In 2007, “Misery Business” by Paramore hit the radiowaves and quickly took the world by storm. By January 2008, the song had placed No. 26 on Billboard’s Hot 100, clueing in the public to this new, up-and-coming band. “Misery Business” may not have been the group’s first song, but it was their highest charting at the time. Released on their second album, “Riot!,” “Misery Business” put Paramore’s past, present and future on the public’s radar and made fans eager for what was to come next.
Paramore originated in Franklin, Tennessee, in 2004. Currently, the group consists of singer Hayley Williams, guitarist Taylor York and drummer Zac Farro. Williams has appeared on all five of Paramore’s albums and has been the only consistent member of the band. Williams has also done solo projects and has been featured in many songs by other artists.
The band debuted in 2005 after they signed to Atlantic Records and Fueled By Ramen. Their first album, “All We Know Is Falling,” features the first song Paramore ever wrote together — “Conspiracy” — along with other popular hits like “Pressure,” “Emergency” and “Whoa.” The album ranked No. 30 on Billboard’s Heatseeker Chart in 2006, a year before their second album dropped.
Featuring a blend of pop-punk, emo and pop-rock, the band’s unique sound even helped them feature two of their songs on the first “Twilight” movie soundtrack: “Decode” and “I Caught Myself,” both of which were released in 2008. “Decode,” one of the band’s most popular songs, was included on Paramore’s third album, “Brand New Eyes,” which wasn’t officially released until 2009 and consists of other hit songs like “Ignorance” and “The Only Exception.”
Paramore is known for their frontwoman Hayley Williams. In addition to her incredible voice, Williams is also memorable because of her bright orange hair. Since the release of the band’s first music video for their song “Pressure,” Williams has been associated with her signature orange hair completed by a reddish tint. Although Williams has gone through a number of hair colors since the start of her career, she will always be known for her original look. Because of fans’ responses to her hair color, she even founded her own hair dye company called Good Dye Young in 2016.
Paramore was nominated for a Grammy in four separate years, but they weren’t awarded one until 2015 for their song “Ain’t It Fun” for best rock song. Paramore has been nominated for and won several other awards throughout the years: favorite rock band, which was secured two years in a row through the People’s Choice Awards; best album through Kerrang! Awards for “Brand New Eyes”; and a whopping 11 awards through the Teen Choice Awards between the years 2008 and 2013.
Williams has also won awards throughout the years on her own, most notably in 2015 when she received the award for best vocalist from the Alternative Press Music Awards. The singer released her first solo track, “Simmer,” in January 2020 along with news of her solo debut album, “Petals for Armor.” In February 2021, Williams released her second solo album, “Flowers For Vases / Descansos.” The albums feature indie pop, synth-pop and art-pop, which varies from Paramore’s signature emo- and pop-punk sound.
The artist has also been featured on quite a few songs throughout the years, one of the most memorable being B.o.B’s 2010 hit “Airplanes.” The song brought new attention to Williams among mainstream artists. Tyler, the Creator mentions “Airplanes” in his song “Yonkers,” referring to both Williams and B.o.B in one line of his lyrics. In 2012, Williams was featured on Zedd’s song “Stay the Night.”
Earlier this year, Williams alluded to a possible new album. Initially, Williams announced that after the release of “Flowers For Vases / Descansos” she had no plans of dropping new solo music anytime soon. However, the artist also mentioned that she couldn’t wait to hear what Paramore had in store for them next. The band has not released any new music since their 2017 album, “After Laughter.”
Williams’ message prompted Alternative Press to speculate that fans would see Paramore’s new album late this year; the magazine wrote, “For now, it’s unknown when Paramore’s next album may arrive. However, if history repeats itself, fans may get to hear it sometime this year. Since the release of 2009’s ‘Brand New Eyes,’ Paramore has steadily released a new full-length studio album every four years. With ‘After Laughter’ making its debut in 2017, it’s possible we could hear new Paramore music in 2021.”
Paramore’s last known concert date was in 2019 alongside the bands Foster the People and Soccer Mommy in Columbus, Ohio. Williams may be known for — and has even won an award for — her vocals, but her fame hasn’t deterred her from performing almost every single one of the band’s songs live at various concerts. Paramore’s only known song to never be performed live is “All I Wanted” from their third album. Williams has said that the song is too difficult to perform live due to its vocal range.
After the release of their most recent album in 2017, Paramore has yet to launch anything new. However, the band is once again gaining recognition, this time because of TikTok. Their songs “All I Wanted” and “Still Into You” have been trending on the platform since 2020 and notable reverb verses of these hits have been made into TikTok sounds. The band has also secured popularity for inspiring up-and-coming artist Olivia Rodrigo, with fans drawing parallels between Paramore’s music and Rodrigo’s hit song “good 4 u.” Rodrigo has even mentioned that the song is meant to sound like Paramore’s “Misery Business.”
With the announcement of a new album supposedly in the works, fans can look forward to Paramore staying relevant. In the last year, Williams has decided to go back to her famous fiery orange locks, and fans hope that the style shift means that Paramore’s sound will return to that of their first and second albums. However, Paramore has announced that they hope to change their sound with their latest album. The pop-punk emo band may be known for their raw and emotional-sounding music, but moving forward, it sounds like Paramore is hoping to go back to their roots and create music inspired by their own favorite bands.
