Hayley Williams

26:41No, I did maybe for a few years in my life when I took piano, but I got so bored with the theory part. I just wanted to play shit that I wanted to sing along to. Yeah. So it's really, I really regret it when I listen to someone like Doug talk about theory and spout off these, you know, this stuff that's so inherent to him as an artist and as a teacher. It's like, dang, I really should have stayed in piano lessons. It feels like everybody who quit feels that way. It would have been cool if I just kept chugging along with the flute. I would have been such a badass. Can you play any instruments? No.

27:19Can you not? I can play a few chords on guitar and a song or two on the piano. And I used to play flute when I was a kid. You did. Yes. And imagine if I could really. Flute is chic. I mean, maybe. But you know what I liked about the flute? The most embarrassing part? What? Cleaning it. Cleaning it. I'm so sorry. But for those people that had a flute, at the end, you were like, I played it. And look, I didn't learn anything. And then you take it apart. I took it, unscrew it. And you had to clean all the parts and you had special brushes. And you put it back in the flute case. And you were like, no, it's clean.

27:58Does this translate to, like, other parts of your life? Do you like to clean and organize? Oh, yeah, very much so. Very much so. What's that like? it's like um it's like a way to like quiet and like the ticky tacky my brain is just like well the food's clean and it's in the box i gotta take that up okay so little haley's singing in church then you're but you know how to play guitar and piano how do you learn that now i know how to play guitar but back then i think i probably only knew how to play piano and i was learning to play the drums um you know i saw one video of zach hansen on the television when i was a kid and i was like now I gotta play drums and um I yeah I started playing eventually and I would play at church you know like I think my experience of music when I was living in Mississippi was just so much at church because no friends I didn't know anyone at school that wanted to play music um but you know there was access to instruments and things at the church so and you moved to Tennessee when you're when you were a teen yeah and that kind of changed everything that kind of blew my world open I mean And I met Zach, who's our drummer, the first day of this homeschool program that my mom put me in.

29:08I tried to go to public school. I was such a nerd. I really got bullied. So I didn't make it very long there. It's OK. When I think about it now, I'm like, it was my mom and I were on such an adventure. We had run away from Mississippi. This was like, you know, the great wide world. And I didn't really, again, I got to this public school and I was like, well, none of these. There's like one goth kid at the school that like will talk to me about music. And that was it. And then I met Zach the first day of this other program. And he was like, you got to come hear me in my brother's band. And he's younger than me.

29:45And I'm going like, oh, there are people my age that like to make stuff. And they see the world a little differently. And I'm not crazy. I think it's always tender when bands come together, that first part. Because it's like, what do you like? What do you like? And you guys were especially young. We were so little. Who were you? Who did you, you know how you kind of trade bands with each other to just test taste? Who did you guys both like say that you liked, you know, in those early years? I think Zach already had this, he already knew of a different world of music that I was not exposed to yet.

30:23And he kind of showed me that. And it was bands like Failure. It was bands like And You Will Know Us by The Trail of Dead. Yes. You know, like it was Hum, who are playing shows next year, I just found out. I probably won't get to see them because I'll probably be on tour. I know when you're on tour, you can't do anything. I can't do anything. Even like you bring out a band that you love that you want to hang out and watch, and you're just like warming up while they're on stage, you know. You miss everything. But Zach just loved. I mean, Zach is the reason that I knew Elliot Smith's music as a really young kid.

30:59And, you know, I remember him making me mix CDs. So I got such a cool education really fast. He had two older brothers that also liked cool music. A lot of people learn their music from their older siblings. Yes. And I didn't have any older siblings. Same. I'm the oldest. Oh, your eldest daughter. Yeah, I knew it. Oh, my God. Capricorn too, I heard. Are you Capricorn? No, I'm a Virgo by Earthstein. or it's and i'm a virgo moon oh i have a leo moon that's why i have this podcast oh my god it makes so much sense i must get i must get some attention so for people who don't know like you you met the people that would become members or founders of paramore when you were a teeny tiny baby in high school and you've been with this band for 20 plus years touring all the time making records all the time and this record is your third solo um record and what is so interesting to me and what and getting back to a question about your voice is what is the difference between being uh the lead singer in a band out on stage performing and being a part being yourself performing without the band behind you?

