Just as the music industry slowed down for the holidays, drama hit the Paramore camp and hard. Two of the founding members of the group referred to Paramore as a "manufactured major label product" and insisted that lead singer Hayley Williams puts herself and her career before the band. It was revealed that Paramore had been signed into a major label contract with Atlantic during their stint at the indie label Fueled By Ramen. This tactic allowed Paramore to take the grass-roots route and gain indie credit. Josh Farro, the now defunct lead guitarist of Paramore, published these pejorative claims, among others, on his personal blog. After learning that the remaining members of group had issued a statement detailing the reasons for his departure before he could address it, Farro felt jilted. He thought their depiction of why his brother and he left the group didn't match up, as the issues were multifaceted. Since, York and Williams of Paramore chatted with MTV, refuting these claims: "We're not a manufactured band. We've dealt with that rumor for a long time, and that's because of the rumors of Fueled by Ramen and Atlantic's relationship. We've always talked about that … saying, you know, when we started, I again fought for something that we could really work hard and start from the ground… we wanted to be that kind of band, we wanted to be those kind of people that worked for whatever they were going to get. We didn't know it would turn into this. Thank God it did, because we got to experience so many cool things." (Read on.)
