey, hey, hey!” The album’s only variety is provided by “Girlfriend” and “I Can Do Better,” and even then, the only slightly different line “Hey, hey, you!” is a central motif.

That title track is perhaps best representative of everything that goes wrong on the disc. The staleness of the song’s lyrics perfectly complements the deja-entendu feeling one gets upon listening to it.

In a brief, speak-singing interlude, she spells out the words that make up her lyrics while squeaky girls giggle in the background. Lavigne sounds far too much like another pop star on the track, without matching her ingenuity: B-A-N-A-N-A-S, anyone?

In short, “The Best Damn Thing” makes you want to say: “Hey, Avril! Why’d you have to go and make things so complicated? Everyone can see the way you’re acting like you’re somebody else gets me frustrated.” Okay, maybe that’s a cheap and predictable joke, but it’s about on par with what Lavigne is doing these days.