Hayley Williams calls out Spotify for adding Misery Business to a female empowerment playlist

11 March 2020, 11:53

By Sam Prance

Hayley Williams says Paramore's Misery Business has no place in 2020.

Hayley Williams has taken to Instagram to make clear that she doesn't endorse Paramore's 'Misery Business' at all anymore.

Fans of Paramore will already know that Hayley Williams has distanced herself from 'Misery Business' in recent years. It may be one of Paramore's most successful singles but Hayley no longer stands by the lyrics. During a concert in Nashville in late 2018, the band announced: "Tonight we're playing this song for the last time. We feel like it's time to move away from it."

READ MORE: Hayley Williams hints next Paramore album will be "hard rock" not pop

Now, Hayley has called out Spotify for including the song in a Women of Rock playlist alongside her new single 'Simmer'.

Yesterday (Mar 10), in a post on Instagram stories, Hayley shared a screenshot of Spotify's Women of Rock playlist and she wrote: "“SIMMER” is on this playlist. thx @spotify... but so is ‘Misery Business’. i know it’s one of the band’s biggest songs but it shouldn’t be used to promote anything having to do with female empowerment or solidarity."

Hayley then went on to state: "i’m so proud of Paramore’s career, it’s not about shame. it’s about growth and progression… and though it’ll always be a fan favorite, we don’t need to include it on playlists in 2020." In recent years, fans have called out the song for the lyric: "once a whore, you're nothing more. I'm sorry that'll never change".

Hayley previously discussed how she feels about the song in a 2017 interview with Track 7. She said: "I was a 17-year-old kid when I wrote the lyrics in question and if I can somehow exemplify what it means to grow up, get information, and become any shade of ‘woke’, then that’s a-okay with me."

Hayley also wrote a blog post about it in 2015 in which she explained: "Misery Business is not a set of lyrics that I relate to as a 26-year-old woman. I haven’t related to it in a very long time. those words were written when I was 17… admittedly, from a very narrow-minded perspective."

She continued: "It wasn’t really meant to be this big philosophical statement about anything. It was quite literally a page in my diary about a singular moment I experienced as a high schooler."

What do you think? Do you still listen to 'Misery Business'?