Sum 41 gets deep

Somewhere along the way, either before or during the recording sessions for Chuck, the boys of Sum 41 went to Africa, did some volunteer work for a group called War Child Canada and had a few brushes with death. That sobering experience is reflected in most of the songs on its latest work, the first since 2002's Does This Look Infected? The album's namesake is Chuck Pelletier, a United Nations volunteer and former Canadian military operative. Pelletier is the man Sum 41 credits with getting them out of the Congo to safety when warring militias started shooting too close to the volunteers' home hotel.\nAs Sum 41 tells on its Web site, the foursome was in the Congo to shoot a documentary, featuring interviews with former child soldiers, rape victims and the selfless U.N. volunteers who care for them. When intense fighting started, Sum 41 and the other civilian volunteers had to make a run for it, hopping into an armored truck, hiding out at the U.N. base, then jumping onto the first plane out.\nThe first song on the album, "No Reason," immediately clues the listener in to what the rest of the album will be like: a flip-flop between traditional guitar-driven Sum 41 attitude and a melancholy self-introspection into the nature of mankind. Together with the second song and lead single "We're All to Blame," the impetus of the album is clear. "No Reason" asks why the world sucks and whose fault it is, and "We're All to Blame" gives the obvious answer. The remainder of the record is an affirmation of the theme, just with different subjects. Pain is the common denominator -- growing pains, living pains and the pain of what they saw while dodging bullets in the Congo. \nUnfortunately, Sum 41 gets a little repetitive in the rhythm department with their new serious sound, and folks who were looking for the Sum 41's hard rock three-part guitar harmony displayed on past albums will be a little disappointed. But Chuck is a solid record and is a good choice for even the casual Sum 41 fan. The album is such that there will be at least three songs on it that any taste will enjoy, and in these days of bubble-gum repeats, that's an achievement.