Paramore - Let the flames begin

Emo-pop-punk. How many acts belonging to that genre mash-up have managed to break free of their adolescent early-career mood, or at least evolve over the years, reinvent themselves, and push their sound and lyrics to the next level? Not many - just think of acts like Fall Out Boy, All Time Low and Panic! At The Disco, born in the early 2000s and not exactly having aged gracefully. That scene, still far too underrated, defined an era, soundtracking the coming-of-age of an entire generation. Among the select few who actually pulled it off, alongside the monumental My Chemical Romance, are certainly Paramore.

The band, originally founded by iconic singer Hayley Williams, brothers Josh and Zac Farro on guitar and drums respectively, and bassist Jeremy Davis, carried a wealth of influences from the very start. Standing out among them are Jimmy Eat World, who along with Weezer were chiefly responsible for the earliest emo-pop crossovers, American Football, Death Cab For Cutie, the arena-rock atmospheres of late-period Sunny Day Real Estate and Foo Fighters, and the sophisticated crossovers pursued by No Doubt, fronted by Gwen Stefani.

Numerous line-up changes and upheavals over the years led Hayley - the band's only constant member - and her bandmates to experiment in ever-new directions while still holding onto a personal identity. The group first dabbled in alt-rock and folk-rock, gradually shedding its emo roots, before later folding in funk, electronics and the synthetic melodies typical of new wave and dance, drawing on historic figures such as Blondie, Cyndi Lauper, the eclectic Talking Heads and their side project Tom Tom Club, eventually brushing up against post-hardcore, math-rock and post-rock territory.

The songwriting process proves to be a genuine coming-of-age journey, moving through themes centered on interpersonal, family and romantic relationships, friendship, and the bonds between the band members. One of the recurring leitmotifs across their work is the idea of "pressure" that constantly weighs on people – handled more directly and in teenager-sized terms on the debut records, then growing in complexity over time until it repeatedly brushes up against the delicate subject of mental health, an issue especially close to Williams.

Rioters: we can feel the pressure…

2004 is the year the band's official lineup was formally set down on paper, but its real origins date back two years earlier, to their school days. At thirteen, Hayley moved with her mother to Franklin, Tennessee, and met Josh and Zac during an extra class, immediately forming a strong bond with them over their shared passion for music. Her mentor and first singing teacher was Brett Manning, today known as a vocal coach to, among many others, Taylor Swift, Poppy, Miley Cyrus and Leona Lewis.

Once she started music lessons, the artist joined a funk cover band called The Factory, where she met Jeremy Davis. The four of them grew close enough to start writing and sharing their own material, rehearsing together, entering competitions, and playing school shows and local venues. Not long after, rhythm guitarist Jason Bynum joined them, and within a couple of years the quintet rapidly worked their way up to the area's most important venues. They were contacted by Atlantic, initially with the intention of signing Hayley alone, but the label decided not to put them straight under a major, choosing instead to find a subsidiary better suited to their image. The one who officially bet on them was Fueled By Ramen, focused on the new emo scene, run by John Janick and Vinnie Fiorello (ex-Less Than Jake), with whom they officially signed in the spring of 2005.

The group relocated to Florida, where the label is based, to start working on their debut, but a first setback arrived almost immediately: Davis was forced to leave the band for personal reasons. The bassist's absence would only be temporary, but the debut All We Know Is Falling (2005) grew out of this episode, and plays like a kind of diary, especially for Hayley. This "personal notebook" has plenty of flaws, but it's only fair to judge it on its own terms, namely as an album written by teenagers, where the shortcomings are balanced out by more than decent elements and some genuinely strong moments. What weighs on it most is the near-total absence of key bass passages, even though the band had brought in session musicians to record the bass parts, leaving the sound too flat and repetitive, a victim of the pop-punk clichés of the 2000s. Perhaps it's one more way of underlining how much of a difference Jeremy's presence made, something also hinted at by the shadow on the album's cover.

