The emo personas of MySpace’s past were resurrected at Brooklyn Bowl Las Vegas on October 17, as the scene-kid spirit was intense at this neon-lit nostalgic fever dream. With raunchy electronica group The Millionaires, crunkcore pioneers 3OH!3 and dance rock band Cobra Starship on the bill, the sold-out When We Were Young sideshow was primed for a celebration of early 2010s debauchery.
The venue felt like an unsupervised house party, packed with When We Were Young festgoers stumbling past each other, spilling their drinks and stopping in the middle of walkways for photo ops with their friends. But things started to get really messy as soon as The Millionaires rushed the stage with their infamously brash lyrics and glittery personas. They ran through their greatest tracks including "Alcohol," "Party Like a Millionaire" and "Stay The Night." The audience ate it up and spat the lyrics back to these OG scene queens.
3OH!3 followed up with a hilarious energy— often stopping to make jokes about changing their name to "3Ozempic!3," that they're the first band to be sponsored by the Costco hot dog and that they wrote the song "Starstrukk: about Shrek 2. Fans joined in making the original 3OH!3 hand signature, which pleased the band and encouraged them to "get the f*ck up!" and "sing this sh*t!", and the audience happily complied. But it was nothing compared to the reaction to the closing song, "Don’t Trust Me"—the room bounced, the gals shrieked and the bros rapped along until the song closed and everyone was left sweating off their black eyeshadow and chunky glitter.
It’s been 10 years since Cobra Starship took the stage, and this gig provided the exact elements they needed to get back into the rhythm of things and prepare them for their performances at WWWY this weekend. "I waited years for this sh*t!" said a nearby concertgoer, who later mentioned Cobra Starship had been his first concert at age 13 at the now defunct Jillian’s venue in Downtown Vegas. The quintet took the stage like they hadn’t missed a beat and the decade long anticipation added to the hype. The crowd sang along to "Kiss My Sass," "Guilty Pleasure," "City At War" and more. And as the night wrapped up, we all relished in the memory of this very niche time in culture and how it’s still got our claws in us years later. Love live the scene.
