You may know I love books, if you've read this blog from the beginning you may know I love music. My iPod is my constant companion, I have a beautiful pair of Sennheisers with incredible sound quality.
What you may not know is who my favourite band are.
You may well be wondering what prompted what I can safely say is about to be a gushing song of love.
Paramore is that what.
Regardless of the bands various dramas, or your opinions of its front woman, the music they put out never ceases to capture my imagination and cause some serious rocking out. It started just over 6 years ago and as you can see I have gathered their entire back catalogue (plus the digital stuff). But why blog about this now?
Well, after spending a 12 hour day in the hallowed stacks of learning that is the Lancaster University Library* listening to albums on YouTube and sporadically doing work,
Hannah and I ended up in our local CD and DVD emporium this morning.
I had a list of things I wanted. What I didn't expect to find was this:
(Apologies for terrible photo skills). This is Paramore. At their Finest. Live and touring their Riot! album. Which for reasons I still don't fully understand is my favourite album ever. EVER.
I still don't know how I had managed not to get my mitts on their only live album and DVD, but it seemed ridiculous and so it kinda marched itself to the till and jumped into my bag more decidedly than a £2 full sized tub of Ben and Jerry's Phish Food.
I don't know what I was expecting of it really, I've seen these guys live, THEY ARE EPIC. It seems to be a thing that short people, who just to spite their diminutive stature have a HUGE presence. Hayley Williams is one such short person, and that physical presence translates to audio. Somehow I had forgotten just HOW GOOD they are live. I clearly need to see them again.
Riot, even 2 albums and 1 EP later still remains their best work, it is full of attitude and stands apart lyrically - probably because its the one album the band has put out that doesn't feature Williams bitching about one or other of her band mates; former or current.
I was introduced to Paramore in early 2008, so I can say with no small amount of relief say, I knew them BEFORE Decode.
Had I not already fallen head over heels for this band, their involvement with "those" films would probably put me off in the long term.
Aaaaanyway,my 16 year old self picked up Riot!,(incidentally the last album I ever bought in a branch of Woolworths), took it home and loaded it in to her still relatively new 1st iPod and was blown away. This was exactly what I had been looking for musically, punk rock, sung not snarled, by a girl with an epic voice, that had attitude to spare. I subjected my entire family to it. In what counts for high praise, my father quite likes it and isn't bothered when we attack the car stereo with it. Mum on the other hand...
Today's acquisition, I haven't been to bed yet so it's still Tuesday by my reckoning, plays with what I believe the musical folks call the "arrangement" of some of the various songs. And somehow makes it better, something I previously believed impossible. (Urgh the cliché- look everyone gets slight tunnel vision about their favourite band) The intro to my favourite song Crushcrushcrush is slightly different and more low key before launching full pelt into the chorus. The song resonated on a very personal level back in'08 and has remained awesome and very personal; the song Hallelujah gets mashed up with a beautiful intro cover of Leonard Cohen's song of the same name, that worked so perfectly in juxtaposition I made silly noises of glee.
It is perhaps obvious by their genre but, Paramore are not a band that produce Beyoncé levels of live gloss, you wouldn't want them to. The raw energy, passion and crazy fun is far more exciting and warming than any piece of high theatre that most pop acts pour so much attention into on their tours these days, live spectacle is one thing but you see some one live for the music, the music and the artists enthusiasm for it should be the spectacle, rather than 50 undoubtedly talented, but ultimately pointless back-up dancing monkeys dancers. Though actual dancing monkeys would be pretty cool.
I am not immune to the changes in the band, the recent upheaval made me worry about whether the band would continue to put out material I actually liked, and if I'm brutally honest I was deeply uncertain of 2013's self titled album when I first put it in my CD player (I have a thing about physical copies of things and CD players) I felt disappointed.
Change is not really my thing, yet as I listened to it again the next couple of times it began to grow on me and now there are several tracks I really love, but unlike its predecessors it isn't one I will play from beginning to end without skipping. Sonically its much more upbeat. Lyrically its much the same. But the changes in the band were to the composition side so it is then somewhat unsurprising. Williams' constant presence means that the lyrics aren't going to change that much. Her signature style will remain stamped all over the band's output; and that's not a bad thing.
Riot! however remains awesome. I will never not love it. It will be the album my children get sick of in the car, and I shall not be sorry.
For now however I must return to the "Misery Business" of essay writing. (oh the puns!!!)
At least I have an awesome soundtrack.
Much Love,
Bethx
*If you can't smell the sarcasm here you've probably got a cold, the stacks of Lancaster's Library are well known to be home to actual birds, who have taken flaky old unread journals to make their nests in its various unused dusty forgotten aisles. There is something quite disconcerting about writing an essay to the strains of Bird song in the library.
