Even before launching her solo career, Hayley Williams ventured outside of Paramore for some collaborative efforts. Most notably, she featured on B.O.B.’s “Airplanes,” which was a No. 2 single in the US. She also had a big Zedd collab in 2013, “Stay The Night.” There are plenty of collaboration opportunities she has turned down, though, including one with Lil Uzi Vert. In an interview with Apple Music’s Zane Lowe, she gave her reasons for saying no the rapper, saying it was because she didn’t “want to be that famous.”
“This is so, so random, but I get asked to do features on country songs sometimes. I’m no hater of country music. I mean, I grew up very young in Mississippi on Shania Twain and Dixie Chicks. I’m pretty sure Jason Aldean asked me to sing on one of his songs. I remember too Uzi asking me to do some stuff with him, and I know that fans are going to be so pissed at me for saying this, but I literally wrote him back on Instagram and I was like, ‘Buddy, I love you so much, but I don’t want to be that famous.’ I told him like we were getting ready to take a break. I obviously had a lot of issues going on that no one really knew about and I was like, ‘Bro, I just need to disappear. I don’t want to be that kind of a famous person.’ Because that is… He’s like a big artist, man. My stepbrother is obsessed with them. He was pissed when I told him the story.”
She’s had a couple of collaborations in recent days that pleased the indie crowd: She and the members of Boygenius teamed up on a new song, and Caroline Polachek also offered a remix of “Simmer.”
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.