Taylor Swift owes her long-lasting friendship with Paramore’s Hayley Williams to one special person — mom Andrea Swift.
“[Me and Taylor] were at some Grammy party — it was actually Timbaland’s Grammy party. Huge. I was very nervous, but a woman came up to me and she said, ‘I’m Taylor Swift’s mom and, you know, Taylor doesn’t have a lot of friends her age that do music,” Williams, 34, shared during the Thursday, October 5, episode of The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. “And I would love to, like, you know, introduce you guys or get your number.’”
Hours earlier, Williams’ band, Paramore, and Taylor, 33, both lost to Amy Winehouse after being nominated for Best New Artist at the 2008 awards show.
“I love Taylor’s mom!” host Jimmy Fallon interjected of Andrea’s mastermind move, to which Williams replied: “Andrea, the legend that she is. She connected us.”
Since that fateful day, Williams and Taylor have formed a tight bond, even collaborating on several projects. Paramore opened up for Taylor’s Eras Tour on a handful of dates earlier this year and will hit the road with the “Anti-Hero” singer once again for the second leg of international shows, which kicks off in November.
Paramore also joined Taylor on stage to perform their hit “That’s What You Get” during Taylor’s Speak Now tour in 2011. More than one decade later, Williams’ vocals are featured on a “From the Vault” track, titled “Castles Crumbling,” off Taylor’s rerecorded Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) album.
“Since Speak Now was all about my songwriting, I decided to go to the artists who I feel influenced me most powerfully as a lyricist at that time and ask them to sing on the album,” Swift wrote via Instagram prior to the record’s July release. “They’re so cool and generous for agreeing to support my version.”
Williams previously spoke about the early days of her friendship with Taylor after news of their collaboration broke in June. “Taylor was the first industry friend I ever made and hung out with outside of work things,” Williams wrote via Instagram alongside a photo of Taylor roller skating at her 21st birthday party. “When Speak Now dropped, I bought my friend’s record (as you do!) and listened to the whole thing in my first car, sitting still in the driveway. It’s my favorite Taylor Swift album for so many reasons.”
She continued: “I wish I could go back to this moment at my 21st birthday and tell her one day she’ll legitimately own Speak Now and we’ll get to sing together on one of the songs.”
Williams isn’t the only celebrity in Taylor’s inner circle. The Grammy winner often asks her A-list friends to lend their talents to her projects. BFF Blake Lively made her directorial debut for Taylor’s “I Bet You’ll Think About Me” music video after the rerelease of Red (Taylor’s Version) in October 2021, while Phoebe Bridgers collaborated on the vault track “Nothing New.”
Pals Sadie Sink and Dylan O’Brien, meanwhile, showed off their acting chops as the stars of her 2021 “All Too Well” short film.
“I had a feeling [Dylan] would be great at ad-libbing and adding nuance to his character, which enriched the story tenfold,” Taylor wrote in an email to Bustle in March 2022. “He absolutely blew me away and I feel really lucky that I gained such a great friend from the experience too.”
O’Brien, 32, was equally effusive about Taylor, praising her for allowing him and costar Sink, 21, to contribute to the creative process.
“For someone who’s that meticulous, she’s so trusting. … Everything was planned to be to music,” he told the outlet. “But then when we played out that scene [with dialogue]. [Taylor] immediately marched over and was just like, ‘This is it. I’m going to play this in the video.’ The confidence to just identify that in the moment on set and take in what we were bringing to it [shows how] she’s so sound with relationships and her instincts.”
