Hayley Williams reflects on her first solo tour: night owl, dark circles, and hungry for more

Hayley Williams on her first solo tour

Hayley Williams has wrapped her first solo headline tour, and the experience left a mark. According to NME, the Paramore frontwoman finished a run of North American dates in Los Angeles on May 15, then appeared at Kilby Block Party 2026 in Salt Lake City two days later. On May 21 she published a reflective post to her 'Live Journal' on Substack, writing in the kind of loose, honest voice that made the whole thing feel less like a debrief and more like a diary entry.

What she actually wrote

"Tour turned me back into a night owl. Back into a teenaged dreamer with dark circles," Williams began. The post, attached with photographs from venues, meals, and off-days, went on to cover everything from sleep schedules to a Björk quote about language being like "trying to put the ocean through a straw." Williams claimed the metaphor for herself with characteristic bluntness: "No, fuck it, I'm the ocean."

She also noted a strange paradox of touring life. The late nights rewired her completely, yet she was waking at 8:45 every morning without an alarm, something she described as feeling unusually hungry for her days.

The shows themselves

The Los Angeles dates brought out a notable crowd of guests. Jenny Lewis, Julien Baker, Jack Antonoff, and Bethany Cosentino of Best Coast all made appearances, according to NME. Williams was on the road in support of her 2025 album Ego Death At A Bachelorette Party, which NME gave five stars, calling it "a brilliant, swaggering new chapter."

What comes next

The tour is far from over. Williams heads to Europe and the UK next month, with two nights at London's Roundhouse on June 19 and 20, plus further dates in Manchester, Glasgow, Dublin, and cities across continental Europe including Milan, Amsterdam, Cologne, Berlin, and Copenhagen. She has also announced a separate 2026 North American and Latin American run, billed as 'The Hayley Williams Show', where she will perform solo material alongside what she described as "exciting surprises."

For someone who told NME back in 2020 that she feared her solo work would disappoint fans expecting a big pop record, the reception to this chapter looks like a fair answer to those old anxieties.