{"id":1707,"date":"2017-05-19T02:26:43","date_gmt":"2017-05-19T02:26:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/?p=1707"},"modified":"2017-05-19T02:26:43","modified_gmt":"2017-05-19T02:26:43","slug":"review-paramore-after-laughter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/2017\/05\/19\/review-paramore-after-laughter\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Paramore &#8211; After Laughter"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I still have very vivid memories of when Paramore first broke out into the music scene. Seemingly almost every day during the drives to school back in middle school, their music would be played on the big pop stations constantly, alongside fellow Fueled By Ramen veterans Fall Out Boy and Panic! At The Disco. As the years went by, Paramore\u2019s presence in the mainstream seemed to fade away as Hayley Williams forayed into guest work on other pop artists\u2019 material. They came back in a pretty big way with 2013\u2019s <em>Paramore<\/em>, an album which showed nods to their punk past while foraying into a more mainstream pop sound, even giving them the biggest hit single of their career so far, \u201cAin\u2019t It Fun.\u201d It appears Paramore isn\u2019t going anywhere anytime soon, as after 4 years and the return of founding drummer Zac Farro, they\u2019re back with their 5<sup>th<\/sup> full-length album, <em>After Laughter.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"747\" height=\"421\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/AEB6ibtdPZc?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s kind of tough to know where to start with this album as, for a Paramore release, it\u2019s surprisingly intricate in its musical and lyrical ideas, but we\u2019ll get to that soon. The album opens with the lead single \u201cHard Times,\u201d a decidedly sugary sweet ode to the pop rock of the \u201880s with its tropical xylophone melody, fun drum grooves, and massive gang vocal chorus. It\u2019s a really fun opener, and Hayley Williams sounds incredibly energetic in her singing, but the mood is contrasted by the lyrics, as they discuss having to power through life\u2019s hardships and tough challenges. This vibe is reflected in the following three songs: playful homages to \u201880s new wave with glittering synths, exotic percussive melodies and drum beats (possibly some of Zac Farro\u2019s best work on record to date), and a general bouncy tone, mixed with brief passages into moodier digressions. These songs are frequently contrasted with lyrics about perceiving an idealized version of the world in depressing times (\u201cRose-Colored Boy\u201d), the anxious fear of screwing up in front of other people (\u201cTold You So\u201d), and similar topics.<\/p>\n<p>Once the album reaches \u201cFake Happy,\u201d its intentions become incredibly clear. <em>After Laughter\u2019s<\/em> important big idea is about the illusion of happiness and being depressed in a world that expects you to be happy no matter what (hell, the album art features a literal optical illusion right in the center, if this wasn\u2019t clear enough). The way the album progresses and unveils this idea is actually pretty clever from a conceptual standpoint: hitting you with blasts of cheery sweetness before diving down into more moody and downbeat tunes. The album starts off strong and also ends strong, with the final tracks \u201cIdle Worship,\u201d \u201cNo Friend,\u201d and \u201cTell Me How\u201d providing an appropriately downer ending to the previously enthusiastic proceedings. \u201cIdle Worship\u201d has some incredibly uneasy synthesizer patterns that accentuate the song\u2019s message about Hayley William\u2019s uneasy relationship with her own fans\/sense of stardom. \u201cNo Friend\u201d is a melancholic alternative rock tune featuring vocals from Mewithoutyou\u2019s Aaron Weiss, delivering an abstract and verbose stream-of-conscious monologue that\u2019s meant to relay the story of Paramore\u2019s career up to now in a way that compliments the previous track. The album closer \u201cTell Me How\u201d is a somber piano ballad expressing remorse over lost friendships and a sense of uncertainty about the future, with Hayley at her most emotionally honest and vulnerable.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"747\" height=\"421\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/yw-RPm1uOM4?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/p>\n<p>While the album\u2019s thematic ambitions are admirable, I feel as though there\u2019s a few odd structural issues that keep the album from being as good as it ought to be. This mainly stems from how quickly the album shifts from happiness to depression, as it\u2019s not really all that gradual. After the first 4 songs, the album takes a hard right turn into the more somber material that\u2019s meant to be the focal point. It\u2019s not necessarily bad per se, as the emotional honesty of Paramore\u2019s lyrics and music has always been part of their appeal, but the rhythm and pacing of its ideas feel a bit jagged, especially when the album tries to swing back to the new-wave glamour of songs like \u201cPool\u201d and \u201cGrudges.\u201d Both of them are really good pop rock jams with really tight compositional work, especially Zac\u2019s drum fills on the latter, but both feel like they should be closer to the first half of the album, helping to give a better segue into the moodier proceedings. It might seem like a small thing, but the issues with structuring and flow are enough to make the big picture feel just a little sloppy. I give the album an &#8220;A&#8221; for effort as far as its ambitions in the context of the Paramore catalogue, but things could have been tightened up a little more.<\/p>\n<p>Overall, <em>After Laughter<\/em> is a pretty solid listen that finds Paramore feeling more inspired and rejuvenated than before. Despite the fact that the message and themes are somewhat undermined by the off-kilter arrangement of the track list, the album still offers a good mix of upbeat catchy songs and more downer material, and the lyrics, combined with Hayley\u2019s always solid vocal performances, show the band at their most emotionally honest. It\u2019s not the band\u2019s best album, but it\u2019s worth a listen or two if you\u2019re curious.<\/p>\n<p><strong><em>Verdict:\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><em>Stream it. There&#8217;s enough fun songs and clever songwriting to merit at least a couple of listens.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>After Laughter<\/em>\u00a0<em>is available from Fueled By Ramen on CD, digital download, and streaming services.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"I still have very vivid memories of when Paramore first broke out into the music scene. Seemingly almost every day during the drives \n<a class=\"moretag\" href=\"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/2017\/05\/19\/review-paramore-after-laughter\/\"> [...]<\/a>","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":1708,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"yasr_overall_rating":0,"yasr_post_is_review":"","yasr_auto_insert_disabled":"","yasr_review_type":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Review: Paramore - After Laughter","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[12],"tags":[358,359,364,360,363,357,361,362],"class_list":["post-1707","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music","tag-after-laughter","tag-after-laughter-review","tag-alternative-rock","tag-fueled-by-ramen","tag-new-wave","tag-paramore","tag-pop-rock","tag-rock"],"yasr_visitor_votes":{"stars_attributes":{"read_only":false,"span_bottom":false},"number_of_votes":0,"sum_votes":0},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.surrealresolution.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/paramore-after-laughter-review-thumbnail.png?fit=1600%2C1000&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8GYHU-rx","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1707","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1707"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1707\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1713,"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1707\/revisions\/1713"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1708"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}