Amid extremely simple songs built on fast guitar riffs and sing-alongs – "Whoa" and "Never Let This Go" being the most obvious examples – it's the first half of the album that deserves the most attention. The opening trio of tracks features the feisty "All We Know", which deals with Hayley's parents' divorce as well as Davis's departure from the band, the more famous, anthemic "Pressure", and "Emergency", which captures a toxic relationship from a teenager's point of view. Also making a good impression are the personal frustrations of "Conspiracy", the very first song ever written by Williams, together with friend Taylor York, at the time an occasional outside collaborator on the project, and the variation on the theme found in the hinted-at scream from Josh Farro on closer "My Heart", which speaks to the importance of Christian faith for the band members.

Solid commercial returns, as well as a critical reassessment (the initial reception had been lukewarm) that now regards the album as a classic of the era's emo-pop scene, would come gradually for All We Know Is Falling, starting from 2007 onward, thanks to the massive worldwide success of the sophomore effort Riot!, released that same year.

By the end of 2005 Davis had officially rejoined the lineup, while Jason Bynum departed, replaced by Hunter Lamb. To promote the debut, rather than immediately pushing for radio play, Paramore started out supporting Simple Plan, Funeral For A Friend and many others on tour, also taking part in the 2005 and 2006 editions of the Warped Tour, a well-known showcase for punk-rock, emo, alt-rock and post-hardcore acts. The charismatic Hayley immediately became the band's defining icon thanks to her fiery red hair and flat-ironed fringe, in keeping with the fashion of the time (a trait she would later overhaul with countless cuts and colors, eventually leading her to found Good Dye Young, a hair dye brand), along with a remarkable, richly promising voice.

Once the international tour wrapped up, in early 2007, the band went back into the studio, without Lamb, to start writing the sophomore record.

Amid constant friction and internal conflict, Riot! (2007) took shape as an uncontrolled, cathartic outpouring of emotion: the first veiled references to the frontwoman's depression surface ("Miracle"), along with betrayed friendships ("For A Pessimist, I'm Pretty Optimistic"), the hard task of coping with life as a public figure ("Fences"), and the odd motivational passage ("Hallelujah").

It doesn't yet make the decisive turn toward power-pop and alt-rock that Paramore (2013) would, but it does start pushing the band's work in a pop-rock direction, as they look around for something new while still riding the crest of the wave. That's borne out by the album's artwork, which winks at the cover of No Doubt's "Rock Steady". The track that wins out over everything is the pivotal "Misery Business", complete with one of the most kitsch videos around, set in a classic high school, which caught the attention of MTV, who put it into heavy rotation and introduced the band to Europe as well. One of the bitchiest, most brutally honest revenge songs around, it shows the point of view of a girl getting even with another girl: the bone of contention between Williams and her rival would, years later, turn out to be Josh himself. Over the years Hayley faced enough criticism over it that, from 2018 onward, she refused to perform the hit live, one of the best-known songs in their catalogue, because of lyrics deemed (somewhat forcibly) "sexist". And on that note, credit is due to Billie Eilish and her brother Finneas, who tricked her into performing it live with them, which ended up bringing it back into the setlist for good by the end of 2022.

Riot!'s chief achievement is managing to become a cult favorite thanks to explosive tracks like the one mentioned above, anthems slightly more structured than those on the debut and packed with contagious choruses, like the catchy, harmonious "That's What You Get", the great riffs and killer refrains of "Let The Flames Begin" and "Crushcrushcrush", and the fan tribute "Born For This", amid whose drum rolls, pounded out by Zac, Davis's bass finally gets to stand out.

The "shameless" tag was probably inevitable, given how they managed, almost unfairly, to reach the numbers of a stadium-filling pop-rock band in the blink of an eye. A few other small novelties involve Hayley's use of new vocal registers, and the first forays into ballad territory, still anchored to a somewhat impersonal style, like "When It Rains" and the prayer-like "We Are Broken", which in some ways run parallel to what Avril Lavigne was doing on "Under My Skin".

