Monday’s second rare installment of our BandsOnBands feature is here, and Set It Off did a great job tackling it. The band is currently out on tour with There For Tomorrow and will be releasing their debut album, Cinematics, tomorrow, which can be pre-ordered here. In the feature, Maxx Danziger from the band truly takes fan behind the meaning of his love for Fall Out Boy and how they changed his perfecption of music. Make sure to listen to great songs by Fall Out Boy on Spotify here and check out what Maxx had to say about one of his biggest influences below!

From Maxx Danziger of Set It Off:

I listened to a lot of different kinds of music when I was growing up but there were only a handful of bands that really stuck with me and drastically changed my perception of music. One of those bands was Fall Out Boy. Bands that have the kind of impact that they did on the scene come few and far between. They had such an influence on so many bands, and they had a huge influence on me. If my angsty teen years had a soundtrack, FOB would be the featured band right on the front of the album cover. 

When I was younger, I used to go to as many shows as I could. It didn’t matter if I knew the bands or not. I just wanted to be surrounded by the atmosphere and the sound of the scene. So it just so happened that one weekend I ended up going to see some band named after an obscure Simpsons reference (Radioactive man’s sidekick? Really?) I had heard of the name Fall Out Boy because I had seen it plastered all over MySpace pages of girls I went to high school with, but I had never given them a listen. Now, I’ve seen a lot of bands but I have never been drawn to a bands live performance so fast in my entire life. It was this perfect mixture of edgy rock and pop hooks. They were able to take the standard pop formula and give it a bite. As if that wasn’t enough, they were spinning around like they were in a tornado. They were able to put on a real performance while playing. Being the impressionable young kid I was, I was completely hooked. 

I didn’t bring any money with to the show so the first chance I got I had my dad drive to a Best Buy (Orlando was lacking in the record store department back then) and picked up “Take This To Your Grave.” I proceeded to play that album on repeat for what seemed like forever. I still go back and listen to that record front to back regularly. I’m not sure if it’s the nostalgia or the hooks, but that will always be my favorite record by them. Throughout the years, I bought each new album the day it came out and each album Patrick’s voice would get better along with his songwriting. They progressed so well musically from angsty pop rock to their own signature Fall Out Boy sound. I remember hearing Sugar We’re Going Down on the radio and thinking it was so cool that a band in the scene was able to break out into the mainstream and make their mark. 

I have so many memories associated with their music. One of the first songs I ever learned on guitar was Grand Theft Autumn. I put countless FOB songs on mix CDs that I would make for my girlfriends, and when we eventually broke up I used those same songs to help me cope with my overdramatic teen emotions. I remember taking road trips and screaming the lyrics to Sending Postcards From A Plane Crash with my friends. 

I learned a lot from Fall Out Boy. They showed me that you can write pop music that has a bite to it. They showed me that having a captivating live performance can make a huge difference. And they showed me that in order to stay relevant as a band, you can’t be afraid to progress musically. I fully believe Fall Out Boy was a voice for my generation. When I’m old and I’m driving my kids around in our hover car (I can only hope they exist by the time I’m old), I’m still going to be listening to Fall Out Boy, and while I fully expect my children to call it old and outdated, it will always be a time machine to my youth. Oh! And one last thing, if anyone in Fall Out Boy is reading this, please get the band back together. We all love and miss you very much.