Concert review: Paramore, Vector Arena

Hayley Williams, Jeremy Davis and Taylor York of Paramore.

Opinion

Rachel Bache takes in Paramore's Sunday night show in Auckland.

The crowd roared as Paramore burst onto the stage of Auckland's Vector Arena last night.

It has been a while since the band's last visit to New Zealand and despite all the dramas the group has faced over the past few years, they have managed to come back hitting harder than ever.

Led by Hayley Williams, with her electric orange hair and Olivia-Newton-John-at-the-end-of-Grease-tight black pants, the pop-punk rockers knocked out tracks from their latest self-titled album, Paramore.

Since the departure of founding members Josh and Zac Farro, who left the band near the end of 2010, Paramore has tilted ever closer toward becoming "The Hayley Williams Show" - and that's not that that is necessarily a bad thing.

The petite 25 year old showed her ability to own the stage. From the moment the spotlight hit her, she had the audience in the palm of her hand and whipped them into a frenzy with her larger-than-life voice.

Paramore offered up a taste of all the music from the band's 10-year career. Classics like Pressure and Misery Business were, of course, fan favourites, while Ignorance from their 2009 album Brand New Eyes got the pit moshing. But it was recent singles Now and Ain't It Fun that had everyone dancing, especially when a gospel choir joined the band on stage to sing out the end of the song.

The high energy show was broken up by winsome interludes: I'm Not Angry Anymore, Holiday and Moving On featured Williams with guitarist Taylor York strumming the ukulele, which echoed the style of their 2013 album.

Aaron Gillespie (The Almost) delivered some headbang-worthy beats to the mix as Paramore's tour drummer. The former drummer and vocalist for hardcore band Underoath added his own heavy drumming style to some of the bands' most well known songs.

Amidst the grungy hits were some moving acoustic moments with The Only Exception and In The Mourning, a song released exclusively to vinyl, with a country vibe that paid tribute to the band's Tennessee roots. The song then morphed beautifully into Fleetwood Mac's Landslide.

"[There were] so many things that could have destroyed us", Williams said near the end of the concert, referring to the Farro brothers fallout, but "[Writing Last Hope] gave us the confidence to get back up," she said before launching into the epic ballad.

Paramore put on an entertaining show and though they are now officially a three piece, it will always be Hayley Williams' power-house vocals and plucky attitude that steals the show.

Who: Paramore
Where: Vector Arena, Auckland
When: Sunday, January 19