Incurably shameless or not, after almost two years of promotional touring, their first on a global scale, Paramore consolidated a success that showed no sign of fading, helped along by the extra visibility gained from writing two songs for the "Twilight" soundtrack (another slice of adolescence many of us deny out of embarrassment, but that in truth we've all seen at least once in our lives), the bright, tense "Decode" and "I Caught Myself". The former, in particular, released as a single, walked away with a platinum certification in both Australia and the US, surpassing the already record-breaking numbers of the singles from Riot!.

Brand new eyes (and ears)

After a torrential run of award nominations and a string of wins at the Teen Choice Awards, the band set to work on their third installment, Brand New Eyes (2009), produced by Rob Cavallo (My Chemical Romance, Green Day, Alanis Morissette), which stands as the only (and last) time a full five-piece lineup would be captured in the studio. Taylor York, sidelined until then despite already being a credited writer on some tracks from previous albums, officially joined the band as rhythm guitarist in June 2009. The band began to set themselves apart from their emo-pop labelmates, leaning more toward an alternative-rock foundation, showing the first signs of growth in their songwriting (now more sharply introspective), in their arrangements, and in their attention to visual presentation, alongside a fuller, more cohesive sound that was no longer as flat as in their early days. The theme of change, together with reflections on faith and the past, dominates the record, symbolized too by the butterfly on the cover.

Another sign of the band's genuine desire to shake off the labels previously pinned on them can be seen in their refusal, in the summer of that same year, to contribute to the soundtrack of the "Twilight" sequel, "New Moon", so as to avoid being branded "the vampire band." Acting as a bridge to their previous work is the search for meaning spelled out in the opener "Careful", marked by tight drumming and a melodic bridge, and the anger spat out amid the notes of the aggressive "Ignorance".

The pop backing vocals of "Playing God" wink at Jimmy Eat World and tackle the weight of judgment, continuing on from the previous track but from a different angle, one that calls out the hypocrisy of religion (also the central theme of "Turn It Off"), while the anthemic "Brick By Boring Brick" repeatedly puts the spotlight on its bassline and on keyboard and organ details.

Other focal points of the album are the two acoustic tracks: "The Only Exception", a big ballad in which the band's true soul shines through, being in fact the first love song Hayley ever wrote, and the bare, razor-thin "Misguided Ghosts". The final peak comes with the closing track, the gorgeous breakup song "All I Wanted", slower and more dramatic in its pacing, dedicated to Williams's then-boyfriend Chad Gilbert (New Found Glory).

The album quickly climbs the charts worldwide, becoming Paramore's biggest success up to that point, and once again sweeps the awards. But amid constant back-and-forth and mounting rumors about the band's real stability and internal tensions, something finally breaks for good, and in December 2010 the Farro brothers split from the band. They initially attempt a short-lived venture together, founding Novel American, before going their separate ways: Josh with the brief solo detour Farro, and Zac with the HalfNoise project.

Start again: we grow up, never grow old

Zac and Josh's departure causes turmoil and further minor skirmishes online, where the latter accuses the remaining members, Hayley in particular, of having become little more than a product manufactured by the record label. Williams, York and Davis refuse to give up, and after regrouping to finish the tour, in January 2011 they announce, during an MTV interview, that they are ready to work on new material and explore uncharted sonic territory.

That same year they contribute the track "Monster" to the soundtrack of "Transformers 3" and release "Renegade", "Hello Cold World" and "In The Mourning" in quick succession, later collecting all four tracks on the EP Singles.

During 2012 the band split up studio duties to work on their fourth effort: Hayley and Davis, besides vocals and bass respectively, handle synths and keyboards, York takes care of guitars along with part of the programming and percussion, while drums are entrusted to multi-instrumentalist Ilan Rubin.

Paramore (2013) is a sprawling, autobiographical seventeen-track work lasting a little over an hour, entirely geared toward the future, toward the uncertainty and frustration that come with it, and toward inner growth, in an attempt to look ahead and channel anger and negative emotions into lessons learned and even something positive. The sound is built on a pop-rock and power-pop foundation, blended with electronics, new wave and post-rock, with the occasional addition of funk, gospel and swingbeat touches. Backing the trio at the production helm, and in some cases also acting as keyboardist and co-writer, is Justin Meldal-Johnsen (Nine Inch Nails), one of the people best suited to bringing out the band's eclectic, experimental side (and his imprint, along with the influence of NIN, can be felt in several moments).

