Rock Sound Classic Features: Paramore

A gem from the archive exploring the tensions in Paramore before the release of 'Brand New Eyes'.

Posted Friday, 1 July 2011 in

As Paramore look forward to their appearance at Rock for People in the Czech Republic this weekend we dig through the racks to pull out a classic feature written about the band as they started promotion of third album 'Brand New Eyes' in the Summer of 2009. Read the revealing insight into the tensions that nearly destroyed the band in the piece below and pick up a copy of Rock Sound issue 150 for more on Paramore and the finest alternative music known to man, woman and child.

On February 27th 2008 a new issue of Rock Sound magazine was placed in racks of newsagents, supermarkets and record stores across the UK, Paramore were on the cover. The issue was intending to celebrate the band’s 12-date UK tour and Grammy nomination for Best New Artist, but the band were far from jubilant. As their second album ‘Riot!’ continued to propel the band forward, fatigue set in and Paramore were struggling to cope with the pace and pressure that came with their position.

“We know we need to be thankful for what we have, we are,” admitted vocalist Hayley Williams when the interview for the piece was done. “But it’s hard to figure out the line of being grateful for it and knowing that if you take everything you’re offered you’ll not last doing it.”

The words proved eerily prophetic as six days before the magazine hit stands Williams posted a message online saying the band had “a lot of internal issues” and would be cancelling remaining tour dates because they weren’t “willing to risk the life of [their] band over one tour”. Strong words, but entirely necessary ones.

“We went to counselling when we got home,” Williams recalls some 16 months later. “We sat down with someone who had known our band for a long time, someone who forced us to be honest and talk to each other about what we were feeling, who we were and what had happened.”

Williams recounts the tale sat in the front lounge of the band’s tour bus as it sits in the loading bay of the First Midwest Bank Amphitheatre in Tinley Park, a desolate and deeply uninteresting suburb 40 miles south of Chicago. The bus is third in a row of nine that house Paramore, Bedouin Soundclash, tour headliners No Doubt and their associated crews. Next to those buses are eight articulated lorries that carry the production across North America on a 44-date tour that will play to a combined crowd of well over half a million, while making the members of No Doubt considerably more each.

Across from Williams sits guitarist Josh Farro, next to him are his drummer brother Zac and finally-official-second-guitarist Taylor York. Bassist Jeremy Davis sits in the corner of the lounge wearing a Snoop Dogg T-shirt and baggy shorts. The mood is heavy, awkward air hangs in the room. The door to the back lounge is shut and the curtain at the front of the bus is pulled to ensure privacy, passively heightening the tension. Josh sits leaning forward head in his hands, looking at the floor, the ceiling or anywhere else to avoid engaging in the conversation at this moment. When the possibility of deferring a question arises, he takes it. It is clearly a time he does not remember fondly. Williams continues the story.

“Before that tour we had a couple of months off but the whole time we were going through a lot of personal struggles, each one of us individually figuring out who we were,” she contemplates. “I remember being home before that tour and not seeing anyone, wanting to be away from everyone, I just sat on my couch at home. When we went back out on tour we were exhausted, we hadn’t really figured anything out, we hadn’t got the time we needed and we weren’t getting along. We didn’t like each other; we were in a band because people expected us to be. It wasn’t fun.”

“Not only were we physically tired but we were exhausted from how much we were not talking to each other,” Zac continues. “It was sad seeing these four faces around me when I would rather be anywhere else.”

“We always did things for other people,” Davis adds, looking up from a napkin he was drawing on. “This was the only time we were ever really allowed to be selfish with something.”
No one remembers who called it, who finally said it, but someone did. The flights were booked, the promoters called and the remaining dates were cancelled. The band flew home.
“It was about saving this band, not saving the tour,” York remembers as the band grappled with their issues in personal and group therapy, struggling to discover who they were, what had happened and what would become of it.

The problem, at its heart, was distance. Despite being on the same planes, buses and stages, the band had stopped talking, stopped being honest with each other. The silence had created spaces that gently eased apart the friendships that existed long before Paramore was a band. Paramore became a business. Paramore became impersonal.
“It was stuff that could have been solved so simply if we had been honest with each other and not afraid to be vulnerable,” Williams remarks with frustration. “I know for me, especially for me as a girl, I was always thinking that I had to be tough, had to be strong and that I couldn’t cry. Mentally and physically I always had to be on top, because I didn’t want to look like a weakling or like the little girl of the band. We each have a story similar to that and we were all afraid to be honest about it and it sucked.”
After therapy, things did improve, but they were not healed.

“We went back out on the road, got tired and didn’t gel back together,” Williams admits speaking softly and slowly, boring holes into the floor with her eyes. “There was a lot of me that I didn’t feel was accepted because I was growing up, but I’ve always been the little sister of the band. I felt like I was ready to wear make-up, ready to wear a dress and I worried what my dudes were going to think of that. It was tough, even after therapy we had to learn to talk to each other on our own without someone helping us out.”

