Mike Ragogna: Haley, what inspired the writing process with your latest album?

Haley Williams: The main thing that I feel like is different and helped fuel our fire was sort of feeling like we were fighting this sort of apparent end to our band. It felt like it was an end of an era, but also a lot of people were wondering if we were going to go away, so we were fighting that. Not so much on the outside, but internally, the three of us always knew that we were going to keep the band alive. We had our doubts in the beginning with the whole process. While it sort of left us drained with little confidence in the beginning, it also fueled a fire in us that honestly we might have needed. We might have never had an album come out this way had we not gone through the things we went through as a band.

MR: To me, “Grow Up” seemed like a testament to that.

HW: A little bit. None of the songs are wholly about losing two band members and going through that drama, they are all parts and pieces of our daily life. It’s not an autobiography of Paramore. I think we already did that with our last album Brand New Eyes. It was in our mind that we didn’t need to re-create a Brand New Eyes Part 2. This album was more focused on growing up, moving beyond the downfall, all the negative energy. At the same time, there’s no real ignoring or denying the stuff that we’ve been through. I think those things shape the way that see myself, the way that I see the world around me and at some point those instances in my life are going to come up whether I want to flat out lie about it or not.

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