More than a year after Dave Baksh's departure, the remaining members of Sum 41 have addressed the the circumstances surrounding his leaving the band he helped form.

In a recent interview, frontman Deryck Whibley addressed the issue, saying:

The reality is, it didn't change anything creatively when Dave left. The first thing I want to say is that I did not want him to leave. I wish he was still in the band, but it was his choice. He quit. He didn't want to do [Sum 41].

He quit because he didn't want to keep playing our type of music. I knew that. We knew that before he quit. He had issues with our band back in 2001. We thought he was gonna quit back then. That was always in the back of my mind. 'Is Dave gonna like this? Is Dave gonna wanna play this?'

Even with the last record, his enthusiasm was so low that it brought us all down. It was a negative vibe in the studio. The fact that it wasn't there made it really easy. The best case scenario was that Dave would have been as excited as us, and been into it as much as us. I would have loved that, but that's not reality.

The band released Underclass Hero, their first record without Dave, last week.