A heavyweight voice in a featherweight body, Poppy delights in Raleigh with a metal sing-along with hundreds of excited young voices.
American metal singer sensation Moriah Rose Pereira, better known as Poppy, brought her They’re All Around Us Tour to The Ritz in Raleigh, North Carolina. The roughly three-quarters-full venue was filled with teens and their mobile phone screens, eagerly awaiting Poppy’s performance on a beautiful early fall evening. Half sporting a variety of metal T-shirts, the other half in meek goth black clothing and makeup, the young crowd was buzzing with excitement before the music began.
Opener MSPAINT slinked onto the stage without fanfare, appearing possibly as a posse of techs doing one last check on the instruments. Once the venue lights changed and the music began, MSPAINT only continued to build on the uncertainty in the room. A mixture of rap, rock, electronic noise, and aggressive slam poetry, MSPAINT’s sound is what an unholy union between Rage Against The Machine and an iPhone commercial would sound like. The band began their set with “Surveillance,” a funky rap-rock track which made a few heads in the audience bob, but vocalist DeeDee’s wild hair and constant prowling across the front of the stage left most in the audience still scratching their heads. By mid-way through MSPAINT’s set, their power and awesomeness became evident, and the audience locked in as the band delivered a heavy dose of experimental rap art rock that ended far too quickly…