Ego Death At A Bachelorette Party Reaches Completion With Physical Release, Williams Receives First Grammy Nominations as a Solo Artist
Written by River Epperson
One of the most unique album rollouts of the year concludes with four GRAMMY nominations, Hayley Williams’ first for performing under her own name. The singer also leaked the tour dates for her first headline tour on Saturday morning.
Ego Death At A Bachelorette Party, the third studio album from Paramore’s Hayley Williams, has had quite the rollout. Initially released as a collection of 17 songs on her website on July 28, Williams supplied fans with download codes reminiscent of Y2K media sharing. A day later, the collection had disappeared, replaced only with a note that read “Thanks for listening.” On August 1, the musician surprise-released the song collection as singles for media streaming, recommending that fans create their own tracklists for the collection. Ego Death At A Bachelorette Party eventually came to streaming with a digital release on August 28, including all 17 previously released songs and an eighteenth track, “Parachute,” with a track list by Williams. The album was released via Post Atlantic, Williams’ own record label started after the expiration of her infamous 20-year recording deal with Atlantic Records, and distributed through Secretly Distribution. Manager Leah Hodgkiss told Billboard the unconventional release was fueled by the intention to “make music tangible” again in an era where digital methods of consumption have completely overtaken analog and physical media.
Even after the digital release, Hayley Williams continued to market her album unconventionally. She leaked exclusive behind-the-scenes content, music video clips, and even a nineteenth track, “Good Ol’ Days,” on October 24. On November 7, Ego Death finally reached completion with the physical release, which includes an additional track titled “Showbiz.” The same day, Williams received four GRAMMY nominations for the project, her first for performing under her own name. The next day, the alternative-rock heavyweight celebrated by leaking the dates for her first headline tour.
Few artists have had a career as long-winding and influential as Hayley Williams, and the versatility of her musicianship shines on Ego Death. Originally formed by teenage emo upstarts championing a fresh pop-punk sound in Nashville in 2004, Paramore quickly became one of the decade’s dominating rock bands, topping charts, snatching GRAMMYs, and pioneering an ever-changing sound. The band continually redefines the pop, rock, and alternative genres by bouncing between the three and refusing to pick just one. Williams plays with the same conventions on Ego Death, perhaps taking it a step further: “Mirtazapine” is a biting ode to antidepressants fueled by the stinging buzz of guitars, “Whim” is a beautiful statement of yearning driven by folksy guitars and pop production, and “Hard” champions the pop-punk sound that initially garnered her fame.
The newest additions to Ego Death At A Bachelorette Party feel far from out of place; in fact, they make the album more cohesive. While “Parachute” acts as a solid album closer on its own, the new additions expand on the album’s nostalgia-inspired retrospective lens and hammer home the emotional themes of the album. “Who knew the hard times were the good ol’ days?” the singer quips on “Good Ol’ Days,” a song with more than one tongue-in-cheek reference to Paramore’s younger touring days. “I wanna do it again / I wanna dance in the strobe lights / I wanna choke on the smoke / And feel your eyes on me,” sings Williams on a verse of “Showbiz,” before crooning: “In the fog / In the flood beams / On a lark… Our silhouettes kiss / Guess that’s showbiz.”
The release of Ego Death At A Bachelorette Party and her subsequent GRAMMY nominations mark a grand finish to 2025 for Hayley Williams, and if the momentum she’s gained is any sign, this next year will be even bigger. The singer-songwriter flexes her strength and versatility as a musician with a keen eye for aesthetics, and proves she’s planning on hanging around after the end of her twenty-year deal with Atlantic Records. What’s next for Hayley Williams? Only she can tell us.
“Ego Death At A Bachelorette Party” had its physical release on November 7, 2025, via Post Atlantic, distributed by Secretly Distribution. Williams will embark on her first headline tour next year with “Hayley Williams At a Bachelorette Party,” playing Chicago’s Byline Bank Aragon Ballroom on April 21, 2026.
