History Music / Sum41

As I Am, Music/FiveSecondsOfSummer

]

+ Music/{{NoFX}}, Pennywise, Music/IronMaiden, Music/JudasPriest, Music/BeastieBoys, Music/{{Metallica}}]

* LyricalDissonance: "My Direction," a fun punk song, not to mention one of only two songs on the album in a major key, about how suicide rates in North America had gone up in the last 30 years.
* MetalScream: Once again, “Mr. Amsterdam”

'''Sum 41''' is a pop punk rock band from Ontario, Canada, formed in 1996 by vocalist/guitarist Deryck Whibley and drummer Steve Jocz "[[PunBasedTitle some 41 days into the summer]]." They were soon joined by lead guitarist Dave Baksh and after a set of bass guitarist they finally settled on Jason "Cone" [=McCaslin=] in 1999. Their first album, ''All Killer, No Filler'', was released in 2001 and spawned their most successful single, "Fat Lip".

* KnowNothingKnowItAll: The record executive (played by ''Series/MadTV'' veteran Will Sasso) in the "Still Waiting" video, who spouses his alleged knowledge of successful "The" bands like "[[Music/LedZeppelin The Led Zeppelins]]" and less successful "number" bands like "GreenDay 75" when trying to convince Sum 41 to change up their style in order to cash in on the then-popular GarageRock revival.

* LighterAndSofter: While darker than All Killer No Filler, Underclass Hero was this to the album previous album Chuck and sounds closer to Does This Look Infected.

* MoodWhiplash: ''Chuck'' is especially made of this. Not only does it put relatively softer songs ("Some Say", "Pieces" and "Slipping Away") between fast and aggresive songs, but even some of the heavier songs on the album have slower, melodic parts such as on "We're All to Blame" (aggresive verses, calm choruses) or "88" (which has calmer first verse and the outro, but is otherwise fast and heavy).

* PunBasedTitle: The band's name comes from the fact that they formed "some 41 days into the summer."

* SpellMyNameWithAnS: Lord knows if this band is supposed to have a space, a hyphen, or no space at all in between the word and the number.
** Same goes with the song "Fat Lip." Is there supposed to be a spaced between the two words, or no...?

* StepUpToTheMicrophone: Aside from singing on Pain for Pleasure songs, Steve also rapped on Fat Lip, What We're All About and Thanks for Nothing (along with Deryck and in case of first two, Dave).

!We're All To Tropes:

* BreakupSong: “Pieces”, “Time for You to Go”, “What Am I to Say”, “Blood in My Eyes” and “Baby, You Don’t Wanna Know”. Note that 4 of these 5 songs were recorded after the divorce from Music/AvrilLavigne

* CallBack: Bridge to the song Subject to Change (found on the japanese version of Chuck) is the same as at the end of No Reason (another, earlier song from the same album). And of course, chorus of the former song was later re-used as chorus to Underclass Hero.

!They provide examples of the following tropes:

* '''Tom "Brown Tom" Thacker''' - guitar, backing vocals, keyboards (2009 - present; 2006 - 2009 as touring member)

!!!Members (current members in bold)

* DarkerAndEdgier: ''Does This Look Infected?'' was this to ''All Killer, No Filler'', ''Chuck'' was this to ''Does This Look Infected?'', ''Screaming Bloody Murder'' is this to ''Underclass Hero'' and finally, ''13 Voices'' is this to ''Screaming Bloody Murder''.

* FadingIntoTheNextSong: They use this a lot. "Grab the Devil by the Horns" to "Machine Gun", "Summer" to "32 Ways to Die" to "Second Chance for Max Headroom", "Dave's Possessed Hair" to "Ride the Chariot to the Devil", almost entire ''All Killer No Filler'', "Thanks for Nothing" to "Hyper-Insomnia-Para-Condroid" to "Billy Spleen", “Intro” to “No Reason” to "We're All to Blame", and all three parts of “A Dark Road Out of Hell”.

* PowerBallad: “Slipping Away”, “Pieces”, “With Me”, and “What Am I To Say”.
* ProtestSong: “Still Waiting”, “Underclass Hero”, and the majority of ‘’Chuck’’.

* SurprisinglyGentleSong: “Slipping Away”, “Pieces”, “With Me”, “What Am I To Say”, bits of “Happiness Machine”, and “Crash”.

