The singer surprise-released the track before hitting the stage at Rolling Stone’s Musicians on Musicians event
Hayley Williams is taking it back to hard times, or rather, the good old days. The singer surprise-released new R&B-inflected song “Good Ol’ Days” just before taking the stage at Rolling Stone’s Musicians on Musicians event in New York.
Hours before Williams was set to join Jack Antonoff for a conversation and performance at the Beacon Theater, the singer spammed her Instagram account with pictures from Paramore’s After Laughter era circa 2017. The inexplicable array of posts made sense after Williams released the trip hop track with lyrical and musical nods to the band’s fifth album, especially lead single “Hard Times.” In the chorus, Williams sings, “Who knew the hard times were the good ol’ days?”
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”Good Ol’ Days” is Williams’ latest single from her third studio album Ego Death at the Bachelorette Party. The singer has been rolling out the full project in unconventional ways since she initially released it. Back in July, Williams shared 17 songs from the album as individual singles found on an old school web player. A month later, she officially shared the album title for Ego along with new song “Parachute.” The physical album arrives on Nov. 7 with “Good Ol’ Days” and one more unannounced song.
Williams just graced the November cover of Rolling Stone with Antonoff for the 2025 Musicians on Musicians package. At the event celebrating the series, the singer gave an impassioned performance of “Good Ol’ Days” for its live debut. Wearing rose-colored sunglasses in another reference to Paramore’s After Laughter, Williams was as playful as her tongue-in-cheek lyrics. The song’s bridge repeats “secret love” and “what’s in a name” in a nod to her band name, which comes from the word for secret lover, “paramour.” She really is Miss Paramour.
