After Sum 41’s Deryck Whibley finished writing the song “Pieces,” the singer/guitarist didn’t think the decidedly ballad-leaning track had a future with his more rock-oriented band. But “Pieces,” the latest single from Sum 41’s 2004 album “Chuck,” has struck a chord with listeners, having recently peaked at No. 14 on Billboard’s Modern Rock Tracks chart.
“I guess we’ve always enjoyed doing something different from what we’ve done before,” Whibley tells Billboard.com. “I just wrote it and I wasn’t trying to have it be a single. It wasn’t even going to be for Sum 41. I think a lot of times, a lot of ballads and slow songs are just obviously trying to be on the radio. And that was us not trying to be on the radio at all. It’s just a completely honest song and that’s why we are so proud of it.”
Arriving five years ago as snot-nosed Canadian punks that owed a debt of sonic gratitude to Green Day, the group has continued to mature. “Chuck” debuted at No. 10 on The Billboard 200 and has sold more than 364,000 copies in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan.
“I definitely feel like we’re having a career instead of [just] an album or a song,” Whibley says. “Everything keeps on getting a little bit bigger and a little bit better for us.”
The band earned extra credibility with its recent “Saturday Night Live” collaboration with rapper Ludacris on his single “Get Back,” a studio version of which is currently available on iTunes. Whibley says the two acts almost joined forces on another song for the original “Spiderman” soundtrack but scheduling conflicts kept the project from coming to fruition.
Sum 41 will hit the road for two months of dates on the Go Chuck Yourself tour, beginning April 7 in Toronto. Beyond tracks from the new album, there is also a cover intended to receive stage time last fall on Sum 41’s co-headlining outing with Good Charlotte that could end up in the set.
“We learned ‘Master of Puppets,'” Whibley says. “We’re used to a lot of guys [at our show] who would know Metallica but there were a lot of 14-year-old girls and eight-year-old kids with their parents. It would have been like eight minutes of boredom for them, so we never actually played it.”
The band members are leaving open their summer schedule but they expect to hit the festival circuit as well as stay on the road through the fall in support of “Chuck.” And after that?
“We don’t really plan,” Whibley says. “We’ve never been a band that plans ahead at all. We just kind of take each day as it comes and will figure it out as we go along. We enjoy it. There is no stress. You don’t have to deal with anything. ‘We’ll deal with it tomorrow’ is our motto.”
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