The song received high airplay in both the United States and Canada, and was performed live on the March 14, 2007 episode of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and again ten months later on January 9, 2008.

[3][4] The style of the song has been compared to (though inspired by) "Take Me Out", a 2004 single by indie rock band Franz Ferdinand.

He added, You’re always the guy in the corner that feels awkward and just drinks too much and then says something stupid and goes home lonely.

(laughs) We were all coming from that place, so when he [singer Scott Anderson] wrote that song, it was like, ‘Oh, man.

The two begin to dance with the symbolic dancers returning in greater numbers every time the chorus repeats.

The video alternates between shots of the band playing on a rooftop that overlooks the dancers in a seemingly abandoned street.

The song then rose to peak at number six on the Hot 100 over a month later, for the chart week of January 5, 2008.

It also became their second top five song on the Alternative Chart after "One Thing", which had peaked at number five, and it later tied 30 Seconds to Mars "The Kill (Bury Me)" and Red Jumpsuit Apparatus "Face Down" for the record of spending the most weeks on that chart (52 weeks).

The song topped three million digital downloads in the United States in late December 2010,[8] and as of January 2015, the song has sold 3.4 million copies in the U.S.[9] The track peaked at number 12 on the Australian Singles Chart based on downloads alone; an amazing achievement considering eighty percent of single sales come from physical releases.

In September 2023, for the 35th anniversary of Alternative Airplay,[11] Billboard published a list of the top 100 most successful songs in the chart's history; "Paralyzer" was ranked at number 45.