| paramoreparamoreparamore |
| Written by Sarah Mudgway |
| Friday, 05 March 2010 09:19 |
 It was a long time coming, but finally the Nashville, Tennessee five-piece better known as PARAMORE, graced our shores with their fiery presence and energetic performances - with local act The Jury And The Saints supporting. Fresh off the Soundwave Festival in Australia, Paramore showed no signs of tiredness or fatigue during their 70 minute set, which featured tracks from all three of their albums to keep the crowd happy. THE JURY AND THE SAINTS are a new band to hit the New Zealand music scene; a friendship that one member holds with Paramore, saw them thrust into the opening slot - or as they like to say, headlining slot. Their synth driven tracks were reason enough to get a good portion of those early enough to catch them, up on their feet... but also (un)lucky enough to be the recipients of a free dinner. Yes, The Jury And The Saints were kind enough to not only provide a dinner of sausages for the audience, but also lettuce for the vegetarian audience members. Best quote of the night - "everyone get your sausages up in the air". Midway through their short but sweet set, an iron-man mask wearing Hayley Williams jumped on stage and took over the drumming for The Jury And The Saints - boosting the screams from younger audience members (in particular, those standing directly behind me) from bearable to insane, but all with good intentions.  As the lights dimmed for Paramore, and the opening chords of 'Ignorance' emerged from the sea of screams, it was clear that this was going to be a fun show of dancing, sweating and epic sing-a-longs. Directly following 'Ignorance' with crowd pleasers 'crushcrushcrush' and 'That's What You Get', the band were well polished, full of energy and flawless in their delivery. Despite lead guitarist Josh Farro being absent and Taylor York's brother Justin filling in for the South Pacific leg of their tour, the musicianship from the young band was exceptional, and the energy they brought forth commendable. Their latest album 'brand new eyes' has been certified gold in New Zealand, and as they played 'Looking Up' and 'Careful' - two non-single tracks from their third release - the passion and singing from the predominantly female audience was unwavering... that is, until, Paramore gifted older fans with some tracks from their first album 'All We Know Is Falling'. As an older fan of the band, it is easy to forget that Paramore only shot to true mainstream fame in New Zealand with their second album 'Riot!' and then their 'Twilight' theme-song 'Decode'. The distinct drop in the volume of singing when the band blasted their way through 'Never Let This Go' and 'Pressure', made this fact blatantly obvious. Any drop in energy however, was dismissed when Taylor walked on stage with an acoustic guitar, and Hayley talked of love before they started playing Paramore's softest track to date, 'The Only Exception'. It was during this song, that the strength of Hayley Williams' voice was truly obvious - without the blasting drums and heavy guitars to mask any potential flaws, Hayley hit every note perfectly and carried the softer instrumentals with ease. For a small lady, she sure has one powerful voice.  'For A Pessimist, I'm Pretty Optimistic' followed 'Where The Lines Overlap', with the latter tracks built-for-singalongs lyrics - "Now I've got a feeling if I sang this loud enough, you would sing it back to me" - creating a live anthem of a track, which was the perfect introduction to the previously mentioned 'Twilight' featured 'Decode'. Heading off stage for a short break, the audience barely had time to start a 'Paramore' chant before the introduction to breakout single 'Misery Business' played and the stage lit up once more. If Hayley is in the business of misery, then misery is an emotion I would like to feel more often... as it clearly means something different to what I thought. Ending their set with 'Brick By Boring Brick' - complete with Rowan from The Jury And The Saints storming the stage during the 'ba da ba ba ba's' lifting Hayley off her feet and spinning her around, leaving the audience to fill in the remaining vocals. When Hayley spoke of Paramore's love for music, their unwavering enthusiasm and appreciation for playing the same songs each night to different audiences - the smile radiating from her face was genuine - and her short but sweet twitter update "Tonight. Ruled" which followed the show, perfectly summarized the night. Paramore are a band, no gimmicks, no auto-tune, no crazy stage set-up - but none of that was required to put on a performance which was worth the wait. For New Zealand, the prospect of seeing Paramore is not a dream anymore, and it was definitely worth waiting for.  |