32:17Is that not the million dollar question? I do not know. Right? Because it's a completely different set of skills almost. It is. I'm very, I'm finding myself because we're planning shows for next year. I'm finding myself really nervous because I, I think I, for my own good, really need to understand who I am outside of the band. Like it's, it's time. I'm like, I'm looking at 40. It's not that many years away. And I'm just like, I should probably know who I am outside of this entity and I'm really I'm very excited for shows and I do think that it might possibly subvert some people's expectations of you know what they think they're gonna get when they see me on a stage what do you think people think they're gonna get I think that with Paramore I feel and especially in the later years like more recently there's been some kind of thing I've noticed this feeling I've noticed that I very much feel like a ringleader and that's not always a positive thing I feel that like it's a huge responsibility to be a mouthpiece for a group of people that's right um we're all very different individual individuals and like I want to speak for myself yeah that's what I'm noticing I love that and it's also I have a version of a similar experience in that when I was in a sketch group coming up.

33:48I read about this. And I was the only girl. Not that that matters, but it's something. I think it totally matters. It's something. So I really get it that you want to then decide, okay, that's something I've practiced and done and I want to try something new. Yes. Yeah. I feel like I'm really enjoying this part of my career because I actually feel like for the first time in my career, I'm talking to women. Growing up, there was just no women around. There wasn't a lot of women when you were on Warped Tour? No. You didn't have a real great gang backstage? No. There wasn't so many that you could chill with and talk about?

34:32Like, there were some really amazing ladies in the production office. Of course. But then I was also, like, you know, I mean, I was, like, pushing gear with the guys on a skateboard down a hill across to Meriwether Post Pavilion, you know? Right. Like, I wasn't hanging out in the production office. Yeah. I really think it is something to be the only girl. It is. In a gang. It is. And it's also like you want to feel, you know, we could we could talk about this part forever and you would be the person to be able to talk about it with. But it's like, how does your the gender that you identify as, how do you sublimate it through your work?

35:11How do you like kind of push it aside? How do you play around with it? Like, I feel like you have really cool ways in which you kind of play around with the mask and femme side of you. Oh, thank you. But it's, but it, sometimes you're just, you need like the space to be able to do that basically. And the safety to be able to do that. The safety. That, that's the, that one hits me more. I think I, the, the, the era that we grew up in, and I know I've already referenced Mean Girls one time, but. You think about like that time. Technically contractually you have to reference it. Yeah, yeah, every episode.

35:45Yeah, okay. Have we done, we've done two now, so you're good. Okay, cool. I owe Tina a lot. You're not going to get a phone call. Yeah, I'm brilliant. I like that was a time in in culture that I do I think more conversations were starting to happen but to be whatever age I was 14 I think oh baby yeah I was a baby and I was in that age range you know of all these people and and like watching the these social like this you know this construct that happens. I feel that once I entered the band world and the music, the climate, you know, especially for like indie and more like punk subgenres, it didn't feel safe to be a young girl.

36:36Maybe if I was an older woman, I would have felt differently, but I really shirked any aspect of me that was remotely feminine. And it, I didn't know this, but it really hurt me. Like I did it to myself. No one asked me to do that. Well, a lot of, we all did it. A lot of us did it to ourselves. Because you're scanning, right? You're always scanning for the dangers. And unfortunately in the industries that we're both in, there's a lot of them. And I think it took me until probably, I remember writing very neutrally, like in terms of my point of view, Like, I never want to give away lyrically that, you know, this is a young girl's point of view.

37:18Yeah. You know, trying to be smart enough to make that happen. But it was probably like our fourth album, which I would have been in my early 20s by that point, where I started to play around with my femininity more. And I wasn't so ashamed of it. And, you know, if I ever felt sexy, I didn't like push that feeling away. Yeah. And I, you know, because of that experience, I'm now I'm 36 and I'm still noticing places where there's a lot of rigidity around my femininity. And I talk to my friends about this a lot. I don't I mean, it's just kind of unfolding day by day. I, you know, you go through rough things in your life.

