Pop-rock chart toppers Fall Out Boy and Paramore have joined forces in this summer’s most-anticipated, co-headlined performances in what’s billed as “Monumentour,” leaving excited fans questioning, how has this not happened sooner?
Answering that and a slew of other questions were Paramore front-woman Hayley Williams and Fall Out Boy bassist Pete Wentz, who participated in separate, back-to-back conference calls in which they shared with the Press their tour plans, fun anecdotes about their journeys and where they’re headed next. Monumentour is coming to Nikon Theatre at Jones Beach on Saturday, June 21—their second stop on the tour, supported by opening act, New Politics.
“More than anything, a tour like that gives you lessons on how you want to act versus how you don’t want to act and how you want to treat people versus how you don’t want to treat people,” Wentz recalled upon reflection of more than a decade touring with Fall Out Boy.
Having ridden parallel roller-coasters through the courses of their careers, their angst-ridden fans ate up the bands’ releases like their lives depended on it. Their’s is the stuff that not so much walked kids through the pangs and pleasures of growing up, but called BS on the whole thing—encouraging an embracement of adolescence, despite the impending doom of grownup world closing in.
A decade older and a decade wiser, both acts still have the kick that their fans’ inner mosh-pit lovers crave, but with the maturity that comes with debunking once romanticized PB&J diets and dirty, cramped tour vans.
When asked for her top three items necessary to life on the road, Williams doesn’t hesitate to blurt out: “Sunscreen, because I am the palest person on the face of the planet,” plus super-controversial scented candles and vitamins.
The most important habit Wentz has taken from his wild tour days? An emphatic fondness of undervalued pre-soaped towelette phenomena. The guy loves babywipes. “You can exist on babywipes and water,” Wentz said.
Have the rock stars lost their mojo along with their senses of rebellion? Not even close. Whatever edge their tour-time duffel bags have sacrificed with passing years was picked up by their aggressive creative attitudes.
“Who says it can’t make the record?” Williams asked rhetorically. “Who says it doesn’t fit? We make the rules this time around.”
She is not shy in asserting who the bosses were in the lengthy process behind Paramore’s most recent release. The self-titled album is an explosive project that’s birthed the band’s most successful single to date “Ain’t It Fun.” The word “reinvention” is tossed around and pondered a bit before a clarifying declaration.
“We’ve broadened our horizons a little bit,” she said. “We’ve broken through whatever ceiling was there before. We discovered that we don’t have to meet anyone’s expectations.”
She added: “Before this album, we always put ourselves in a box. We always tried to live up to whatever expectations we felt mattered. Again, it’s just been really liberating. I could never make an album under the same restraints that we might have put on ourselves before we made (the album) Paramore.”
Wentz shared the same distaste for an in-the-box, stay-the-course future for his band.
“Fall Out Boy in 2014 is really about the creation of ideas as much as it is about creating albums,” he said, noting his excitement for the possibilities bred by what he calls “YouTube culture.” He sees a world that is open to an unorthodox cluster of interests, less focused on the limitations of genre-specific stereotyping. Following the successful release of “The Young Blood Chronicles,” a video series accompanying their newest album, “Save Rock and Roll,” it seems likely that the boys will continue to tackle off-kilter endeavors.
“It’s more about creating something that will exist within FOB’s legacy and less so thinking of things that are going to be so immediate,” Wentz said.
The same think-big themes promise to be displayed in their live shows during the Monumentour. Fueled by friendly competition induced by the co-headlined bill, both rockers assured reporters that fans will witness grand moments on stage.
“It’s more akin to [Scotty] Pippin and [Bill] Cartwright,” joked Wentz, likening the co-headline tour to watching the Chicago Bulls in the 1990s. “You’re on the same team at the end of the day and you’re trying to both win for the team.”
He also alluded to the bands’ ambitious preparations, drawing inspiration from legendary co-headlines of days past, namely the Guns ‘N Roses/Metallica stadium tour of ’92. Williams and Wentz each noted that nothing is official, but both hinted at the possibility of on-stage collaborations.
“With A co-headline tour, it’s cool to conceptualize it in that way,” Wentz said. “I think it would really be special for fans.”
Williams seemed confident that something of the sort will go down.
“Everything so far has been very collaborative,” she said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if there is more of that actually while were on the tour hanging out every day.”
