From teenage defiance in Franklin, Tennessee to synth-driven introspection, Hayley Williams and company keep rewriting their own rules.
If you want to understand Paramore, start with 'Misery Business' and then listen to '26'. The distance between those two songs tells you everything about how they've changed while staying honest.
Paramore matters because they've soundtracked a specific kind of teenage frustration and grown up in public without losing their bite. 'Misery Business' became an anthem for a reason, it's all sharp elbows and catchy hooks, capturing that feeling of being righteously pissed. They've kept that directness even as their sound shifted from pop-punk to the synth textures of After Laughter.
They started in Franklin, Tennessee with Hayley Williams on vocals, building a sound around pop-punk energy on albums like Riot!. Lineup changes followed, with Williams and guitarist Taylor York steering the band through shifts in style, from the introspection of '26' to the synth-driven tones of After Laughter. They've continued as a trio on 2023's This Is Why.
Keep it compact: a lyric you come back to, a live memory, or the part of the catalog you would point someone toward first.
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