From the very first listen, the rhythms and synthetic textures of the breezy "Fast In My Car" catch you off guard, followed by the even more electrifying "Now", bolstered by a driving rhythm section that builds toward an explosive chorus, where the frontwoman draws inspiration from the production and vocal style of Gwen Stefani. "Grow Up" harnesses new wave airs, as does the epic "Daydreaming", which also unleashes grandiose orchestral arrangements. The multifaceted "Ain't It Fun", caught between gospel choirs and funk-pop jolts, earns the trio a Grammy in 2015, making Hayley the first woman since 1999 to win in the Best Rock Song category.

The frightening instrumental passages of the claustrophobic crescendo of "Part II" make a fine showing, tying together electronics, math-rock leanings and post-grunge, and positioning itself as a sequel to "Let The Flames Begin", clearly echoing some of its lyrics. The album also roams further afield with the melodic "Last Hope", the sunny, sugary upbeat teen-pop of "Still Into You", the quiet pop-folk of "Hate To See Your Heart Break", and the surprising, long tail of the bleak post-rock closer "Future", born of a fortunate accident that merged two different tracks into one.

The album runs on a bit longer than it should, falling into some avoidable padding, between acoustic ukulele interludes and a few lesser moments in its second half, such as the rousing "Anklebiters" and "Be Alone", "Proof", and the strings and doo-wop swagger paired with the guitar riffs of "(One Of Those) Crazy Girls". Songs that fit perfectly within the record's framework, yet end up weighing it down too much. Even so, this doesn't stop the trio from once again outdoing themselves and surpassing their previous excellent results, leading them to embrace yet another world tour.

At the end of 2015 another cold shower arrives, with the definitive break between the band and Jeremy Davis, after which, having left the lineup, he files a lawsuit against former bandmates Williams and York over issues tied to the band's future earnings and credits he claims he was denied. The road to the fifth studio album looks like an uphill climb, the temptation to drop everything and disband is strong, and it puts Hayley's nerves to the test. In mid-2016 she and Taylor return to Nashville, Tennessee, to head into the studio. Joining them, alongside Justin Meldal-Johnsen, will be Zac Farro, whose official return will only be confirmed at the start of the following year.

After Laughter (2017) is the darkest chapter of the Paramore era, where the seemingly brightest atmospheres of their career yet, staged through eighties-inspired synth-pop and alt-dance textures mixed with nu-disco, clash sharply with dark, fairly creepy lyrics, shaped by Hayley's severe depression and the band's latest rupture.

The exotic rhythms lent by a marimba on "Hard Times" combine with a chorus that seems to evoke the late-seventies disco sound of "Good Times" by funk outfit Chic, followed by the blind, unsustainable optimism of "Rose-Colored Boy", where the new wave of Altered Images meets Cyndi Lauper and the synthetic pop of Scritti Politti. Falling in with this same theme are the sing-alongs "Fake Happy" and "Idle Worship", while nu-disco, new wave and a funky bassline chase each other through the lively "Told You So".

Hayley looks at herself in the mirror and comes to terms with the passing years, her dreams, her aspirations and the difficulties she has to face, leaping back into the Nineties with "Caught In The Middle", thanks to ska echoes reminiscent of early No Doubt, while the acoustic "26" plays only on the notes of two violins, a cello and a viola.

Reflections on relationships, both romantic and platonic, are not lacking. The crystalline "Pool" deals with the dark side of a romantic relationship, while "Grudges" addresses the regret of wasted time spent not speaking to a friend after reconnecting; the handclaps of the breezy "Forgiveness" revolve around the inability to forgive certain actions, and the core of the hushed, reflective "Tell Me How", where marimba and keyboards once again take center stage, is the loss of someone due to a deep, irreparable rift. The only blank cartridge fired in the bunch is the hypnotic "No Friend", where Aaron Weiss of mewithoutYou lends his voice to the tight, barely audible spoken word.

