During her recent run of quarantined singles, the Paramore lead singer has now finished them off with a beautiful cover of Radiohead’s ‘Fake Plastic Trees’. Other songs she covered over the last few weeks include SZA and Bjork. It is quite fitting that she would pick such a beautiful song to finish off them with.

In a post on her Instagram, she explains how Radiohead had inspired her and how much of an influence they have had on her career. She says “in admiration of one of the best bands of all time”, I think this tells you what she thinks of the influential English band. She should not worry about covering them though, as she has shown on the video just how good she is and executed her cover perfectly.

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for a while, anyway. the top requested song throughout my brief career in self-serenadism has been a @radiohead song. seemed sacrilegious at first until i realized that the band themselves have never once regarded what they do as precious or never-to-be-toyed with. they are never beholden to any one version of their expression and public affections don’t seem to sway them. so many times people thought they were at their best only for them to bloom more beautifully into something unexpected and unequivocally better. for a time i pretended to be over Radiohead (iiii knowwww) but good good things always find you and welcome you back. so, in admiration of one of the best bands of all time – and in humility to everyone who did *not* ask for this – here’s a self-serenade of “Fake Plastic Trees”. enjoy it if you can.

A post shared by hayley williams (@yelyahwilliams) on Aug 7, 2020 at 11:44am PDT

Williams is just coming off the back of her debut solo album which managed to secure her a top 5 album in the UK charts. The immediate success of her album will hopefully convince her it is enough to continue making solo music and push forward in the future. Being her first album away from Paramore as well makes it even more impressive.

Her last effort with Paramore came in 2017 which saw the release of ‘After Laughter’ which was met with very strong critical praise. Hopefully we get to listen to a new album sometime soon as fans are very interested in seeing what way the band goes in after they made a change in sound on it.

Williams has, in recent years, taken a break from working on her pop-rock band, Paramore, allowing her to explore other areas of her creativity. Similarly, other artists to have done this in history include Serge from Kasabian with SLP, Alex Turner with The Last Shadow Puppets and Matt Bellamy with The Jaded Hearts Club Band. This can give them a different challenge, allow them to try something new, and give them a fresh outlook on their main project is always good to have. 

Hopefully though, we do get something from the Paramore camp as ‘After Hours’ has only served to whet the appetite for more music from the band. It being that good was not wholly expected but it was wholly appreciated. But, for now, go listen to her cover as that will do more than enough for you.