37:57And I think each time I come around to an obstacle, I'm like, OK, how do I do this better than the last time I did? I went through something like this. And somehow femininity is always at the core of the issue. I so feel you. I feel like it's like a lot of deprogramming, a lot of like being just what you said, a little bit curious and not so judgmental. And just if you're 10 % more aware of anything you're doing, you're hanging in there. Because it's, you know, you can't like judge yourself for what you didn't know. Yeah. When you were on tour, were there is there any women that come to mind that were kind of guiding lights or, you know, people that you met along the way that kind of felt like, oh, I'm going to take it.

38:43I'm going to notice them and I'm going to kind of pay attention to what they're doing and I'm going to learn from it. Yeah. The second year we were on Warped Tour, Joan Jett and the Blackhearts played on the main stage like the whole summer, which is a brutal summer. It's a long tour. And I would catch them anytime I could. And we ended up in a photo shoot together for, I think it was for Billboard. And I kissed her on the cheek. I'm very shy. I don't, if I, like, if we weren't doing this, I don't know when I would have ever met you. Like, I don't, because I'm so, I just don't, I never want to bother people.

39:16And I am quite shy when I'm not on stage. And I, I don't know, we were standing next to each other and I just kissed her on the cheek. And I remember being like, I love her. And I didn't know anything about her other than she was in the runaways and I had a runaways poster on my wall as a teenager. But I thought she was, I thought she was just, I liked her masculinity. I liked that she wasn't embarrassed to have that side of her as a woman. And she was also very sexy. So that was probably the first woman that I really like performer that I was really around for, for like an extended period of time in my early career.

39:57And then, you know, I just this year, I met Kathleen Hanna. And I told her, I was like, I just, I haven't had many of these conversations. And it's so validating to, it's so validating, by the way, to read books like your book and Kathleen's book and read about women. I, you know, I have amazing, my mom and my granny are like these incredible women in my life that I've learned so much from. My mom and I are like really close in age and all that. But I, I learned there's, we have so much grace for each other and I, I'm very thankful for those relationships, but I didn't have anything outside of my family to really like soak up wisdom from other women.

40:43So I'm enjoying that. Yeah. It's like the proximity of them. And you must have, you must have felt that on the heiress tour. Like you got to be around all these incredible women and an incredible woman at the helm. And you just got to feel what it feels like to be in that matriarchal simulation. Totally. It is a different, it's a different feeling altogether. I mean, there was just, there was a time too where we would go a whole year and I wouldn't see another girl on stage. And now when we, now that we have the power to choose, to make those choices, it's so nice to get to be intentional about that and to think about the conversations you might get to have backstage and what I might learn or what I might be able to offer another artist that, you know, that's maybe like the Linda Lindas.

41:29I love those girls. Oh, I love the Linda Lindas. Like, I love them. And I just think that they're so smart and they're so aware, like politically, like aware and not afraid. I think that it's very healing for me to see young, like teenage people be so bold about what they believe in and really confident in their playing and how they perform and their friendships. It's really healing to see that. Well, you probably, I mean, I have a couple of questions about the Ares Tour and they're practical questions. They're like, what is it like to perform early in the day? I love it. It sounds amazing. If I never, I've already told the team, like, if we get festival offers, please don't make me play after the sun starts to go down.

42:18I completely agree. Nothing good is happening out there when the sun goes down. First of all, you can be done by what, 8.30? Yes, I want to have a normal dinner. A normal dinner. Please. This is what Tina and I go on tour, and we do, like, 4 o 'clock and 6 o 'clock shows. What? Babe, you can do a 4 o 'clock show. I mean, you're the boss, so you can. And guess what? People are going to show up, and you can say to them. I'm going to show up. You can say, good night, enjoy your dinner. and they're like, I'm in bed by 7.30. Oh my God. That is a dream. I mean, we did do that on the Aeros tour. So what at the, like you had a long stretch when you were with them in a bunch of different cities with Taylor Swift on the Aeros tour.

