Future

Album: Paramore (2013)
Play Video

Songfacts®:

  • Paramore close their self-titled fourth album with this nearly eight-minute track about moving forward. Hayley Williams told Artist Direct that the song was "a happy accident." She added: "That's something I was playing around with on my guitar right after Josh and Zach Farro had left the band. It was an old song. It was this old thing I kept picking on guitar over and over again. It wasn't complete. It was a few lines. I showed it to Taylor four or five months later. If you look at the timeline, that was way before we started writing the album. It's something that came up again. I saved it on my voice memos on my iPhone. I was going through all of these ideas we wanted to shape up for demos."

    "We played around with it for a long time," Williams continued. "Finally, I was at the studio one day with Jeremy, Taylor, and (producer) Justin Meldal-Johnson. Justin was like, 'Jam on it right now! See if we can figure it out lyrically". I kid you not; the thing we recorded that day just jamming out live in the living room of the studio with iPhone apps open with drums on them and little keyboards Jeremy was playing is what's on the record. That ended up making it. The other half is the guys jamming at Sunset Sound in the live room. It's a really special song. It's super emotional for me."
  • The Paramore album found the trio rediscovering themselves as a band and as friends after the departure of the Farro brothers This song finds Williams realizing that looking ahead is better than wallowing in the past. She explained to Artist Direct: "I tend to be a really nostalgic person. I could write books and a million albums on a feeling or something I went through at sixteen- or seventeen-years-old, but what would be the point? There's a twenty-four-year-old person right here in me that is experiencing new life and new things that are probably more important than things I dealt with as a teenager. There are things I need to deal with now. There are things I'm happy celebrating now. It was important to the whole the record to be an ode to the future."

    I guess that song, long before we got ready to really write the record, shaped my thought process, where we were headed and where we needed to go," Williams added. "I was so tired of rehashing the past. We were doing so many interviews at the time about what was going on in the band and all of this black, negative stuff. I was just over it. So, it was a little song that got us through a lot."

Comments

Be the first to comment...

Editor's Picks

Who's Johnny, And Why Does He Show Up In So Many Songs

Who's Johnny, And Why Does He Show Up In So Many SongsSong Writing

For songwriters, Johnny represents the American man. He has been angry, cool, magic, a rebel and, of course, marching home.

Zakk Wylde

Zakk WyldeSongwriter Interviews

When he was playing Ozzfest with Black Label Society, a kid told Zakk he was the best Ozzy guitarist - Zakk had to correct him.

Art Alexakis of Everclear

Art Alexakis of EverclearSongwriter Interviews

The lead singer of Everclear, Art is also their primary songwriter.

John Lee Hooker

John Lee HookerSongwriter Interviews

Into the vaults for Bruce Pollock's 1984 conversation with the esteemed bluesman. Hooker talks about transforming a Tony Bennett classic and why you don't have to be sad and lonely to write the blues.

Tim McIlrath of Rise Against

Tim McIlrath of Rise AgainstSongwriter Interviews

Rise Against frontman Tim McIlrath explains the meanings behind some of their biggest songs and names the sci-fi books that have influenced him.

80s Video Director Jay Dubin

80s Video Director Jay DubinSong Writing

Billy Joel and Hall & Oates hated making videos, so they chose a director with similar contempt for the medium. That was Jay Dubin, and he has a lot to say on the subject.