* CallBack: Bridge to the song Subject to Change (found on japanese version of Chuck) is the same as at the end of No Reason (another, earlier song from the same album). And of course, chorus of the former song was later re-used as chorus to Underclass Hero.

* FourTemperamentEnsemble: From the early days, before Dave's leave-

* FiveManBand after Dave rejoin the band and Steve left the band

** TheHeart: Dave after he left and rejoin the band

** As of 2017, Pain for Pleasure is back. Except now they call themselves T'aint for Pleasure, with slightly different line-up: Pleasure and Sniper remain on their instruments, Gunner switched to rhythm guitar and was replaced by new drummer El Dildo (Frank), while Pain was replaced by T'aint (Tom).

* PerishingAltRockVoice: In the outro to “Skumfuk”
* PowerBallad: “Slipping Away”, “Pieces”, “With Me”, and “What Am I To Say”

* RockTrio: During Underclass Hero era they officially consisted only of Deryck, Cone and Steve (Tom was a live member only and as such did not play on the album, nor did he appear in music videos). Screaming Bloody Murder was also recorded in three piece despite Tom Thacker already being a member of the band at that point (he did get a co-writing credit for title track, though).
* {{Rockumentary}}: ''Rocked: Sum 41 In Congo.'' Subverted in that it's not so much about the band and their music as it is their experience visiting the Democratic Republic of the Congo in Africa and getting caught in a deadly shootout. See "WarIsHell" for more.

* SurprisinglyGentleSong: “Slipping Away”, “Pieces”, “With Me”, “What Am I To Say”, bits of “Happiness Machine”, and “Crash”

* CanadaEh: The band hail from Ajax, a sleepy town in Southern Ontario.

* CanadaEh: The band hail from Ajax, a sleepy town in Ontario.

* Adorkable: All of them, especially Cone.

* StudioChatter: At the beginning of “We’re All to Blame”.
** Also prevalent in "What' We're All About." After the line "I was drinkin' underage, I belong onstage," you can hear Cone in the right speaker saying something along the lines of "You ready?". A few seconds later, you can hear a woman saying, "Five," probably alluding to when he was supposed start up playing the bass again.

* TrashTheSet: The end of Still Waiting video. Also in Walking Disaster.
* WarIsHell: After recording ''Does This Look Infected?,'' the band took a break from music to join War Child Canada (the Canadian equivalent of The Peace Core), which sent them to the Democratic Republic of the Congo in Africa to work with Congolese youths. While there, they witnessed the country's long-ongoing war firsthand, and were later caught in a deadly crossfire between rebel soldiers and government troops which destroyed their hotel. The band and everyone else staying there were trapped for two days with the rest of the guests until they were rescued by a peacekeeper named Chuck Pelletier, who brought them safely home. Most of their following album, named ''Chuck'' in Pelletier's honor, was written to reflect on the experience.

* WarIsHell: After recording ''Does This Look Infected?,'' the band took a break from music to join War Child Canada (the Canadian equivalent of The Peace Core), which sent them to the Democratic Republic of the Congo in Africa to work with Congolese youths. While there, they witnessed the country's long-ongoing war firsthand, and were later caught in a deadly crossfire between rebel soldiers and government troops which destroyed their hotel. The band and everyone else staying there were trapped for two days with the rest of the guests until they were rescued by a peacekeeper named Chuck Pelletier, who brought them safely home. Most of their following album, named ''Chuck'' in Pelletier's honor, was written to reflect on the experience.

* MyNaymeIs: Deryck insists that the spelling of his name is [[AsLongAsItSoundForeign British.]]

* FlippingTheBird: At concerts, Derick leads the audience in the "41 Salute," which consists of holding up four fingers on the left hand and the middle finger on the right.

* ButtMonkey: Poor Cone. Not only does he not get any rapping or singing parts (at least, not in studio recordings), but he's constantly at the butt of jokes, too. And the victim of Steve's teasing and torment!(See DisproportionateRetribution below.)

** Deryck has one at the end of one their live performances of "The Hell Song."

* SpecialGuest: [[Music/{{Slayer}} Kerry King]] on [[Film/SpiderMan1 What We're All About]].
** Sum 41 themselves performed on Little Know It All by [[Music/TheStooges Iggy Pop]] and Get Back by Ludacris.

* Adorabkle: All of them, especially Cone.

* InkSuitActor: The band, in it's original incarnation, were animated into an episode of ''WesternAnimation/KingOfTheHill'' where they played a Christian rock band.