42:54What did you do after the show? Well, when we were in the UK, I loved this because, you know, BBC, no, not BBC, E4. I can't remember what channel it is, but they play Gogglebox. Have you watched Gogglebox? Yes, I've heard of Gogglebox. Oh my God, Amy, this is my favorite show of all time. Explain to people what it is for people who don't know. So imagine Amy and I are like, we're watching television together and all these cameras are still here, which honestly sounds terrifying. But like, it's just families and friends watching TV, like commenting on what they're seeing. And some of it is like, you know, soap opera type shit.

43:36and other times it's like Boris Johnson. Yeah. And I love that. I often see some clips of like heavy, beautiful scenes where like a young teen is coming out to his parents and then they'll show all the different reactions. And you think like, oh, this very blue collar family is going to have a tough time with it. And they never do. Oh my God. England is just full of angels. Well, according to Gogglebox. Yeah, according to Gogglebox. According to Gogglebox. It's very wholesome. Yeah. And I love to just pop a netty or two and just sink into a, you know, have some room service around. Let me watch what people are watching.

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46:27Okay, so you would like watch TV after. You would chill out. You would not go out. We went out some. We had a lot of days off too. And we would like, my favorite days were Portugal. We were in Portugal for like four days before the shows started. And we did one day on like this little boat. The guys and I all went out, our crew, everybody. I think that was like 40 of us, maybe 30 of us total. And we went out. and we're not talking about like a yacht situation, but it was very cute. And we went out and we swam. Well, the guys swam and then we found out later it was like a really not a good idea to swim in that water.

47:06But, um, and you had the instinct to not go in. I did. Yeah. I didn't want to be cold. I'm not, I'm not a cold person. You don't, you never do like a cold plunge or any of that. You love a cold plunge. I know this about you and look how you're radiant. Thank you. It's, And it's not about the skin, although that's a nice byproduct. The skin is all I care about. I know. The insides can be rotting out. Let my skin glow, please. Okay. It's good for inflammation. Oh, shit. I know. I don't want you to tell me that. And, you know, you don't have to do it. You never, ever have to do it. Maybe soon. But I think it has—and honestly, it's really helped with anxiety and depression.

47:43Really? Yes, because it—talk about somatic. It flips on your, like, fight or flight. Oh. It flips on some kind of, oh, no, I'm going to die. I'm so cold. But how does that help? Because the high when you're still alive is high. Have you ever, like, thrown up on stage? I've never thrown up on stage. I actually don't think I've thrown up from a show. That's amazing. I blacked out on stage at ACL, like, the last album cycle, but I didn't pass. I, like, blacked out. Pink Pantherist was on stage singing Misery Business with us. And I had this moment where I was like, I just went out for two seconds.

48:25And I came back. It turns out I was sick. So I found that out later. But other than that, I've only had a few instances where, like, there was one time Mexico, a festival in Mexico City. I almost shit my pants, threw up, and blacked out at the same time. I was going to ask. I didn't want to be rude. But, I mean, how, after so many shows, have you not shit my pants down? How have I not shit my pants down? I really don't. I mean, I assume pretty much every singer I see, I assume that they've. They're fans. Not on stage, but plenty of times off stage. I mean, there's nothing you can do about it. I think it's like when you're on your period and you go in the water, apparently it just sucks up.

49:05It just goes, mm-mm. I think that's what happens on stage with me. It's just like, we're not doing this. Yeah. Wait until after, bitch. Women are incredible. Women are so strong. We are so sweet. women most of the time don't shit their pants. Yeah. Like most of the time that's, that's like a guy thing. Actually, sorry. 100 % is true. I don't know. I don't know any women today that have pooped their pants once. I need no one here in the studio today. Today, not once. We should just all try it together once. So we can know. But it is, it is, it's super physical. And then the other, I have so many like, because I feel like there's a version where one must like, disassociate and just kind of be in your world and saying and other times where you want to feed off of the eye contact from people and is that just you're just always adjusting with that or yeah I I don't know if I'm I don't know if I'm fully present to like that awareness when I'm in it yeah but I I get such a rush I mean especially at a paramour show I usually recognize a lot of the people in the front so we're all we'll we'll have like a relationship then throughout that show where I'm like, I know you, I've seen you a million times and like you're with me.

