Paramore fans were surprised by a guest appearance from Lil Uzi Vert during the band’s second night at Madison Square Garden as Hayley Williams invited the rapper onstage to perform “Misery Business.”
Each night, the band plucks select fans to join them for the hit song. Not always going for the obvious picks, like the barricade warriors, Williams scans the crowd to choose more unsuspecting audience members. Lil Uzi Vert, a longtime Paramore stan, has cited them as influences to their work.
“[We’ve been] talking for a minute, but this is the first time we’ve met in person. I love you,” Williams said to Uzi on Wednesday night. “You’ve said too many nice things about me. You are so sweet to me and to Paramore, so can we do this bridge again together? And then we’re gonna melt their faces off. Alright? New York City, are you ready? Here we go!”
In March 2020, Williams told Apple Music’s Zane Lowe that she turned down a collaboration with Lil Uzi Vert, because she worried the track would bring her an uncomfortable level of fame.
“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,” she told Lowe, “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.’”
Not one to give up, Lil Uzi Vert told Complex at last year’s BET Awards that their dream collaboration would be “Hayley Williams from Paramore,” saying, “There’s no one better than Hayley Williams.”
During the Paramore’s first of two sold-out nights in New York, Williams stepped in to address a couple of fans who were pushing and shoving in the general admission pit. After the dispute was settled, Williams had the band restart “Figure 8,” the song she halted to sort out the crowd.