Having won virtually unanimous praise from critics, at the end of the After Laughter Tour in the summer of 2018, the band decides to take an indefinite break.

Hayley dons an armor of flowers and dances alone

Hayley's solo career had always been talked about very little, yet the singer had taken part in the making of soundtracks and carried on several collaborations. Among the best worth revisiting are "Bury It", a featured appearance included on Chvrches's "Every Open Eye" (2016), and "Uncomfortably Numb" by Mike Kinsella's American Football, a band symbolic of the history of emo and math-rock, featured on "LP3" (2019).

The start of 2020 marks the official turning point with the release of the single "Simmer", an excellent preview of the solo debut Petals For Armor, which came out right in the middle of lockdown in May of that same year.

The lyrics tell of a woman's journey as she wrestles with her own demons to find balance, accompanied by minimal, electronics-leaning sounds, underpinned by the different vocal styles the artist adopts. The visual art - the music videos for the singles, complete with their make-up and choreography, and the artwork - plays a central role in the work, and given the obsessive attention to detail, it's only natural to link the singer to figures tied to various strains of art-pop such as Björk, Grimes, Billie Eilish and similar artists.

The album also features the artist's fellow travelers: Taylor York takes on the role of producer, arranger and writer, while Zac Farro directs the video for "Dead Horse".

Split into three EPs before its full release, Petals For Armor can either click with listeners or, over time, come across as a bit repetitive. The first part stands out for the dark, obsessive opener "Simmer", whose lyrics touch on trying to manage impulses of anger and anxiety, the tones of "Sudden Desire", and the bitter, sorrowful "Leave It Alone", where fury gives way to pain and a moment of awareness, metaphorically portrayed in the track's video through Hayley's rebirth from a cocoon. The same idea is underscored by the driving rhythms of "Cinnamon", in which the artist acknowledges that she is free and no longer alone. The second block includes even more intimate tracks, such as the Nineties-style dance-pop song "Dead Horse", about the stormy relationship with ex-boyfriend Chad Gilbert, the dance-punk tones of the motivational "Over Yet", aimed at those battling depression, and the reflective ballad "Why We Ever", which again touches on complicated relationships and the difficulty of letting go of the past.

The dreamy "Roses/Lotus/Violet/Iris" uses floral metaphors to tell a story of growth and inner searching, and features the indie supergroup boygenius, made up of Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker and Lucy Dacus.

The final part centers on "Pure Love", a track ideally connected to "Sudden Desire" and "Dead Horse", as it describes what falling in love again can involve. "Sugar On The Rim" is one of the album's most experimental tracks and manages to capture the balance the singer has achieved through experience, both sonically and lyrically.

"Watch Me While I Bloom" and "Crystal Clear", closing the record, are respectively a further floral metaphor referring to the artist's new life, and a love song.

Petals For Armor is a debut with its share of light and shade, both for the themes it explores and for the very slight repetitiveness that afflicts it, but thanks to this solo outing, Hayley is officially (if belatedly) recognized as a source of inspiration for the new generation of singer-songwriters, including Phoebe Bridgers herself, who always openly cites her among her own personal influences.

Surprisingly, after a series of clues scattered across social media, in early 2021 the singer releases Flowers For Vases/Descansos, a kind of prequel positioned between the first two parts of Petals For Armor. Recorded at her home in Nashville, and entirely written and performed by the artist, it moves between indie-folk and ambient-pop, without resorting to any tricks: focused on Hayley's voice and on introspective lyrics, the album opens up an intimate, direct dialogue between her and the listener, much like an album such as "Folklore" was for Taylor Swift, marking another step in Williams's artistic development.

The album opens with the torments and memories of “First Thing To Go”, which links back to themes explored in “Why We Ever”, while the hypnotic “My Limb” that follows references “Simmer” and describes the loss of someone so important they could be considered a part of oneself. On “Asystole”, cardiac arrest becomes a metaphor for the failure of a relationship, while the steady, measured “Trigger” recounts old toxic relationships and the need to be loved, and “Over Those Hills” is a cocktail of medication and thoughts directed at an ex-partner.