50:17But then I'll spot other people and I can really feel, it's almost like I intuit what the song means to them. I'm not thinking about what it means to me anymore. It's so healing. It's very liberating actually because I love to write about stuff that'll just make you so depressed. You know, like I need to get that out. So to have an experience with other people that takes it away from me is really, I really need that, I think. What's a song or a lyric or a moment that has been given back to you by a fan, like by someone in the audience singing it back to you that's changed the meaning of what you wrote?

50:55Oh, wow. Because that's a very cool thing you just brought up. I didn't even think about it. I mean, to me, my question was going to be, what does it feel like to pass around all these feelings to people so that they can all have their feelings about it and become detectives about it? But I realize there must be a gift also in the way people sing the song back to you, tell you what they feel about the song, then it must change the meaning of the song. It really does. Does anything come to mind? Well, the first one that comes to mind is this song called Last Hope from our fourth album. or we had a self-titled record that came out when Zach left the band.

51:34He left the band with his brother who started the band with us when we were teenagers. And it was really, Taylor and I were writing and I was, we were both really sad. And I just kind of also felt like, I mean, what does a band matter? You know, I really was feeling so existential about the whole thing. And I can't remember, it's the lyric and the bridge. It's like the salt in my wounds isn't burning, doesn't burn quite as much as it used to. I can't remember exactly the words right now, but I just remember writing it and being like, this is so sad. And it unfortunately is how I feel. And I've really struggled with my mental health and kind of like, you know, I've wanted to not be here plenty of times.

52:23And that song kind of expressed that in the moment for me. Having that at a Paramore show, that moment, and feeling like everyone in the room has survived so many different things and we're all here. Half of us will never see each other again. It really does something to those types of songs where I wrote them in such isolation. And now here I am having to like not only be witnessed, but bear witness to all these other experiences that have coalesced. And people are just physically joyously singing that back to you. Smiling and being like, thank you for writing that thing. Like, dude, joy is really joy is a is a is a tough emotion for me because I don't trust it.

53:15I always think it's gonna the piano is going to fall from the sky is what I say to me. It's just gonna hit me when I least expect it. And I think that's why Paramore shows, at least for me, that they feel so joyous because I'm I'm relying on a lot of other things. I'm not thinking so much about my own experience and when we can transcend our own experience it's like for me joy becomes more tangible it's like oh I'm not controlling what's happening anyway yeah and this thing is is being offered up we're all kind of creating this energy together and we just get to reach up into and pull it down into our hearts and it's it's like it's very wholesome It is.

54:03I mean, it's very primal. Yeah. It's very primal. Singing with other people, like just the frequency of that in a room is powerful. Yeah. Can we talk about being short? Can we please fucking talk about being short? So we're both 5 '2", according to Wikipedia. Are you a natural 5 '2"? Yeah, I am. In fact, one time I did the whole insurance thing. They come, they take your blood and all that stuff. And they were like, you're 5 '3", and I never let it go. It's on my driver's license. 5 '3 is on my driver's license too. Because they measured me at 5 '3, which I'm not. I'm 5 '2. Yeah, I don't think I am either.

54:39And they were like 5 '3 and I was like, okay. Thank you. I got super pumped. Oh my God. I was so relieved actually. What is the good thing about being 5 '2 and what's a bummer? Well, so my friend Daniel that I made the record with is probably like 6 '3. Isn't it funny that you don't know? Because anyone over a certain height, I'm like, just tall. Just a building. I don't like I don't know. I'm just walking through New York every day of my life. But we were we were standing on like a porch of a house that was kind of like on a hill. And then there were there were chairs and I was like, you're way up there, man.

