Ballad Breakdown: Hayley Williams Pairs Anger with Vulnerability on New Single “Simmer”

In the first single from her upcoming solo debut, Petals For Armor, Paramore singer Hayley Williams dares to live in her darkness.

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Written by Carys Anderson

Photo courtesy of Lindsey Byrnes

Hayley Williams is famously animated. The energy she’s brought to Paramore — from her “headbanging is crucial” stage mantra to vocals far more nuanced than the often nasally whine of her pop-punk peers — has carried the band from the Warped Tour to the Grammys. The group’s last album, 2017’s After Laughter, tracked her struggles with depression and anxiety, but its lyrical darkness was tempered by bright instrumentation; glistening synths and arpeggiated guitars soundtracked Williams’ despondency. Now Williams is gearing up to release her first solo album, Petals For Armor, out May 8 via Atlantic Records. She announced the project last month, thanking fans for their well wishes on her birthday and slyly adding in that she “made something [she was] going to call [her] own.” In a press release, Williams said “I’m excited to let people in to experience a different side of myself that I’ve only very recently become familiar with.” After citing artists from Talking Heads to Loretta Lynn as influences over the years, it was unclear what style of music Williams would create that she saw ill-suited for Paramore. 

In some ways, “Simmer” follows in After Laughter’s footsteps. There are more keyboards than guitars, but rather than jumping to popstar pep, Williams continues to examine the darker tunnels of her brain. However, on her solo debut, she no longer pairs her discussions of darkness with musical buoyancy. The song’s pulsing bass and skittering drums uphold the tension as Williams works through her anger in real time. 

In the chorus, Williams asks herself, “Oh, how to draw the line between wrath and mercy?” This is the song’s central dilemma: finding the necessary space to justify our negative feelings while balancing that empathy for ourselves with empathy for those who hurt us. On After Laughter track “Forgiveness,” Williams sang: “and you want forgiveness / but I, I just can’t do it yet.” Now, she’s wondering if that’s still okay. 

Some lyrics come across as stock truisms — “rage is a quiet thing,” indeed — but “Simmer” shines in its second verse. The song’s persistent synths fade for a moment of repose, as Williams jumps from clichés to some of her most intimate poetry:

If I had seen my reflection

As something more precious

He would’ve never 

And if my child needed protection 

From a f---er like that man

I’d sooner gut him

‘Cause nothing cuts like a mother 

While Paramore specializes in making singalongs out of universal experiences — romantic jealousy, wrecked friendship, the challenges of living in the real world —Williams now shares a perspective uniquely hers. It’s a dynamic moment in a song that primarily stays in one place. Her delivery is emotive as always: she punctuates lines with frantic yelps and moves from a whisper to a bite in the song’s sole curse. 

In a recent interview with BBC Radio 1’s Annie Mac, Williams explained that Petals For Armor was borne out of necessity. She remembered Paramore wondering what to do once the After Laughter tour ended, saying, “What’s it like to have time off without losing a band member?” But what began as a break from music turned into something much less relaxing. Personal problems resurfaced during her hiatus, leading Williams to turn to the catharsis of songwriting. “I have a tendency to really deny things that I’m feeling and writing helps me, so [the project] just happened,” she said. Petals For Armor came after the realization that she doesn’t have to live with her “fists up” to the world all the time; the title serves as “a mantra to try to stay soft in a really, really hard world.”

Written by Williams and two other Paramore members, guitarist-songwriter Taylor York and touring bassist Joey Howard, “Simmer” is a safe debut in some ways. There are no loud, headbanging choruses; the song remains on the same plain with its rolling beat and dinging keys grounding Williams instead of allowing her to take off. But if this is our first taste of Williams learning to be vulnerable in a new way, there’s no telling what Petals For Armor will sound like when the pot boils over.

This article was added to Ballad Breakdown after its publication, upon the creation of the Ballad Breakdown series.