Another awesome moment

“I didn’t even know she had a record coming out. I was all worried about Mariah Carey,’’ he says with a chuckle of last week’s surprising chart positions.

The pop-punk quintet watched with amazement as its third album, “Brand New Eyes,’’ debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 albums chart between new releases by the legendary New York power divas. “It’s pretty awesome,’’ he concludes.

It’s a word Farro repeatedly returns to when searching for adequate means to describe the rocket ride the band - which includes his younger brother Zac on drums, guitarist Taylor York, bassist Jeremy Davis, and front woman Hayley Williams - has been on since teaming up as teenagers in Tennessee in 2004.

Grinding out summers on the punk rock caravan that is the Warped Tour to work up a fan base? Awesome. Watching second album “RIOT!’’ spawn a string of peppy hit singles in 2007 including “Misery Business’’ and “crushcrushcrush’’? Awesome. Getting a Grammy nomination for best new artist in 2008? Awesome. Spending three months on the road with heroes No Doubt this past summer? Awesome. An upcoming headlining tour of large clubs, including a sold-out date tomorrow at the House of Blues? Awesome.

What wasn’t so awesome for Paramore was the winter of 2008. That was the moment when the young musicians, ages 19-25, decided to cancel a string of European tour dates to sort out some internal conflicts. The problem Paramore had was not a new one for successful groups: a failure to communicate. Add in the pressures of burgeoning success, homesickness, and the resentment-hatching brighter spotlight that tends to shine on lead singer Williams, and you’ve got a recipe for strife.

“I think we’re all just learning how to do this,’’ Farro says on the phone from a Detroit tour stop, where the band has recently picked up after a bout with laryngitis laid Williams low for a week. “Nobody’s an expert. It’s good practice for marriage that’s for sure,’’ he says with a laugh. “We still have our little tiffs, but it’s getting better. We’re starting to realize that the more and more we don’t communicate how we feel about each other, the worse it gets. It’s just better to get it all out. You feel 10 times better when you do.’’

If the cathartic lyrics that Williams wrote for some of the tunes on “Brand New Eyes’’ are any indication, she must be feeling great. She lashes out at those who judge her on tough first single “Ignorance’’ and the angry “Playing God.’’ And on the decidedly more optimistic “Looking Up’’ she croons: “I can’t believe we almost hung it up. We’re just getting started.’’

Once the band was back on good terms, crafting a more expansive sounding record, with noted producer Rob Cavallo (Green Day) at the helm, became the mandate.

“Obviously we don’t ever want to lose fans, but we wanted to reach a whole new sort of demographic,’’ Farro says. To that end the band branched out into intimate acoustic territory with “Misguided Ghost’’ and vulnerable balladry with the tender “The Only Exception,’’ which Farro unashamedly envisions fitting nicely onto a chick flick soundtrack. And there are a number of heavy riffers like “Careful,’’ that could easily beat up their pop-punk predecessors. “When [the] ‘Twilight’ [soundtrack] came out and we had ‘Decode’ on there, we feel like our fans really did like the heavy sound so we put that [sound] on the record too.’’

Warped Tour founder Kevin Lyman, who booked Paramore at the early gig that brought the band to the attention of its record label in 2005, says that kind of thinking is what intrigued him from the beginning. “I was sold from the minute I saw them,’’ Lyman says. “They’re a band that needs to develop each album like Green Day. They’re real artists.’’

Most important, Lyman thinks the group has the goods live. “I think they’re most comfortable in that hot, sweaty atmosphere,’’ he says, comparing Paramore to recent tourmates and fellow Warped veterans No Doubt. “They had to change just a few things inherently to make them that big, big band and that’s the transition [Paramore] is in. With the right things, as they develop they’ll be that band that can headline amphitheatres very soon.’’

Farro isn’t sure about that, giggling at the idea, but he does believe that the hardship the band endured, and then poured into “Eyes’’ unfiltered is what will help make it successful.

“When I first heard Hayley’s lyrics I was like, ‘Oh great, here we go’,’’ says Farro, who writes the music before sending it to Williams for melodic and lyrical topping. “But I think it’s just the season of life that we were [in]. We’re honest, and we don’t put on a fake persona like, ‘Oh, we’re perfect, we’re a happy band all the time!’ Because I don’t think people want that. They want to know that we hurt and that we fight and that we cry; it’s something they can relate to. They don’t want some just bubbly Disney person all the time.’’

Sarah Rodman can be reached at srodman@globe.com.