Paramore: rested and ready to rock

When Paramore cut short its European tour in February and returned home to Tennessee to work out "personal issues," fans buzzed online that the band was breaking up - or that lead singer Hayley Williams must be pregnant.

But the guys in Jimmy Eat World, who are co-headlining a show with Paramore on Tuesday at the San Jose State University Event Center, understood exactly what was going on. Five years ago, the older band had been in the same place, frazzled after 2 1/2 years of hard touring in the wake of its breakthrough hit, "The Middle."

"Sometimes you've just got to take a break," says Jimmy Eat World guitarist Tom Linton, 32. "You're stuck in a van or bus with the same people for so long, you can start to get on each other's nerves. I think just taking a break is the best thing they could have done."

Paramore bassist Jeremy Davis, 23, says the time off was just what the band needed after 3 1/2 years of near-constant touring.

"Things haven't been this good in a very long time as far as our relationships with each other," he says. "We just needed it more than anyone can imagine. As a band, we've always been about pleasing everyone else before ourselves. . . . I think it was time for us to be selfish and please ourselves."

It's been a remarkable rise for Paramore, a band that has scored a Grammy nomination and a gold record for its second album, "Riot!" despite the fact that two of its members are still in their teens.

The band is

thrilled to be co-headlining a tour with its heroes.

"They've been our favorite band and our main inspiration in this band since the beginning," Davis says. "And now, having met the guys and them being so cool, it will make me love them 10 times more."

Linton says his band shared some bills with Paramore in the winter and found the musicians to be nice people, though the age difference did make for one striking exchange involving lead singer Jim Adkins.

"One of the guys in the band came up to Jim and said, 'Yeah, I bought 'Clarity' when I was 10 years old," says Linton, referring to Jimmy Eat World's 1998 recording, which is considered a landmark release in the genre of "emo" rock. "It makes us feel old, but it's a good feeling when a band says that to us."

Davis knows something about an age gap himself. He first played in a funk cover band with Williams, four years his junior, when she was about 13. A couple of years later, she approached Davis about joining a new band she was starting with her friends Josh and Zac Farro. Davis was taken aback when he showed up at the first rehearsal and found that drummer Zac was 12.

"I had very, very, very little faith in everyone in the band because of their age," says Davis, who was already an experienced musician with some Nashville session work under his belt. But he was quickly won over.

"Some of the ideas that come out of Josh and Zac and Hayley's heads - it astounds me at times, because I remember how young they are. I just feel like they're super-creative."

Because of their history together, Davis has a unique perspective on Williams' talents.

"I still feel like no one in this world has heard Hayley sing like I have," he says. "Really, she holds back so much. There's like a big Aretha Franklin inside of her that is just powerful, and just crazy, and no one's really heard that side of Hayley."

Even "holding back," Williams has impressed nearly everyone who has come across her music with a powerful voice and stage presence. Many have speculated that the band's recent problems stemmed from the attention Williams receives from the press at the expense of her bandmates, particularly her songwriting partner, guitarist Josh Farro.

Davis scoffs at that idea.

"Hayley's been offered everything," he says. "She's been offered roles in big movies, tons of stuff. She doesn't want to do anything that will pull her away from the band."

That selfless attitude is also part of Jimmy Eat World's success. When the band started as a teenage punk group in Mesa, Ariz., Linton was the lead singer and primary songwriter, but as the band evolved, Adkins assumed the frontman role.

As Linton relates it, the switch didn't cause the slightest bit of stress.

"Jim never said, 'I'm going to be singing more,' " Linton says flatly. "It kind of happened naturally. I think it's worked out for the best, so far."

And Linton says he doesn't see it ending soon. Though sales of last year's "Chase This Light" are falling far short of the levels of the band's smash 2001 "Bleed American" CD, Linton says crowds are getting bigger, and the old friends are still enjoying themselves on the road.

As for Paramore, Davis rejects the idea that it could ever split. He says when the band temporarily left the road, it heard from parents who said Paramore's music had given hope to children who had contemplated suicide. Davis, a committed Christian like the other members of the band, takes this responsibility seriously.

"I feel like, if we were ever to break up, we would be letting down all those kids," he says. "That's never even an option."

Jimmy Eat World, Paramore,

Dear and the Headlights

Where: Event Center, San Jose State University,

290 S. Seventh St.

When: 7:30 p.m. Tuesday

Tickets: $30; (408) 998-8497, www.ticketmaster.com