Paramore have been building hype for their forthcoming album, Tell My Why, since the latter half of 2022, when they dropped the LP’s title track and its follow-up, “Good News.” Now, in the new year, the band is back with their third taste of the project, “C’est Comme Ça,” and the hype hasn’t died down at all—the song has already climbed into the Top 5 on the Genius Top Songs chart.
Channeling the spoken-word style of bands like Yard Act and Dry Cleaning, “C’est Comme Ça” is a song about struggling to adjust to a sense of calm. “I’m trying to get un-addicted to a survival narrative,” frontwoman Hayley Williams said in a press release. “The idea of imminent doom is less catastrophic to me than not knowing anything about the future or my part in it. The guys and I are all in much more stable places in our lives than ever before. And somehow that is harder for me to adjust to.”
The song opens with the chorus, where Williams repeats the track’s titular phrase—an expression that is basically the French equivalent of saying, “That’s just how it is,” though its exact translation is “it’s like that.”
C'est comme ça, c'est comme ça
Na-na, na-na
On the first verse, the chaos of everything going on in the world over the last few years has taken an immense toll on Williams. She’s managed to settle down in its aftermath, but now the most excitement in her life is a routine check-up.
In a single year, I’ve aged one hundred
My social life, a chiropractic appointment
On the second verse, she starts to crave the chaos as if it were a caffeine addiction.
I’m off caffeine on doctor’s orders
Said it was gonna help to level out my hormones
Lucky for me, I run on spite and sweet revenge
It’s my dependence on the friction that really hinders my progression
Williams knows she shouldn’t feed that addiction on the bridge. While her stability is quite dull, the alternative is much worse.
I hate to admit getting better is boring
But the high cost of chaos, who can afford it?
Tell Me Why is due out February 10. While you wait, you can read all the lyrics to “C’est Comme Ça” on Genius now.
