A sold-out crowd packed into the House of Blues Orlando for a night of unique alternative metal led by Los Angeles singer Poppy. The duo House of Protection opened the show with a thirty-minute set of energetic Prodigy-influenced industrial. Guitarist Stephen Harrison and drummer Aric Improta jumped, flailed, and flipped onstage while serving up frenzied beats supported by backing bass tracks, synthesizers, and more. Both musicians shared vocal duties, alternating between Beastie Boys-style rapping and melodic singing.
On “Learn to Forget,” Harrison grabbed his guitar and mic stand and entered the crowd, performing from the center of a circle mosh pit. While onstage, the duo careened through a lively set of songs like the bouncing “Fuse” and the industrial head-banger “Pulling Teeth,” full of bludgeoning beats and high-gain guitar that melded with the bass backing tracks. They closed their set with the adrenaline-inducing “It’s Supposed to Hurt.”
Poppy then took the stage backed by a three-piece band on guitar, bass, and drums, all wearing black ski masks. During the next 70 minutes, Poppy and the band tore through a set made up almost entirely of songs from 2024’s Negative Spaces and 2020’s I Disagree. Poppy’s distinctive sound is a blend of saccharine pop melodies, screaming alt-metal ferocity, and industrial rhythms, and the show highlighted each of those varied styles. Upbeat pop songs like “Crystalized” showed Poppy in pop star form, crooning over danceable beats, while in “BLOODMONEY,” she aggressively chanted over a layer of grimy industrial thumps.
The diminutive singer’s voice alternated between a soft, girl-next-door croon and vicious metal screams, often in the same song, while the backing band met her in stride with matching pop grooves and powerful alt-metal attacks. “The Cost of Giving Up” matched her various styles well, with most of the song offering sing-along melodic pop-rock while the bridge devolved into in-your-face metal fury.
Poppy sang, danced, and thrashed onstage while maintaining a distance from the crowd. Aside from one moment of directing a mosh pit, there was no banter. She disappeared behind a curtain between each song and reemerged once the next one began. In the place of the usual banter, pre-recorded messages played between songs, sometimes with the words projected on the screen, and other times spoken by a ventriloquist’s doll with Poppy’s likeness.
Stephen Harrison joined the band on the high-octane metalcore song “The Center’s Falling Out,” adding extra riffs the best he could, while the strap kept popping off his guitar. Throughout the show, though, the guitar was often lost in the mix, drowned out by the bass and drums, so the individual riffs were usually indecipherable.
Though “The Center’s Falling Out” offered straight-up metalcore with rapid-fire riffs and discordant squeals, most of Poppy’s set was about dynamics. Things would start quiet but shift into a heavy breakdown. Her soft, clean vocals would get harsh during a bridge or a single line. In doing so, every heavy moment packed a punch. “I Disagree” highlighted those dynamics by shifting between mid-tempo djent, pop balladry, and uptempo fury.
After a lively rendition of “Surviving on Defiance,” Poppy and the band left the stage. The doll appeared again and noticed that the crowd still hadn’t left.
“What do they want?” the doll asked.
“I think they want some more,” answered an unknown voice.
“Okay. Have some more,” the doll said.
Poppy and the band then returned for a two-song encore, starting with one of the night’s heaviest songs. On “They’re All Around Us,” frenetic metal verses led to melodic sing-along choruses. Then, they closed the night with another song that captures the various genre influences in Poppy’s catalog. “In New Way Out,” the crowd sang along with Poppy on the melodic pop moments, danced to the industrial grooves, and moshed to the brief bursts of metal energy.
