Paramore – Brand New Eyes

{mosimage}After the huge success of their previous work, Riot! Here comes the current favorite band of the Emo boys and girls again!

Some years ago, Paramore would have just been catalogued as another young promising American pop-rock band, but it looks like during last year they have really exploded (maybe it had something to do the inclusion of Decode, the last bonus track of this album, in the soundtrack of the infamous film Twilight).  So far they have managed to tour around the world headlining, which is a great breakthrough.

What we have here is an album with good and bad sides. One cannot ignore the development (in vocal skills and physically, the girl is becoming a real “hottie icon” for the masses) of the red-haired Hayley Williams. She masters the tempo of the album, screaming when she has to scream and going softer when it is about time to light the candles and lighters for a romantic time. In some ways, Paramore can remind you a bit of previous bands like No Doubt, where the dominating presence of the female vocalist is predominant all over.  There are good tracks around the album like Ignorance, the great Playing God or the lovely ballad The Only Exception, but some other songs turn to be a bit boring, like for example Turn it off.

It seems that the band wanted to make everybody happy, both the more hardcore punkers and the emo female teenagers eager to imagine themselves in the middle of the forest surrounded by fairytales like Bella and Edward in Twilight, and in the end the final product is a little bit too much soft and insipid. Not a bad effort though, but it would be nice to see Paramore in a few years when they really create what they want to create without mainstream pressures.

Rating 3/5