All We Know Is Falling

All We Know Is Falling
Studio album by Paramore
Released	July 26, 2005 (2005-07-26)
Recorded	2005
Studio	Various studios: Wisner Productions, St. Cloud, Florida ARS Studios, Orlando, Florida Bigger Dog Studio, Franklin, Tennessee Stone Gables Studio, Brentwood, Tennessee The Skyview Church of Tone and Soul, East Nashville, Tennessee
Genre	Pop punk pop rock[1] emo
Length	35:47
Label	Fueled by Ramen
Producer	James Paul Wisner Mike Green Roger Alan Nichols Nick Trevisick
Paramore chronology
All We Know Is Falling (2005) The Summer Tic EP (2006)
Singles from All We Know Is Falling
"Pressure" Released: July 31, 2005 "Emergency" Released: October 21, 2005 "All We Know" Released: December 16, 2006

All We Know Is Falling is the debut studio album by American rock band Paramore, released on July 26, 2005 under the Atlantic-distributed Fueled by Ramen on July 26, 2005 in the United States. Its production was led by James Paul Wisner, Mike Green, Nick Trevisick, and Roger Alan Nichols. Josh Farro and Hayley Williams, guitarist and vocalist of Paramore, respectively, wrote almost all the songs.

The album's production took place in Orlando, Florida. The departure of bassist Jeremy Davis, which occurred a few days after arriving in Orlando, served as the album's main theme. This theme was reflected especially in the album's cover, its title and the song "All We Know". Instead of making a major push towards radio, the band's A&R recommended that the band build a fanbase through word of mouth.

Three singles from the album were released: "Pressure", "Emergency" and "All We Know". None of the singles managed to chart, though "Pressure" was certified Gold by the RIAA in 2016 after the band had found commercial success. In July 2014, after the group found success with subsequent albums, All We Know Is Falling received gold certification from the RIAA. The album received mixed reviews by music critics, who but still praised the voice of Hayley Williams. However, the album had a weak commercial performance: it failed to enter the Billboard 200, though it did reach number 30 on Billboard's Heatseekers Chart. The album reached No. 8 on the UK Rock Chart, and in 2010 it managed to reach the place fifty-one the UK Albums Chart and earned certification as a gold record by the BPI.

Background

Hayley Williams was originally signed to Atlantic Records in 2003 as a solo pop singer. However, Williams resisted the label's wishes, saying she did not envision herself as "the next Madonna".^[2] As a result, she formed Paramore with Josh Farro, Zac Farro, and Jeremy Davis.^[3] In her short solo career, Williams recorded some demos, which were later re-recorded with the band for a "more authentic" sound. However, the band was almost fired because the label said they "were terrible." The songs then recently written by Williams and Josh Farro, "Here We Go Again" and "Hallelujah", saved the group from being fired. "Here We Go Again" became the fifth track on All We Know Is Falling, but "Hallelujah" was saved for their sophomore album album Riot! (2007).^[4]

Production

The departure of bassist Jeremy Davis served as one of the themes for the album.

The group traveled to Orlando, Florida to write and record the remainder of the album. A few days after arriving in Orlando, Davis left the band.^[4][5] The remaining members continued work on the album.^[4] The song "All We Know" was written about his departure, and the album was also thematically based around his absence.^[5] Hayley Williams said of the album's theme: "We decided we were going to base the album off of that, which is also what the cover means. The couch with no one there and the shadow walking away; it's all about Jeremy leaving us and us feeling like there's an empty space."^[6] The album's artwork was created by Electric Heat.^[7]

The album's recording process took about three weeks, with Josh Farro calling the sessions "rushed".^[8] "All We Know", "Never Let This Go" and "My Heart" were recorded with producer James Paul Wisner at Wisner Productions, located in St. Cloud, Florida. "Pressure", "Emergency", "Brighter", "Whoa", "Conspiracy" and "Franklin" were recorded with producer Mike Green at ARS Studios, located in Orlando, Florida. "Here We Go Again" was recorded with producers Roger Alan Nichols and Nick Trevisick at Bigger Dog Studio, located in Franklin, Tennessee. Additional recording took place at Stone Gables Studio, located in Brentwood, Tennessee and The Skyview Church of Tone and Soul, located in East Nashville, Tennessee.^[7]

All of the songs were mixed by Green, except for "Here We Go Again", which was mixed by Nichols and Trevisick. Tom Baker mastered the recordings at Precision Mastering in Hollywood, California. Nath Warshowsky acted as the studio drum tech for every song, except for "Here We Go Again". Dave Buchman engineered "Here We Go Again". Lucio Rubino, formerly of StorySide:B, replaced the absent Davis in the studio. He performed bass on every song except for "Here We Go Again", which was done by Jeremy Cadwell.^[7]

Typically, Farro would write the music while Williams wrote the lyrics.^[9] On occasion, Farro would contribute lyrics as well. "Conspiracy" was composed by Williams, Farro, and Taylor York.^[7] It was the first song they wrote together.^[10] Many of the lyrics in All We Know Is Falling which do not deal with Davis' departure deal with the bad relationship and divorce of Williams' parents.^[11] The band's influences varied in sound during the album's recording. Williams claimed influence from Underoath, Failure, and The Academy Is... while Davis said the band were heavily influenced by Slipknot.^[12]

Release and promotion

Hayley Williams performing on July 4, 2006 in Phoenix, Arizona as part of the 2006 edition of Warped Tour.