“Inordinary” is one of the album's most important tracks, retracing Hayley's childhood and adolescence, recalling her debut with Paramore, and reassessing the simplicity of life's small everyday things. Other notable moments include the ironic intro of “HYD”, the brief and tender “Find Me Here”, and the closing track, the slow-building crescendo of “Just A Lover”, in which Williams hints at the idea of leaving the band (and music in general) in order to devote more time to herself. The instrumental “Descansos” takes its title from the Spanish word for the memorials left at places where someone lost their life or radically changed it, here used as a metaphor for the desire to reinvent oneself, overcoming the traumas, pains and insecurities the artist has carried since adolescence.

Despite its ups and downs, with her sophomore album Hayley has managed to symbolically prove to everyone, and above all to herself, that she can be complete in every way, even on her own.

One step beyond your door/ It might as well have been a free fall

In a world built on disposable music, where Spotify numbers call the shots, in terms of plays and constant, rapid-fire releases needed to stay in the spotlight, there's growing debate about the importance of putting a project on hold while waiting for the right inspiration to strike. That reasoning carries even more weight when the parties involved are bands rather than solo artists. The idea of an indefinite hiatus is every fan's worst nightmare, and those who had been following the story of Paramore had grown pretty used to it by now. The American band, made up of singer Hayley Williams, guitarist Taylor York and drummer Zac Farro, had been written off as finished countless times, and the launch of the eclectic frontwoman's solo career with Petals For Armor suggested that the door to any eventual return would remain firmly shut. The turning point came with This Is Why (2023), alongside a return by the trio to as-yet-unexplored punk territory, arriving six years after After Laughter, on which Paramore had embraced unprecedented alt-dance and synth-pop textures.

The excellent title track gets straight to the point, highlighting the new influences the trio have developed: a stripped-back verse backed by a hypnotic, funky bassline sitting low in the mix, dance-punk energy in the chorus, and blunt, personal lyrics (the connections to Williams's solo debut are countless, both here and in the tracks that follow) written by all three members, accompanied by a video directed by Brendan Yates of Turnstile.

The stark verses of “The News” ride the new post-punk wave in the direction of The Lounge Society, with echoes of early Bloc Party, thanks to the mechanical grooves laid down by Farro's drumming and York's cutting riffs, while the chorus retains that pop-punk imprint typical of the band, bound to make its most devoted rioters jump. The danceable “Running Out Of Time” flaunts a new-wave side paired with funk touches, with Hayley laughing at her own poor time-management skills, a subject also picked up by “C'est Comme Ça”. The latter is the album's least successful moment: built on verses with Dry Cleaning-style sprechgesang, in keeping with the record's overall mood, it rolls out one of its catchiest refrains, seemingly engineered purely to get stuck in your head.

Having found the one flaw, the album doesn't hit a wrong note again until the end. The delicate “Big Man, Little Dignity” follows a dream-pop path and hides a jab at men who dodge every responsibility; meanwhile “You First” and the following “Figure 8”, which borrows samples from At The Drive-In's “Arcarsenal”, lean into post-hardcore and math-rock. The sweet ballad “Liar” returns to dreamy textures, echoed by the nostalgia wrapped up in the harmonica-laced “Crave”, before closing with the reflective, atmospheric “Thick Skull”.

The final symbolic act of the current “Paramore era”, the album breaks away from its predecessor, grafting onto its post-hardcore base some subdued slowcore tones in the style of American Music Club, brushing up against a post-rock drift. Balanced and magnetic from the very first track, This Is Why offers a sigh of relief to anyone who had written off the Tennessee band for good, but it's more than that: the album is yet another successful piece of a wide-ranging stylistic evolution that began back in 2009 with Brand New Eyes. That process has allowed Hayley and co. to grow, broaden their audience over time, and step out of the teenage emo-pop-punk niche, while keeping their strong identity fully intact. Proof that beneath the ashes, the flames of the old rioters are still smouldering, now free of every constraint.

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