"When it ended, I asked, “Do you hate it?” How an old rap-rock demo, a Chris Farley skit and an all-star jam helped turn one Canadian pop-punk band into megastars

Canadian rock band SUM 41 (L-R) Dave Baksh, Jason McCaslin, Deryck Whibley, and Steve Jocz in March, 2001 in Los Angeles, California. — (Image credit: Gregory Bojorquez/Getty Images)

When Sum 41 frontman Deryck Whibley played an old demo to producer Jerry Finn, he was so embarrassed about his efforts that he hid his face until it was over.

For around six months, the Ontario four-piece had been working on their debut album All Killer No Filler at Metalworks studio in Mississauga, Ontario, and Cello Studios in Los Angeles, California (now known as EastWest Studios).

Their album had largely been written and recorded, but Whibley had an idea for a song that had been pieced together over the course of 18 months. He had to finish the song, even though it wasn't fully formed.

"It was all over the place," Whibley revealed on The Joe Vulpis Podcast. "I finally landed on something I thought was kind of cool, but I was so embarrassed by it that I hadn’t shown the band or told anyone. We waited until late one night when everyone had left the studio and I played it for him. When it ended, I asked, “Do you hate it?”

"That's your first single," was the producer's reaction, adding, "I think that’s the best song you’ve ever written.”

I thought 'Fat Lip' would be the first single. There was no doubt in my mind, but we didn’t all share that feeling.
Deryck Whibley

Inspired by the likes of Run DMC, the Beastie Boys and LL Cool J, Whibley christened the song's sound as "punk hop". Rap was the first music that he listened to that didn't come from his parents record collection. His early demo had samples galore but the producer offered some salient advice.

"He told me, 'I think we take out all that old school hip hop stuff you’re adding. Keep the vibe, but just have you guys play it. We don’t need sample drums in the verse or for it to sound like LL Cool J circa 1986'," Whibley told Joe Vulpis.

With Finn's reaction giving the songwriter a sense of confidence in his demo, he played it to his bandmates, bassist Jason 'Cone' McCaslin, guitarist Dave Baksh and drummer Steve Jocz.

"I think there was some excitement – nobody in the band didn’t like it," Whibley told Less Than Jake's Chris Demakes on his podcast. "Cone and Stevo were ‘OK, cool’, where Dave and I thought this was a really cool song. When it was finished as a demo, I thought it would be the first single. There was no doubt in my mind, but we didn’t all share that feeling."

Sum 41 - Fatlip - YouTube

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Maybe it was the idea of rhyming with the flow and confidence of a rap battle-hardened emcee that didn't sit comfortably with his bandmates. Thanks to some coaching by the rapper MC Shan, they'd previously dipped their toes in the rap-rock world on their Beasties-flavoured Half Hour of Power track What We're All About. But for Fat Lip, Whibley felt they could do better.

The lyric "Stormin' through the party like my name was El Niño, when I'm hangin' out, drinkin' in the back of an El Camino" had been kicking around for ages, partly inspired by a Saturday Night Live skit starring the late Chris Farley, but the remainder of the song required a group effort.

"I thought that lyric was funny," Whibley told Demakes. "[Chris Farley says] ‘I’m El Niño and tropical storms bow before me'. I don’t know why but that was in my head. It was the only line that existed for a long time. We came up with a bunch of different rhymes."

After brainstorming the rest of the lyrics, the band introduced some Ontario slang and band in-jokes to their fans. To save you a fruitless visit to Google Translate, 'Skid' is a hesher, a street kid. 'Kufuffin', meanwhile, is a nonsense word that means bullshit. You're welcome.

The single was released in April 2001, a taster of their album which was a few weeks away, but it wasn’t until the summer that an MTV performance truly sent the Ontario pop punks’ career skyward. Ridiculously so.

The band, who were on Warped tour, were invited by the then-music station to appear as part of their 20th anniversary celebrations. The band had the idea to do a fun collaboration and pitched some names to the channel executives: Tommy Lee, Rob Halford, the Beastie Boys and Slash. Real bucket list stuff.

“Both Slash and the Beastie Boys were like, ‘We're not going to show up. We're not doing that thing.’ But Tommy and Rob were like, ‘Fuck yeah, sounds great.’”

The band’s medley featured Fat Lip, Beastie Boys' No Sleep 'Till Brooklyn, Mötley Crüe's Shout At The Devil and Judas Priest’s You Got Another Thing Comin’.

Everybody was like, ‘You guys are going to be massive. After that, nothing's gonna be the same.’
Deryck Whibley

“When we opened the show, I thought we played like shit,” Whibley told Grammy.com. “It just didn't sound good in our monitors. It felt a little weird. You're playing to a lot of industry people, so you don't know if people like it or not.

“When we walked off stage, the heads of MTV came by and they were just saying, like, ‘That was phenomenal. We're gonna have a great relationship together. You guys are the next big thing.'”

Whibley wasn't joking when he describes that chain of events in the summer of 2001 as "life-changing".

And, true to their word, MTV began to feature the Fat Lip video heavily the very next day. The single also became a number 1 single on Billboard’s US Alternative Airplay chart.

“We flew back to the Warped Tour, and our friends – all those bands – had watched it,” he added. “Everybody was like, ‘You guys are going to be massive. After that, nothing's gonna be the same.’”

Born in 1976 in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Simon Young has been a music journalist for over twenty-six years. His fanzine, Hit A Guy With Glasses, enjoyed a one-issue run before he secured a job at Kerrang! in 1999. His writing has also appeared in Classic Rock, Metal Hammer, Prog, and Planet Rock. His first book, So Much For The 30 Year Plan: Therapy? — The Authorised Biography is available via Jawbone Press.

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