Paramore have welcomed back their breakthrough single into their live performances, four years after retiring it from their shows. The track in question, ‘Misery Business’, appeared as the final song of the main set in Paramore’s first live shows in four years.
In 2018, vocalist Hayley Williams explained the group would be removing the song from their setlists due to controversy surrounding the line, “Once a whore, you’re nothing more / I’m sorry, that will never change.” Speaking to Billboard at the time, Williams said that if she was to write the song now, she was uncertain if she would use the same language. “Calling someone a whore isn’t very cool,” she explained.
Paramore – ‘Misery Business’ (Live)
After ‘Misery Business’ appeared in Paramore’s final live performance in 2018 and Williams performed it alongside Billie Eilish at Coachella in April, the track has now made its reappearance at the band’s first shows in four years.
“Four years ago, we said we were gonna retire this song for a little while, and I guess technically we did,” Williams told the crowd during their show in Bakersfield, California on Sunday night. “But what we did not know was that just about five minutes after I got cancelled for saying the word ‘whore’ in a song, all of TikTok decided that it was okay.”
As Williams continued, she recalled a time in Paramore’s early days when the band felt uncomfortable after fans began to refer to themselves as “Parawhores.” Ultimately though, Williams and the group accepted that it is simply a word in a song, telling fans, “if you’re cool, you won’t call a woman a whore.”
“We can all learn from ourselves, right? But just for the record, 90% of you said ‘whore’ tonight,” Williams added. “That’s all I’m going to say – I’m not going to preach about it. I’m just gonna say thank you for being nostalgic about this because this is one of the coolest moments of our show and it’s very nice to feel like there’s a reason to bring it back that’s positive.”
Paramore are currently in the midst of their US tour which follows on from the release of ‘This Is Why’, their first new single since 2017. The track will appear on their new album of the same name, which will arrive on 10th February, 2023.
Further Reading
Hear Spacey Jane Cover A Paramore Classic
Love Letter to a Record: Jess Day on Paramore’s ‘Brand New Eyes’
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