55:18Like you're like we're already standing atop this little hill. And so I got on the chair and I stood next to I stood on the chair next to him where I was even with him. and I felt so vulnerable to the elements. I was like, Closer to the sun. This is not where I want to be. No, too windy up there. It's too windy. Yeah. I don't like to be cold. Yeah, too cold up there. And I hate wind, if I'm being honest. Yeah, get down under, get down back into your short little sea. I just, I just, I really felt scared for like a few minutes. So I - You can tip over. I don't know how tall people don't constantly tip over.

55:56And it's like not our business what's happening up there. It's not a business. What's up? No. I don't want to know. It's like, if something's important, shout it down. But we don't need to go up there. Yeah. I mean, really, though, I do, though, when I'm shopping, I hate being short. It sucks. It's so embarrassing. It's so embarrassing. Every pair of pants, you look like a little kid, like, like swooshing around in a long panting room. You know? Every, nothing fits. Nothing is made for shorties. It's really not. And now that I'm getting a little bit older, I'm, like, learning about, like, if my torso is the right length and if this part of my body.

56:37I don't want to know. I don't want to know this shit. Do you have anything on your body that's long? My dick.

56:49Perfect. But it's also really wide. Yeah. Which is, like, what do I do with this? Ladies love it. I just always tell you. Hold it and roll it.

57:02And then prepare for one more glaze. Okay. Okay. I'm ready. Well, I actually don't know if this is the last glaze, but prepare for another glaze. Okay. But you are an artist that other artists, male and female, feel like you are a lot of people's favorite artists' favorite artists. Oh, my God. They love working with you. They have huge tender feelings about being in your orbit. They on stage feel very like they're kind of loving you in real time on stage. And you've worked with a ton of people who love working with you and would, you know, we'd be able to get 20 people to talk about how much they love you.

57:46Who right now, like who do you, who are your people right now that when you get to see them, perform with them, be with them, they feel like they're part of a peer group that like lift you up and support you or people that are up on that you're hoping to support and bring along for the next ride? Man, well, I got to perform with the Linda Lindas in London, and I felt really proud of them. I get to do more stuff with David Byrne this year, and I know that's going to feel like— It's weird. It's interesting because Linda Lindas are younger than me. David's older than me. Well, that's what I feel like being in your mid-30s feels like is you're feeling a little— In the middle?

58:27In the middle. Yeah. And, you know, if, you know, if your 20s are figuring out what you want to do, then your 30s are kind of figuring out what you don't want to do. And so you're kind of letting go of things that aren't working for you anymore. But that vacuum gets filled with cool stuff, like, and you're looking ahead and back. I mean, what do you think your 30s feel like? I have felt like. honestly enjoying you talking about it because I, 30s are weird. Like it's weird, especially the middle of my 30s. I still felt very young in my early 30s. Like I still felt very, um, what's the difference between 28 and 32?

59:04I felt like it was all the same. Something happened at 35. I started seeing myself, like seeing pictures and being like, oh, that's different. Um, but I also still feel sprightly and have energy and and almost like a renewed passion that makes me want to like live it all up yeah it's it's just a I didn't expect 30s to be like this yeah well I mean did I guess I want to know what did you expect 30s to be like isn't it funny when we're young like when I'm like what feels old because I I I'm here to tell you I'm 54 I don't feel any I don't feel old, but when I was a young person, if someone was like, she's 50, it would be like, oh, my God.

59:52That's the oldest number I can think of. But it's so funny here to tell you from, like, sending you a dispatch from 54, I don't feel that different. It really excites me. Yeah. It excites me because I see, like, because being 36, when you say 54, maybe this is the age where, like, that doesn't sound old to me. That doesn't scare me. I think it sounds better than 36 in a lot of ways. I think it sometimes is harder to be in the middle. Yeah, the middle. It's a little hard. The middle is hard. Hell is the hallway. Life is a highway, but hell is the hallway. Hell is the hallway. We just wrote a whole song.

