• Taylor Swift expressed her desire to resemble Carole King when she was 19 years old.
• At the 2019 American Music Awards, Swift also accepted the Artist of the Decade Award from King.
• The newest single from Paramore, “C’est Comme a,” was released last week.

According to the vocalist for the band Paramore Hayley Williams, Taylor Swift expressed her desire to resemble Carole King when she was 19 years old.

The Good Dye Young co-founder, 34, reflected on a discussion she had with Swift, 33 when they were both just starting out in the business as she talked to Billboard about her group’s new album This Is Why and its opening spot on the first night of Swift’s The Eras tour.

“When we were 19, [Swift] told me — she was a country singer at that point — that she wanted to be like Carole King,” Williams remembered. “And I was like, ‘Whoa, that’s a crazy thing to say,’ you know? Because we were kids. And I’ll be damned, this woman, she’s crossing genres and bleeding over into other aspects of pop culture, and she’s helping to shape it at the very least.”

Williams described Paramore’s March opening-night performance in Arizona as a “huge event,” and Swift shared her thoughts on the occasion in the Billboard cover story, calling it “such an honor.”

It feels incredibly special to launch the tour with each other nearly two decades later, according to Swift, who added that the two of them first met as Nashville kids composing their own songs. I simply recall being consistently astounded and moved by their writing, inventiveness, and aesthetic integrity.

Swift continued, “Hayley is such a captivating performer because she’s so diverse — brave, cheeky, vicious, and totally in command. “To come together in this way is a dream come true.”

Swift’s respect for the legendary singer-songwriter is well known: She opened the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony in 2021 with a performance of the timeless song “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?” in honor of King, who was a member of the class of inductees.

Swift discussed growing up “dancing around the living room in socked feet to the sounds of Carole’s deep voice” during that occasion.

“Her songs speak to the true and honest feelings that everyone has felt, is currently feeling, or hopes to feel one day,” she said. “So it is only right for them to be passed down like precious heirlooms from parents to children, older siblings to younger, lovers to each other.”

At the 2019 American Music Awards, Swift also accepted the Artist of the Decade Award from King.

Williams discussed a speech she gave at Paramore’s When We Were Young festival where she said that the scene wasn’t always a safe place “if you were different if you were a young woman if you were a person of color, [or] if you were queer.” Williams later reflected on this speech in Billboard’s story.

“We don’t want to be a nostalgia band,” Williams said, reflecting on that speech. “But I think what I felt was a mixture of vindication and also a lot of anger. I was really surprised that I had so much anger well up in me because I was like, ‘Wait a minute. They’re treating us like a prize now…’ And I feel strongly that without young women, people of color, and also the queer community, I just think we would still be where we were then.”

The newest single from Paramore, “C’est Comme a,” was released last week. On February 10, this is Why will be released by Atlantic Records.

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