Set It Off, Scene Queen, In Her Own Words, Rivals
Rams Head Live!, Baltimore, MD
May 1, 2023
Review and Gallery by: Mari Abbate

Starting the night off strong, Rivals was the perfect opening act. They filled the stage with energy fueled by Kalie Wolfe’s intense, New Years Day-esque vocals. They performed their new song “Man Eater,” which was release on May 5, 2023 along with many other songs from the EP. One thing about Kalie is that she gets completely absorbed in her performance, constantly spinning and headbanging on stage. She also frequently crouched down at the edge of the stage to create a more personal experience for the audience.

Next up was In Her Own Words, a pop-punk band that perfectly matched Rivals’ energy despite being slightly different genres. There wasn’t a still moment on stage with bassist Eric Ruelas and guitarist Andretti Almalel constantly switching sides and playing to each other. During Alone With You, In Her Own Words called a special guest to the stage– Trey Miller from Cherie Amour. Last year Cherie Amour went on multiple tours with IHOW as well as Set It Off, so the boys were glad to see their friends again. When they played Steady Glow, Joey Fleming asked the crowd to turn on their phone lights to simulate the title of the song, and it was mesmerizing. The audience swayed their lights just right to match the tune of the music, and lit up the whole room.

Scene Queen, also known as Hannah Collins, made quite the impression on the audience. Every chance she got, she was at the barrier, leaning over, reaching out to fans and forming a true connection. Her screaming “I fucking love women!” got a particularly strong response from the crowd, lots of cheers from lots of queers (myself included, of course). Scene Queen coined the term “bimbocore,” a subgenre of metalcore classified by the combination of feminism and femininity– the concept of women being strong and “girly.” That being said, it isn’t hard to imagine the amount of misogynist-fueled rage Hannah lets out through her music. Her set featured songs like Pink Whitney, Pink Paper, and 18+. She even performed a cover of Katy Perry’s I Kissed a Girl, which of course the audience loved. Due to earlier technical difficulties, Hannah was told she had to cut her set short by Cody Carson, who then joined her in performing Barbie & Ken (a song he’s featured on). However, being the bisexual queen she is, Hannah refused to leave the stage without playing Pink Panther, a wlw anthem, joking that it would be a hate crime if she couldn’t.

At last, it was time for the much-anticipated headliner: Set It Off. Kicking off the Dopamine tour, fans were practically buzzing as they watched the 60-second countdown signifying Set It Off’s appearance. When they finally took the stage, Set It Off dove right into their latest single, Punching Bag. Despite only being a few weeks old, fans screamed along to every word as if they’d known it forever. During Killer in the Mirror, Cody Carson jumped into the crowd, where he surfed to the middle and stood up– on top of the crowd– for the rest of the song. When he returned to the stage, he announced that they had many surprises in store for the night. The audience was teetering with excitement, knowing that Set It Off had promised some “older songs they hadn’t played in a while.”

To many fans’ delight, those “older songs” included not one, not two, but three songs off their 2013 album Cinematics. One of them being Partners in Crime, which features Ash Costello from New Years Day. Kalie Wolfe joined Set It Off on stage to sing Ash’s part in the duet. They also played I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead and, as part of their encore, I’d Rather Drown. Set It Off debuted their newest song Win Win with the help of Scene Queen, who’s featured on the song. During Hypnotized, Maxx Danziger surprised the crowd by coming down to the front of the stage while Cody took over on the drums. Maxx performed the entire song, of course replacing the line “oh me? Cody died” with “Maxx died.” The audience absolutely loved having more interaction with the drummer, as he’s usually hidden behind his drum set. Speaking of which, in between Why Do I and Lonely Dance, Maxx had a drum solo which was a medley of Megalovania (Undertale), Heart Attack (Demi Lovato), Discord (The Living Tombstone), DECO*27, Fake Love (BTS), Talk Dirty (Jason Derulo – Cody Carson’s version), and One Step Closer (Linkin Park – 100 gecs reanimation). The crowd completely lost their minds at each new song they recognized. Clearly, Set It Off are a bunch of nerds who know their audience far too well.