Avril Lavigne’s ready to take her fans on an “emotional journey” as US shows beginAvril Lavigne’s ready to take her fans on an “emotional journey” as US shows begin

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Having finished touring her native Canada, Avril Lavigne hits the U.S. Friday, joining her pal Machine Gun Kelly‘s in-progress Mainstream Sellout Tour. While Avril plans to play about half of her new album, Love Sux, she says she’ll revisit her entire back catalog — and the memories associated with it.

“It’s important for me to play songs from all seven of my records. So I’ll play all the hits from over the years, some from each album,” she tells ABC Audio. “And I think that’s fun because it’s like going on a journey with me [and] with my music over the last 20 years.”

Avril says she loves the fact that performing her past hits takes her fans back to a certain place and time in their lives.

“It’s kind of nostalgic, y’know? You tie memories to certain songs and I hear that from people all the time,” she shares. “They’re like, ‘Oh, I listen to ‘Sk8er Boi,’ it takes me back to high school!'”

Avril laughs, “I’m like, ‘Yeah, it takes me back to making my first album and coming out to LA for the first time and dropping out of high school!”

The singer, who’s engaged to boyfriend Mod Sun, notes, “I have my memories attached to the songs and then other people have theirs: falling in love, summer, whatever it is. And so that’s so fun. and I love that! And it’s kind of like this, emotional journey…That’s what I love about music. It’s so powerful.”

Avril’s tour with MGK runs through August 13.  In September, she starts a run of festival appearances, including Brazil’s Rock in Rio, Delaware’s Firefly Music Festival, and the emo-tastic When We Were Young festival in Las Vegas. Then she’s off to Asia and Europe for more shows.

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