Paramore released All We Know Is Falling on July 26, 2005 in the United States.^[1] According to Paramore's A&R at Atlantic Records, Steve Robertson, the promotion strategy behind the album was that the band would start small and slowly build through word of mouth instead of giving the debut album a major radio promotional push. In his own words, Robertson "wanted kids to discover the band without it being shoved down their throats."^[13] In September 2005, a special Japanese edition containing the previously unreleased song "Oh, Star" was made available.^[14] On May 26, 2009, a deluxe edition of the album was released exclusively on iTunes with live versions of "Pressure" and "Here We Go Again", and the music videos for all the singles.^[15] A 10th anniversary edition of the album was released on December 4, 2015 on vinyl, which contains "O Star" and "This Circle" as bonus tracks.^[16] The album featured three singles: "Pressure",^[17] "Emergency"^[18] and "All We Know".^[19] Initially, none of the singles managed to chart, but after the success of their following album Riot! (2007), "Pressure" managed to peak at number 62 on the Billboard Digital Songs chart.^[20]

Two weeks before starting a tour to promote the album, John Hembree joined the band to replace bassist Jeremy Davis,^[21] though he ended up rejoining the group.^[4] In January 2006, the band took part in the Winter Go West tour where they played alongside Seattle bands Amber Pacific and The Lashes.^[5] In February, the group went on Midwest and east coast tour with Halifax, My American Heart, and So They Say.^[22] Through the spring of 2006, Paramore was an opening act on tours for both Bayside^[23] and The Rocket Summer.^[24] The band was initially planned to appear on the 2006 edition of the Take Action Tour in early March 2006,^[25] but Williams came down with flu, which resulted in the band being replaced by Sullivan.^[26] The band went on the 2006 edition of the Warped Tour, beginning in Nashville, near the group's hometown.^[27] In August and September, the band went on a headlining tour of the U.S. with support from Hit the Lights, Cute Is What We Aim For and This Providence, followed by a UK tour in October.^[28]

Critical reception

Professional ratings
Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[29]
Alternative Press	[30]
Click Music	[31]
Punknews.org	[32]
The Trades	A-[9]

The reviews for All We Know is Falling were mostly positive. Trevor Kelley at Alternative Press stated "On their incredibly polished debut, it's obvious that someone has done Williams wrong ... but the well-trained boys in her band seem to realize that these vaguely emo, but mostly mall-punk tracks are better off recalling what you might've heard had you just dropped the attitude and accepted the fact that the last Avril Lavigne disc totally ruled."^[30] Tony Pascarella of The Trades praised Williams' voice as "a rich, powerful voice that rarely makes a mistake on this stunning debut."^[9]

In a retrospective review, Allmusic reviewer Neil Z. Yeung showed mixed feelings about the album. He regarded the album as "alright", however, he believed that the songs were too straightforward and lacked "differentiation, excitement, or the brightness that would be found on later albums."^[29] Jordan "Anchors" Rogowski from Punknews.org was more critical of the album, while praising William's voice, but criticizing the structures of the songs, regarding them "just too flat, too linear".^[32]

BuzzFeed included the album at number 13 on their "36 Pop Punk Albums You Need To Hear Before You F——ing Die" list.^[33]

Commercial performance

Initially, All We Know Is Falling had a weak commercial performance, making it only to number 30 on the Billboard Heatseekers Albums chart in September 2006.^[34] After the success of their second album Riot!, it became a sleeper success; the album sales started growing. Although it never charted on Billboard 200, it did manage to take number 13 on the Top Pop Catalog Albums chart in 2007,^[35] and later charted on the Billboard Catalog Albums chart in 2009.^[34] All We Know Is Falling was first certified in 2009 in the United Kingdom, earning the gold award for shipments of over 100,000 copies.^[36] It was then certified in Australia in 2012, where it went gold for shipments of over 35,000 units.^[37] In 2014, the album was certified gold in the United States for shipments of over 500,000 copies. In 2016, the album's lead single "Pressure" was also certified gold.^[38]

Track listing

All lyrics written by Hayley Williams, except when noted; all music composed by Williams & Josh Farro, except when noted.

Bonus tracks

Personnel

Personnel per booklet.^[7]

Chart positions

Certifications

Release history

References

External links

• All We Know Is Falling at YouTube (streamed copy where licensed)