Hayley Williams Debuts 17 New Solo Songs On Her Website

It’s been an eventful month for Paramore fans! Just a couple weeks ago, dummer Zac Farro dropped his latest solo album (and first under his own name, rather than his longtime Halfnoise moniker), Operator, and celebrated with a release show at The Blue Room. Last week, Paramore celebrated the 20th anniversary of their pop punk classic debut album, All We Know Is Falling, with a deluxe reissue featuring four tracks that make up The Summer Tic EP, a previously CD-only release from 2006, and Farro and singer Hayley Williams did some nostalgic press to mark the occasion. Also last week, and in an effort to shed light on local NPR affiliate WNXP’s sudden defunding at the hands of the federal government, Williams dropped off a surprise new single, “Mirtazapine,” for the beloved station to premiere (she also dropped by Newport Folk Fest over the weekend for a surprise performance of that song during Bleachers’ set). Then, finally, today, Williams dropped what appears to be a whole new album, leaked on a late ’90s/early ’00s redesign of her website, available to access through a code distributed to fans who ordered limited-edition new hair dye color Ego, from the singer’s wildly popular Good Dye Young line (announced just this morning as “the shade that unlocks the soundtrack to your summer,” Ego was limited to just 2,000 cartons, signed by Williams and her creative partner Brian O’Connor, and quickly sold out).

The dye color, currently being rocked by the singer herself, is described as “worn unapologetically by Hayley Williams to mark the beginning of a new creative era,” and that era, unsurprisingly, seems to be a new solo musical chapter (perhaps that surprise single drop last week and Moses Sumney collab “I Like It I Like It,’ back in May, should’ve been a tip off). A part of Paramore since 2004 (the group’s latest and sixth album, This Is Why, arrived back in 2023), Williams first properly branched into solo music in the spring of 2020, with stunning, artful, experimental, indie and art pop effort Petals for Armor. At the time, she had plans to tour (including a show at Nashville’s own Brooklyn Bowl), but Covid derailed them, leading, instead, to more writing and creative exploration, resulted in more raw and folky followup FLOWERS for VASES / descansos, in early 2021. Moving on to more Paramore activity, that brief solo era for Williams always felt tragically cut short, and fans have long hoped (and the singer has long teased) a return to more Hayley Williams music, and perhaps a makeup tour, more than half a decade later.

We can’t speak to the latter (though we’re optimistically hopeful), but these 17 songs- about which little to no info has yet been revealed- definitely appear to make up a full album (possibly one called Ego?), and one that feels uniquely Hayley, akin more to Petals than FLOWERS, but wholly distinct from either, landing as a bit more straightforward indie and alt pop, with some dynamic moments of heavier and guitar-driven jams, some more experimental and synthy pop works, self-reflective and melancholy downtempo tunes, and ’90s alt rock throwbacks, all with a shimmering, summery vibe and an earnest range of thematic subjects, from heartbreak to sociopolitical frustration to hyper-local critique of Nashville’s overdevelopment. We expect a more formal announcement to follow, and for this record to appear on streaming services soon, but, for now, the only legit way to hear it is by visiting Williams’ website, and putting in an access code (which can readily be found in spots like Reddit). In addition to the tracks, and a wallpaper that appears to be Hayley’s dog Alf, there’s also a folder labeled “Misc,” which contains a t-shirt design that reads “Hayley Williams Is My Favorite Band” (an homage to old Paramore merch), what appears to be a lyric book, a video clip of the band Phoenix performing in Monterrey from 2017, and an audio recording of an unknown child saying “I’m sorry that you’re going through something hard.”

The songs aren’t numbered so the final track listing is unclear, and the titles are more like file names, so they could be abbreviated or temporary, but here are the 17 tracks available to stream:

“Kill Me”
“True Believer”
“Blood Bros”
“Negative Self Talk”
“Ego Death at a Bachelorette Party”
“Mirtazapine”
“Ice in My OJ”
“Brotherly Hate”
“Zissou”
“Dream Girl in Shibuya”
“Discovery Channel”
“Love Me Different”
“Hard”
“Whim”
“Glum”
“Disappearing Man”
“I Won’t Quit on You”

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