derek discanio

The Reunion Tour Featuring:
Candy Hearts
State Champs
William Beckett
Set It Off
We Are The In Crowd

The Reunion Tour hit the Greene Street Club on Friday, March 28th, in Greensboro, NC. Before doors even opened, there was already a long line of fans eagerly awaiting the music filled night ahead of them. This tour is We Are the In Crowd’s first time headlining in the US and it has been a successful one so far.

Candy Hearts started off the night to a slightly slow start. They received a quiet welcome to the stage from the audience, perhaps because they were the least well known of the bands on tour. Lead vocalist, Mariel Loveland seemed a bit nervous for the first few songs of their set, but eventually she began to loosen up and the crowd did too. For the last song of their set they asked for the audience to sing a line from the chorus and they cheerfully sang along until the end.

Next up was State Champs, a pop punk band from Albany, NY. The energy was brought as soon as they hit the stage. Vocalist, Derek Discanio, immediately asked the crowd to move up closer as soon as he arrived to the stage. Discanio has an incredible voice that blends perfectly with the high energy instrumentals from the rest of the band. The band has an amazing stage presence and are constantly moving around the stage and interacting with fans in the crowd. Throughout their set fans were singing along to the words, but it was fan favorites, “Remedy”, and closing song, “Elevated”, that really sent the energy in the room to the next level.

Set It Off was next on the bill and having seen them on multiple occasions I knew they were going to be one of my favorite acts of the night. Their set began with a slew of theatrics, including black hoodies, red masks and a voice over of a storyteller explaining what the show was going to entail. Frontman, Cody Carson, continued the theatrical story of a romance gone wrong, telling a little more of the story between each song. My favorite part about Set It Off’s live performances is that they leave no member of the crowd unattended. Each member of the band was singing and making eye contact with fans throughout their set. Carson reached into the crowd multiple times, stood on crowd’s hands and crowd surfed, putting huge smiles on fan’s faces. My only complaint would be that their set was too short and I wanted to see more.

The lights began to dim and the sound of Eminem’s “My Name Is” started to play with an overdub of William Beckett’s voice saying “Hi, my name is, William Beckett”. It’s clear that Beckett wanted his set to be a fun and enjoyable one. Beckett also showed a soft side, he is a great story teller and shared stories of bullying and struggles and encouraged people to keep their heads up and to keep looking forward. Beckett invited Carson back on the stage to perform a song and claimed that they would be performing “a new song that they just wrote that day”. They then began to break out into Katy Perry’s hit song, “Dark Horse”, much to the amusement of the audience. Beckett ended his set with, “About a Girl”, one of his hits from his former band, The Academy Is…. This got the crowd very excited and ended his performance on a high note.

Finally, after all the energizing performances from the opening acts, it was time for the headliners, We Are the In Crowd. The band began with their new hit, “The Best Thing (That Never Happened)”, off their recently released album, Weird Kids. This instantly got the crowd energized and excited for the rest of the show. Vocalists, Tay Jardine and Jordan Eckes’ voices bounced off each other beautifully and you can tell that based on the fun interactions with all members of the band on stage that there is great chemistry in this group. Midway through their set, WATIC slowed things down to play, “Windows in Heaven”, a personal song about Jardine’s late father. You could tell by the emotion in her voice that this song is very special to her. WATIC continued playing a mix of new and old songs throughout the rest of the night, which included fan favorites, “Kiss Me Again” and their finale song, “Rumor Mill”. The night ended well and I believe WATIC are going on to do great things.

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Photos and written by Caitlyn Willard

Tag: derek discanio

Show Review: The Reunion Tour 3/28