1:00:28No one's ever written any of those words. okay and then and then the the last thing i'll say is that i i i see in the in the music world what happens a lot in in in the more like actor comedy world which is women who are very very different are kind of asked to be a member of the same group and they're all really different with different styles and different ways of approaching things and but you have an incredible you're in an incredible time right now for just women in music they're just dominating oh my god and so Different styles. Exactly. Yeah. I'm really enjoying watching women on stages right now because of what you said.

1:01:07It's so many different personalities. I love Mannequin Pussy, I think. Yeah, they're amazing. They're amazing. And singer. Talk about a voice. Yeah. Yeah. And we just connected over, like, just over DMs. And Missy was talking about losing her voice. And we were kind of like kiki-ing about that a little bit and talking about this initiative that she told me about, this No Music for Genocide initiative. And it's just so nice, again, to talk to other women and music that, like, we don't have to be doing the same thing. We don't have to like the same music. Like we can be on completely different sides of the musical landscape, but I feel so much less alone by engaging in it more.

1:01:56And I just, it's so exciting. Also, like I was just telling my friends this morning, I normally listen to like, you know, I like bands and I like heavy music and I like weird, you know, I like all the stuff that's happening in Copenhagen right now. What's happening in Copenhagen? Oh, there's such a great music scene in Copenhagen. And it's, yes, I'll send you a playlist. Oh my God, I love it. It's, is it all, it's like heavy, heavy Copenhagen stuff? No, it's, it's not heavy. It's just a vibe. It's a vibe. And I've always liked music from that, from like Scandinavian artists, you know. But also I just like was listening to, um, I put on this Olivia Dean song called Man I Need.

1:02:38And I started, and I was like, oh, I know it. Cause I've seen the clips all over the internet and I started singing along to it and I started crying to it. And I think it's because it's so, it feels joyful. It feels very feminine. It's not, my mouth doesn't make those shapes very often. And my body like really responded to it. So I just, yeah, there's so many different types of music happening right now that I'm so inspired by. That's awesome. Yeah, it's fun. And what are you listening to, watching, reading? What do you do to laugh? what do you do when you want to get up uh you know get on the elevator and get up out of the like what makes you laugh Wayne's World it's my favorite movie of all time I watch talk about how much how great Wayne's Can we please talk about it I mean Dana Carvey was instrumental for me when I was he was in you know like you always kind of fall in love with the SNL cast that you saw when you were like 13, 14.

1:03:34And he, him and Jan Hooks and like that cast, Phil Hartman. And Mike Myers was an improviser who came out of the theater that I studied at. So Mike was a kind of an example of like, one of us can make it. He kind of came up through that system, that Chicago system and got an SNL. So those two were. And, but what do you like about Wayne's World? Why does Wayne's World make you laugh? Well, so my parents were really young and I think that's why I got to grow up on stuff like that from the early early 90s or the late 80s and um I thought that's how we would dress when we became adults I was like this is how adults dress we wear fishnets under denim ripped up shorts we wear flannels over Aerosmith t-shirts and I literally dress like that I mean I just I that movie has it's like the godfather to me like I quote that movie all the time what's one of your favorite scenes in Wayne's World oh this is good well it's probably the Dreamweaver scene it's probably when they first see Cassandra and that gorgeous woman played by Tia Carrera Tia Carrera my queen incredible and Chris Traeger's Rob Lowe is in Wayne's World Rolo as we like to call him you know I did not like Rob Lowe until much later in his career.

1:04:57Because he was bad in Wayne's World. Like he was the villain in Wayne's World. Yes. I believe Parks and Rec was my, was the redemption tour. Okay. So we'll finish with Doug's two questions because they were great questions. Oh, okay. Yes. So Doug had two questions for you. And by the way, make sure you check out Wayne's World. If you haven't seen Wayne's World, what the fuck? Honestly. Do you have to bleep curse words? No. You don't? We don't have to bleep on this. Oh, my God. Fight the power. Yes. Incredible. It's so incredible. Freedom. Freedom. Okay. He had two great questions. One was, you know how Batman has a symbol in the sky that calls Batman?

1:05:40Yeah. What would Hayley Williams' symbol be?

