Hayley Williams has reflected on her first solo live tour, saying that it “turned [her] back into a night owl” and “teenaged dreamer”.
The Paramore frontwoman wrapped up a run of North American headline shows in LA last Friday (May 15), before making an appearance at Kilby Block Party 2026 in Salt Lake City two days later (17).
She was out on the road in support of her 2025 album ‘Ego Death At A Bachelorette Party’, with Williams scheduled to tour in the UK and Europe next month. This leg includes two gigs at London’s Roundhouse on June 19 and 20.
Today (Thursday May 21), the singer-songwriter shared a new post to her ‘Live Journal’ on Substack.
“Tour turned me back into a night owl. Back into a teenaged dreamer with dark circles.
But tour had me up every morning at 8:45, no alarm. On show days and other days too,” Williams began.
“I’ve not been this hungry for my days in quite some time. Nor my nights. Gorging on future memories while they’re hot and ready. Practicing hyper-presence. Swimming in a spiral, in a familiar fishbowl, back around to lessons I didn’t learn the first or fifty-leventh time. Hopefully my brain is stitching all this together.
“There are so many funerals and weddings to attend in our minds over the course of one lifetime. There’s only so many life-death-life cycles one can take before the body will finally request a coma.”
As for how she was adjusting to normal life post-tour, she added: “I’ve been waking up in my own bed around noon every morning for the last couple days. It felt so good to come home. But it felt so good to be out there too.
“I’ve tried on occasion, over the last 2 months, to make myself work out in writing what current growing pains and pleasure feel like. What I would want to remember most about these days.
“Björk said something once in an interview about how language and communicating was like trying to put the ocean through a straw. I think I am the ocean.”
Williams attached many photographs from her travels, including behind-the-scenes pictures from the venues, images of meals out, and snapshots of what she got up to in her free time.
At the end of the post, she concluded: “No, fuck it, I’m the ocean.” You can read the full entry here.
Hayley Williams’ UK and European tour dates are:
05 – Alcatraz, Milan
08 – Paradiso, Amsterdam
10 – Live Music Hall, Cologne
11 – Live Music Hall, Cologne
15 – Tempodrom, Berlin
16 – Poolen, Copenhagen
19 – Roundhouse, London
20 – Roundhouse, London
22 – Academy, Manchester
23 – Academy, Manchester
26 – O2 Academy, Glasgow
27 – O2 Academy, Glasgow
29 – National Stadium, Dublin
30 – National Stadium, Dublin
Earlier this month, Williams announced a new 2026 tour for North America and Latin America, dubbed ’The Hayley Williams Show’. It will see her perform solo material and “exciting surprises”. Find any remaining tickets here.
In a glowing five-star review of ‘Ego Death…’, NME noted that “there’s plenty in this brilliant, swaggering new chapter to be excited about”. It added: “These songs might be about missed second chances, but Williams is certainly making the most of hers.”
Speaking to NME in 2020 about launching a solo career, Williams explained: “What I thought that people would predict [from my solo work] was another ‘Hollaback Girl’. To be really candid – and I don’t mean this in any offensive way – I really didn’t want to be like Gwen [Stefani].
“I felt a lot of anxiety about… do people want a crazy big pop record? What if [debut ‘Petals For Armor’] isn’t that, and it’s a letdown? When I ended up writing some songs that were poppier and dancier like ‘Dead Horse’, it was like, ‘Oh shit – am I a sell-out?’”
