Today we’re celebrating a really incredible anniversary. It was exactly 15 years ago today that Simple Plan played their very first show in their current formation – that means with Pierre, Sebastien, Jeff, Chuck and also David who joined the band a little later. It’s quite extraordinary to see that even after 15 years, the band has never changed any member of their line-up. And how exactly did this show come about?
The story goes like this: the band started with Chuck and Jeff, who later got Jeff’s friend’s (Jay Lefebvre) brother Sebastien to audition as well as asked Pierre to come try out with a new project they were starting. Pierre, who was still in Reset (Pierre’s and Chuck’s foremer band, which Chuck got kicked out of), eventually decided to join Simple Plan and leave Reset. That meant Reset had to find a new singer and they decided to go for a talented young bloke from Matane, David Desrosiers. However shortly after the four-piece Simple Plan’s first show, the band realized they needed one more member to allow Pierre more freedom in singing without having to take care of the bass as well. One day the guys went to check out Reset’s first show with their new lead singer and were completely amazed by David’s performance and suddenly realized he was the missing member of Simple Plan. They asked David to try out and eventually decided to join Simple Plan and leave Reset for good.
The first official Simple Plan show with the current formation took place 15 years ago, on February 3rd 2001, when Simple Plan opened for Our Lady Peace at Laval University in Quebec City. In a way, we can consider this Simple Plan’s official birthday.