1:05:47And it can be anything. Yes.

1:05:52do you know in wayne's world when they're driving in the gremlin and it's the middle of bohemian rhapsody when the guitar sure it like kind of breaks down and the camera pans up and there's like a car on top of a pole okay i think it's a car it's like a sign for something and it it would be like that but it would just be the gremlin it would be and And it would have a glow behind it. Oh, yeah. You would see it in the sky and be like, gotta go. Gotta go. It's time. You know what I mean? Yeah, gotta get in there. Gotta get in that world. It would be like that. And very faintly, from a distance, Bohemian Rhapsody might even be playing.

1:06:38It's a little solo. Yeah. What's your favorite part of Bohemian Rhapsody? um it's uh so you think you can

1:06:52that's my favorite part of course and then the um the the next question which is wild is what what is the last song that you want to hear before you die okay oh no i know and you're and and do you feel like you would know it staying alive that was always my funeral song but i suppose it would be kind of cool to go out to it as well and you know when i add an extra layer to it that is supposedly the beat that you're supposed to do CPR to. Stop. Staying alive. That's when we learned CPR. It was like, ha, ha, ha, ha, staying alive, staying alive, and then breathe into their mouth. Whoa.

1:07:45So, that might be what you want to hear. Doug, you got your answer. Well, I hope this isn't too embarrassing, but we're going to do a cool down with our straws. Oh, yeah, with our straws! Yeah, here's your straw. Damn, Doug has really taught you. He gave us a cool down, and And now I only want to do it with straws. Okay. Can you talk us through it? Yeah, we do a few different versions. And it honestly has been a moment since I've done it, which is hence why I was saying I need to start doing it at night. But I think the whole idea is normally you're going from here, building up, kind of up your range.

1:08:19Now we're going to shut it down. Okay, great. Let's start like not too high, but just.

1:08:46That's a little too low.

1:08:52Haley Williams, thank you so much for being with us. Thank you. That was lovely. That felt really good. It did. And I love you and I love your voice and I love spending time with you. I love you so much. There was a lot of real fan things that just happened there. I'm going to really unpack on my way home. And I'll send you a playlist. Yes, please. Because we need to know what's going on in Copenhagen.

1:09:17You're right. Because I'm embarrassed about how little I know what's going on over there. We need to get over there. and don't think that for the rest of the week I'm not going to dine out on the fact that Hayley Williams told me there's a lot of music going on in Copenhagen I'm going to say it at least 10 times tell everyone you know people might meet at the gas station it's hot, the block is hot in Copenhagen you got to tell them I'm going to drop that like it's nothing I'm just going to say it so casually I'm not even going to make eye contact hands in your pockets cigarette appears okay friends for life yeah okay bye bye guys we're gonna stay here but you're gonna go thank you so much for coming Haley you are well you're my new best friend whether you know it or not um and uh we'll be friends forever um it was so fun to see you and and uh I just want to say Haley talked about a lot of amazing musicians and and people that she loves to work with But for this Polar Plunge, I'm just reminding everybody about two things.

1:10:22The great Kathleen Hanna, who, you know, started Bikini Kill and La Tigra and is an incredible activist and musician and instrumental for so many women's careers. Such an inspiration, I know, for me and many other people. and the Linda Lindas a band that Kathleen has supported as well as Haley Forever they are just this really super fun great musicians great vibe I got the chance to work with them in a movie I directed called Moxie where they were playing at the dance and they're just so fun so check out music from the Linda Lindas and always bow down to the great Kathleen Hanna and thank you, Hayley Williams, always, for all that you do.

1:11:10Can't wait to see what's next. Okay, thanks. Bye. You've been listening to Good Hang. The executive producers for this show are Bill Simmons, Jenna Weiss-Berman, and me, Amy Poehler. The show is produced by The Ringer and Paper Kite. For The Ringer, production by Jack Wilson, Kat Spillane, Kaya McMullen, and Alaya Zanaris. For Paper Kite, production by Sam Green, Joel Lovell, and Jenna Weiss-Berman. Original music by Amy Miles.

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