Paramore at the LG Arena

Every now and then, you get the chance to see a band that you truly love. Like one that you love so much that you don’t want to listen to their music with anyone else in case they don’t feel the same indescribable adoration for it. This is how I feel about Paramore.

Best known for their flame-haired front woman, the absolute creative powerhouse Hayley Williams, and their ability to consistently churn out chart-topping tracks that also stay true to their pop-punk roots, Paramore visited Birmingham LG Arena on the UK leg of their 2010 worldwide tour, and I was lucky enough to be able to see them.

With two artists supporting the first being the very lively Fun, whose lead singer skipped out about the stage to their pop/indie/electronic sound, depending on which song they were playing. The second support act was the hugely popular R&B newbie B.O.B, who, in his relatively short music career so far has already had 3 of his singles turn platinum, and judging by his popularity with the crowd of Birmingham, is set to have even more. I think it’s fair to say that these two different, but equally crowd-rousing, acts prepared the awaiting crowd well for the pure excitement of Paramore’s entrance.

As the guitar, bass and drum beats of “Ignorance” fired up, and Hayley’s strong and unique voice pierced through the echoey arena to over 14,000 gobsmacked fans. The phrase “the crowd went wild” is a massive understatement for what happened at this gig. Paramore are one of the bands on the pop-punk scene at the moment with the fastest-growing teenage fan base, and although there was a large majority of red-haired, teen fans wearing the obligatory Paramore-tshirt and skinny jeans combination, there was also a wider audience in the form of fans in their late 20’s, 30’s and even 40’s, all adding to the band’s massive popularity.

Mosh pit anthems “Careful”, “Where the Lines Overlap” and “Brick By Boring Brick” were belted out to the crowd’s content, showing that they still have the same awesome talent for song writing and performing on their new album “Brand New Eyes” (their highest charting album yet) as they have on their two previous and equally as popular, “All We Know Is Falling” and “Riot!”. And although Paramore’s performance was already amazing, with their friendly stage manner and obvious love of what they do, the gig became something beautiful when they started their acoustic set.

Sitting on a black leather sofa with a borrowed tambourine, Josh Hayley, Zac and Taylor created magic with their pared-down playlist of amazing songs like “Misguided Ghosts” and “The Only Exception”, and at Hayley’s command, the crowd put “anything that glows in the air”, waving them along to the heartfelt lyrics.

After the great gig so far, you didn’t think it could get any better. However, Paramore had one last treat for someone lucky enough to be picked- they invited one person from the hyped-up crowd to come and sing with them on the last song of the night, their mega-famous sing-along 2007 hit “Misery business”. The girl who was chosen immediately hugged Hayley, high-fived the rest of the band and continued to jump up and down and make high-pitched noises for the rest of her time on stage, belting out the chorus “whooooaaaaa I never meant to braaaaggg” along with everyone else in the room. And who can blame her? It perfected an absolutely awesome night, which left me looking forward to the next time I see Paramore, already.