The band toured with their heroes Jimmy Eat World, headlined Give It A Name, contributed ‘Decode’ to the Twilight soundtrack, watched ‘Riot!’ go platinum in the US, Gold in the UK and slowly stitched themselves back together over the rest of 08. Specifics are not discussed, rumours are not quashed and internet speculation not addressed directly as the band don’t mention names, dates, places or instances. Neither does Williams mention how (and if) her partner, New Found Glory guitarist Chad Gilbert, was involved. Despite the lack of detailed information, the atmosphere on the bus makes abundantly clear how complicated, painful and difficult the process was.

“A lot of change happens between the ages of 16 and 20,” admits Mark Mercado, one of the band’s two managers contacted later for comment. “Imagine if that change happened when you were on the road, away from your family and friends. The band are all so different from each other, that’s what makes this work and that’s also what makes things tough. I think they’re beginning to understand how to respect those differences. One of the biggest changes is seeing each of them really trying to communicate with each other. It’s not always easy, but it’s great to see.”

From the opposition, the pain and the self-inflicted scars of that year came their first single, ‘Ignorance’, from forthcoming third album ‘Brand New Eyes’.
“When we started writing again all the things I felt were starting to come out and I was really scared,” Williams explains. “How was I supposed to show my band, my friends, this song that has me putting them in a corner because of how I feel? How could I expect them to still like me at all?”

But show the band she did and somehow they accepted lyrics like, “The same tricks that once fooled me / They won’t get you anywhere / I’m not the same kid from your memory / Now I can fend for myself” from ‘Ignorance’ and “Next time you point the finger / I might just have to break it, break it off” from ‘Playing God’.

“I think we struggle with not being able to get back and say our side of those stories but we’ve all learnt to deal with that,” York says diplomatically, looking across at Williams. “Being a musician, you accept you’re not the voice of a band. We trust and love Hayley enough to give her that role even though it’s difficult sometimes.”
But, despite the aggressive candour and wounded retaliation of the album’s first three songs, ‘Brand New Eyes’ grows into a collective document of Paramore’s recent – and eventful – existence. The album demonstrates, both lyrically and musically, that the band now see the world on more sophisticated terms, not just black and white but distinctly lighter and darker, with many more shades of grey between.

“There are only so many times we can make ‘That’s What You Get’,” Zac admits. “We love poppy songs and we’re still going to play them but we have more to say now. I would love to play in the Foo Fighters but I would also love to play in Radiohead, you know? Some of the songs are way different and I guess we’re moving, just because our last record worked it doesn’t mean we should just repeat it.”

‘Brand New Eyes’ has at least five singles, five bombastic, charismatic rock songs that will surely catapult the band further up the food chain, but the crown jewel of the album is ‘Misguided Ghosts’, a song of pure, haunting beauty recorded in just one take when the band were in California with producer Rob Cavallo (Green Day, My Chemical Romance) during the early stages of 09.

“We actually wrote that track when we came back to the UK after taking a break,” Williams remembers. “Taylor was playing it one day in soundcheck, I thought it was a Bon Iver song, maybe Iron And Wine or something like that, but it was ours. I started writing to it immediately.”

The song, delicate, crisp and subtle, has a texture, a fragility that could only be expressed from the other side of a painful experience. It’s cruel, yet ironic that the band’s tumultuous past gave them the chance to illuminate their future through moments on ‘Brand New Eyes’ such as this.

“I think it’s the first time I’ve been able to sum up every oddball emotion I’ve ever had,” she offers candidly. “The song is about navigating through and from pain to find out where you fit.”

“I think this album is only a hint of what’s to come in this band’s future,” manager Mercado adds later. “I believe they have what it takes to go wherever they want to go. It’s our job to make sure that the pace is right.”

A few hours later, when Paramore perform their set in front of 25,000 people, it’s not hard to agree with their manager’s words. Sure, the cheers aren’t as loud, the set not as elaborate and the production not as complex for Paramore as it is for No Doubt, but it’s still easy to imagine the band holding an audience of this size in the years to come. ‘Brand New Eyes’ is the document of a stressful past and the blueprint for a brighter future, the songs on it are the most mature and accomplished the band have ever written.
“I feel like we’re capable of growing as big as we want to,” remarks York as he acknowledges that the band’s success is dependent on their ability to function as a unit. “We’re so thankful for this, we have friends at home struggling to pay their water bills with their music. We want to take as much advantage of this opportunity as we can while still staying sane.”

When Paramore started the members were young, so young. Some left, some stayed and they grew, they grew apart and nearly fell apart. Somehow they dealt with it and muddled through, taking the shards of their broken lives and fractured relationships and fitting them into a sort of mirror that reflects their togetherness, allowing them to carry on doing what they love. ‘Brand New Eyes’ is about fear, falling and finding a new balancing point. It’s real, awkwardly, painfully real. It’s the best album Paramore have ever made.