As the sun set on the last Tuesday of September, Poppy took the stage by storm at The Observatory North Park for her San Diego stop of the “They’re All Around Us” tour. Poppy, whose hard pivot from avant-garde pop into metalcore had not yet been tested live, took this opportunity to give us all the confirmation we needed to know that she authentically rocks.
With a double metal opener act of MSPaint, a Mississippi rock band that first hit the scene in 2023, and the seasoned Dying Wish, an Oregon rock scene staple, it’s clear that Poppy was making an intentional statement. Even within The Observatory’s high-security walls, the two bands set an expectation of free movement, moshing hard, and losing control.
This is, however, generously tinged by hindsight: MSPaint offered a couple rocky attempts to encourage crowd-surfing, and this audience was not suitably impressed by Emma Boster’s vocalizations until far too late in Dying Wish’s set.
Openers have a hard task though, and Tuesday night is a tough slot. I was initially doubtful of this choice to relentlessly thrust nonstop metal upon an audience that is diverse in their genre choices, but music, especially metal, is the type to sink into your bones whether you notice it or not. And by the time Poppy came on stage, the crowd was frothing with frenetic energy.
Crowds follow the etiquette indications of the performer, and Poppy’s aura as an artist — the juxtaposition between her almost-hyperfeminity and her raspy screams and cryo FX — translates phenomenally on stage. If there is one thing Poppy undoubtedly is, it’s interesting, and her crowd reflects this demographic. As a performer, her intentions for our night environment were crystal clear: liberation, revolution, and most importantly, fun.
To kick off her set, Poppy performed a gnarlier, sassier rendition of “BLOODMONEY,” a song that scored her a Grammy nomination for “Best Metal Performance” back in 2021 and before her full metal era. Punctuated by the track’s iconic line — “Beg for forgiveness from Jesus the Christ!” — Poppy switched effortlessly between her soft falsetto vocals and her angsty scream vocals, rousing everyone in the crowd to scream along with her. Complemented by aggressive strobing lights of angelic white and deep red, this opening performance set a fierce tone for the night, despite her backing band’s goofy stage presence.
Poppy’s collaboration with Bad Omens back in 2024 yielded the insanely popular electronic metalcore track “V.A.N” and set her up nicely to release her recent album, “Negative Spaces,” the same year. Her vocals on this track, however, have always struck me as cold and artificial, and her live performance of “V.A.N” similarly failed to impress. To me, the blippy, electronic instrumentation paired with her heavily autotuned voice felt out of place within the setlist, but much of the crowd raged for this fan-favorite track.
Despite her on-and-off reliance on autotune and backing tracks during this show, Poppy demonstrated admirable voice stamina for having only recently forayed into extreme vocals. On “Negative Spaces,” she exclusively used her high-pitched fry screams; on this tour, she seems to have expanded her repertoire to include deeper, more guttural false chord screams.
Poppy’s first real showcase of her newly mastered false chord screams came during “Anything Like Me,” a highlight off her avant-garde metal album “I Disagree” from 2020. The technique gave the song’s defiant hook — “You shouldn’t be anything like me” — a primal edge that prompted a visceral “hell yeah” from me. This performance encapsulated everything strangely magnetic about Poppy’s older music: theatrical bubblegum pop colliding with chaotic metal, delivered with unshakeable confidence.
The rest of Poppy’s set alternated between high-octane fugues and slower, more emotional moments. “The Center’s Falling Out” tore through the venue, the mosh pit revived and erupting in full force at her whims. She slowed the pace with “Surviving on Defiance,” a dreamy, Deftones-esque track that spoke more in mood than in words — delicate and haunting for a metalcore song. But it was “They’re All Around Us” that cemented Poppy’s versatility and dominance in modern metalcore, her aggressive screams and melodic singing voice alike cutting through the crowd. As the title track for her tour, it was the apex of her show in San Diego.
By the final chord, it was clear: Poppy isn’t just dabbling in metal anymore — she’s taking over. Through devastating screams and soaring melodies, she fearlessly commanded the stage at The Observatory, leaving the crowd exhausted, exhilarated, and convinced that she’s here to stay.
