Paramore Releases Sixth Studio Album "This Is Why"

By Chloe Chang

Photo by Zachary Gray

Paramore released their newest album This Is Why! The album is the group's sixth in their discography, after works such as All We Know is Falling, Riot!, Brand New Eyes, Paramore, and After Laughter. This Is Why has 10 tracks exploring different music genres while still capturing the quintessential Paramore sound.

Paramore is reaching 19 years of existence since first being formed in 2004. Hayley Williams, in an interview with the Los Angeles Times, looked back at the past and said, "What feels most merciful about it is that we didn’t know we were doing anything different back then... “I use the word ‘merciful’ because we could not have predicted that people would give a s— 20 years later. We were just eating peanut butter and living the dream.” Seeing Paramore's achievements, it's easy to see how much people care about the group. Paramore has won countless awards including a "Best Rock Song" Grammy in 2015 for "Ain't It Fun."

Photo by Elke

Yet with immense growth in popularity, Paramore isn't just sitting back and relaxing. The group's guitarist Taylor York said to NME, "For me, this is the scariest record we’ve ever made... We’ve always had this underdog mentality. But when we took a break more people discovered our band. Streams went up. I feel that pressure more than ever. There’s this energy of proving ourselves.” Paramore is definitely proving themselves, especially on music charts. On January 27th, the group reached the number one spot for the first time since “Ain’t It Fun” on "Adult Pop Airplay" in 2014. When single "This Is Why" was released, it went to the top of Billboard's "Alternative Airplay" chart.

Although Paramore is pushing forward away from the group's traditional pop punk genre, the members still have fond feelings for the "old" Paramore sound. This is shown in Williams' reaction to This Is Why's track "Crave," when she said to NME, "When the guys showed me ‘Crave’ I was pumped because we haven’t had anything that sonically felt like that in a really long time... We don’t like to give too much credit to nostalgia, we like to move forward. But with the music, you couldn’t escape that feeling. I was just thinking about why I always miss the moment that I’m in because I’m too worried about when it’s going to be over.”

Paramore is also gearing up for a year of concerts! The band's tour website lists shows beginning on March 2nd all the way until August 2nd. In addition to Paramore's own headlining concerts, the group is also supporting Taylor Swift in Arizona on her "Eras" tour.

Stream This Is Why now on all platforms!