This Is Why marks the return of Paramore after a five-year-long hiatus. It's the band's 6th studio album, released on February 10, 2023.
The album was created as a response to the plethora of global issues that affected the planet during their time off, and a result of introspective conversations about the state of the world and their role in it as a band finally maturing and moving on from their tumultuous history – in their nearly twenty years together, it also is their first album made by the same line-up as the one from their previous release, After Laughter. They describe it as their most collaborative effort, with each core member (Zac Farro, Taylor York and Hayley Williams) equally contributing to it.
Background[]
This Is Why marked a sonic departure from After Laughter and an expansion of the band’s sound to a mature alt-rock direction, while also including elements from other genres. In an episode of her BBC Sounds podcast Everything is Emo, Williams cited which artists had inspired the album, including Talking Heads and British acts such as Bloc Party and Foals.
After the band completed After Laughter’s touring cycle with a special final show in Nashville on September 7, 2018—Art + Friends—the trio made the decision to take a break before Paramore’s next project.
In an New York Times interview with Hayley Williams for her first solo album 'Petals for Armor' Hayley confirmed that the next Paramore album would be next after the completion of Petals for Armor.
In the same interview she hinted at the album being more hard rock like early Paramore albums.
"This now feels like a beginning. Whereas honestly, months before we released After Laughter, it felt like an ending." She then explained that After Laughter was more pop because the band were "tired of headbanging". Hayley said: "Our necks hurt." However, now they're ready to return to "hard rock"."
The album was postponed due to the coronavirus. in April 2021, during a livestream with NTWRK, Williams broke the news that the band had “started to work on [new] music.” Later, in November, she hinted at Paramore’s return for the following year in a newsletter sent to fans:
Paramore can’t be “on a break” forever now can we? I love y'all. See you sometime next year?
At the very beginning of 2022, Rolling Stone shared an exclusive first look of the recording process of the album in an exclusive interview. The band shared that they were looking back on their early influences for inspiration, and were putting emphasis on guitars and drums.
Throughout 2022, Paramore started announcing several festival appearances and tour dates for the last quarter, suggesting that brand-new music would be arriving before the end of the year.
Mixing engineer Manny Marroquin confirmed to Music Connection in July his involvement in This Is Why and announced that its mixing process was completed. He also revealed that the album had only one producer, Carlos de la Garza.
De la Garza assumed the role as the album’s sole producer. Prior to This Is Why, he had been involved in the recording process of Paramore’s previous two albums as an engineer, while Justin Meldal-Johnsen handled production along with York. The former, however, did not return to work with the band on this occasion.
During the album’s release week, Paramore hosted listening parties in record stores across the world for fans to hear the album before its release. On February 6, Paramore performed an album release show in Nashville, where they debuted “Running Out of Time.”
This Is Why is Paramore’s final album released under the contract Hayley Williams signed with Atlantic Records in 2003.
Tracklist[]
| # | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "This Is Why" | 3:26 |
| 2. | "The News" | 3:08 |
| 3. | "Running Out of Time" | 3:13 |
| 4. | "C'est Comme Ça" | 2:30 |
| 5. | "Big Man, Little Dignity" | 4:21 |
| 6. | "You First" | 4:06 |
| 7. | "Figure 8" | 3:25 |
| 8. | "Liar" | 4:22 |
| 9. | "Crave" | 3:56 |
| 10. | "Thick Skull" | 3:53 |
Personnel[]
Hayley Williams - Percussion, Piano, Vocals
Taylor York - Glockenspiel, Guitar, Keyboards, Vibes, Programmer, Programming, Backing Vocals
Zac Farro - Drums, Glockenspiel, Keyboards, Percussion, Programming, Vibes, Backing Vocals
Brian Robert Jones - Bass
Carlos de la Garza - Producing, Backing Vocals,
Emerson Mancini - Masterering
Harriet Tam - Engineering
Manny Marroquin - Mixing
Phil Danyew - Glockenspiel, Keyboards, Programming
Henry Solomon - Clarinet, Flute, Bass Clarinet
Joanne Almeida - Guitar Technician
Joey Mullen - Drum Technician
Erik Bailey - Guitar Technician
Anthony Vilchis - Assistant Mixer
Trey Station - Assistant Mixer
Zach Pereya - Assistant Mixer
Trivia[]
- This Is Why is the band's first album that follows the same member line-up as the previous (After Laughter);
- It's the band's last album released under Atlantic Records.
References[]
https://www.popbuzz.com/music/artists/paramore/news/hayley-williams-album-new-york-times-interview/ https://genius.com/albums/Paramore/This-is-why
