Tennessee pop-punk veterans Paramore have undergone quite a metamorphosis in terms of the creativity and cohesion of the band.
With their latest album, the angst is all grown up and precedes the return of the Emo scene.
The backdrop of explicitly referential and more evocative nostalgia for bygone eras has always been prevalent in fashion.
First heralded by museum curator James Laver, he sought to compress the complex cycle of fashion into an easily digestible 150-year span.
Though Laver’s timespan is far longer than the current industry-used concept of the ‘20-year rule’, it claims something similar: what was once in style inevitably comes back.
The wind of the Y2K revival has filled the sails of fast fashion for a few years, with the visual wave now finally spilling over our eyes and into our ears.
Under the siege of TikTok, the beauty trends have coincided with the return of pop-punk.
An ambiguous accolade to ‘Misery Business’ was debated when Pop’s newest princess Olivia Rodrigo released ‘Good 4 U’.
Whilst Pierce The Veil’s mega-hit ‘King For A Day’ ricocheted into mainstream resurgence thanks to semi-viral trends, reacquainting itself with the U.S. Billboard Hard Rock Songs Chart by topping the list almost ten years since its initial release.
Manifesting the MySpace-era aesthetics of flat-ironed, side-swept bangs and heavy black eyeliner came to fruition with Paramore announcing their first new single in five years.
Fastforward to February, 10 when the band released its long-awaited sixth studio album of the same name, ‘This Is Why’ is a catchy and tight ten track, 36-minute listen, and arguably one of the strongest records in Paramore’s discography so far.
What it lacks in length and shimmer, it makes up for in rawness and blunt force that is perhaps only suggested by an appealing maturity.
A characteristic blend of low, groovy tension building verses punctuated by drums and panoramic gang vocals on the hooks – the hubris of their teenage-angst selves carves out a jagged sound upon the music landscape of 2023.
Their potent spirit of reclamation is excavated in the release of Williams’ feelings.
On such angular choruses, York and Farro’s complimentary guitars sharpen the vicariousness of her vocal vulnerability.
Scattered vocals detour the first four tracks into the narrative of palpable fear, the anxiety of “shutting your eyes” but the outside world’s opinions and tribalism “won’t go away” is echoed in ‘The News’.
Williams makes a simple recommendation – “turn off the news”.
She screams of the struggle for ignorance yet simultaneous trade-off that comes with being informed by the news that it skews and poisons the well around so many essential conversations.
In a long statement posted on the band’s Discord, Williams remarked that the “plethora of ridiculous emotions” embarked upon the album are emblematic of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Yet more so its societal exposure that people vulnerable to change can absorb their fear and hurt others in response.
She echoes this sentiment in the latter half of the album.
‘Liar’ is a cathartic burst of sullen melodies interwoven by cuts and bruises of a self-reflective ballad.
With ‘Thick Skull’, the massacring of guilt to “come on out with your hands up” and acknowledge your own personal failings is reinforced by “romanticis[ing] even the worst of times” in ‘Crave’.
Production upon ‘C’est Comme Ça’ sounds distinctly rougher than the rest of the LP.
Explicit punk remnants of “Na na na’s” are hardly a juxtaposition to the preceding track, ‘Running Out Of Time’; more so the intrusive thoughts it carries over provide relief in the childish taunting.
And taunt they have. The band released the first single five months before dropping the full album and, within that time frame, we have seen a throwback to the early 21st century physically reincarnate itself.
Three years after the controversial experimental album ‘MANIA’, Fall Out Boy have returned to their original record label Fueled by Ramen to reclaim their signature thrashing guitars and sardonic lyricism.
Dynamically blending all they’ve accomplished in the past twenty years with their unflinching roots careens down a path that has already been touted by Paramore this year, and thus looks promising for the Chicago quartet.
Lead singles ‘Love From The Other Side’ and ‘Heartbreak Feels So Good’ are out now, and bleed like a love letter to the passion prescribed pop-rock genre.
Despite currently touring, it seems the fever was finally sweated out when Brendon Urie announced the end of Panic! At The Disco in January.
A career spanning three decades – each with a distinctly limited iteration of the band, with Urie eventually reforming as a solo project – the news lingers with bittersweet hesitancy.
Whether their style and sound polarized listeners remains a subjective statement, but it can’t be forgotten that, as a band, they brought numerous people to the emo genre at its height.
The flickering embers of this potential mainstream music scene were further ignited when demand for the ‘When We Were Young Festival’ became so high that the initial one-day event in 2022 paraded into a three-day festival.
Underdogs became the frontrunners as the festival.
Taking Back Sunday, Bring Me The Horizon, Jimmy Eat World and The Used also took to Vegas for the event. Paramore and My Chemical Romance each respectively headlined.
Thus, My Chemical Romance solidified their status as alternative rock kings when they wrapped up their reunion tour last October.
A one-off show in Los Angeles pre-Covid rendezvoused with the concept of a fully-fledged sold-out tour across the world in 2022, selling out Stadium MK three times in the UK.
Being out of the playing field for nine years did nothing but reassure the staunch sincerity of the fans.
The Twenty-Year Rule isn’t a phase, mom.
That teenage angst never went away.
Image Credits: Instagram, @paramore