God Is A Weapon At Planet Hollywood On September 26th

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All Photos By Rocky Kessenger/@through_the_metal_lens

Las Vegas thrives on spectacle, and FALLING IN REVERSE knows how to deliver one. At Planet Hollywood, the band turned a Friday night into something closer to a Vegas residency show than a standard rock concert. Things kicked off with Donnie the puppet on the big screen, taunting the crowd that the band had to cancel. Groans started until he quickly cut it with a smug "just kidding, just kidding", immediately reminding everyone they were in for chaos, not disappointment. Moments later, a live cam followed the band from backstage, and as "Viva Las Vegas" blasted through the PA, Ronnie Radke danced his way onto the stage like a hometown villain returning to his kingdom. For all the controversy that trails him, Ronnie thrives in environments like this: high drama, high stakes, and nowhere to hide.

From the very first notes of "Prequel (Dear Diary)", the crowd was screaming every lyric, turning the opener into a communal roar. "Zombified" poured gasoline on the fire, with flames blasting sky-high as Ronnie yelled "OMG Las Vegas!" to an eruption of cheers. "God Is a Weapon" slowed things down with strobe-heavy hypnotics before "Trigger Warning" turned the entire stage into a furnace while Donnie reappeared on the big screen "playing" keyboards. Then the tone flipped with "I'm Not a Vampire", bathed in orange light and pyro bursts, where for the first time that night the band let loose genuine smiles. Ronnie played with pacing brilliantly, he asked fans to raise their hands and "look at yourself" before "Losing My Mind", filling the venue with nothing but piercing red and green strobes. He barely paused before tearing into "Fuck You And All Your Friends", cutting the venom mid-song to tell the crowd, "Look how beautiful you are... that's right, you know I love you Las Vegas!!" before hammering the chorus again. The stadium detonated. "Bad Guy" turned into the loudest sing-along so far, Ronnie prowling the stage with a smirk as fans carried entire verses, before the joke of the night, "Knock, Knock" slammed into "The Drug In Me Is You", the second-loudest sing-along of the set.

The show had its Vegas-only moments. Covering "Situations" wasn't just a nostalgic callback, it was dripping with irony as Ronnie called out ESCAPE THE FATE drummer Robert Ortiz, who was spotted in the pit. Fans erupted at the drama. The mid-set stretch of "Just Like You", "All My Women", and "All My Life" kept the momentum high before "No Fear" blurred the line between artist and fan as Ronnie and Daniel Laskiewicz walked through the crowd, screamed at point-blank range, and recorded on hundreds of phones. But nothing matched the eruption of "Popular Monster". It turned the venue into a galaxy of glowing phones, the pit surging in time while the deafening sing-along proved why it's their defining anthem. Ronnie paused to get real before "Voices in My Head", telling the crowd, "When you are feeling down, always be grateful... you want to know what I'm grateful for? Building a foundation of loyal fans. I look out at every venue along this tour, and there you are smiling with friends, family, and the kids, the next generation. Thank you very much. LET'S GO!" The sincerity landed hard, making the song hit like both a release and a thank you.

What stood out about the setlist wasn't just the individual moments, but how it was pieced together. The show never dragged, even when tempos dropped or the tone shifted. Songs like "God Is a Weapon" or "I'm Not a Vampire" acted as clever resets, giving the audience just enough room to breathe before the next blast of firepower. Ronnie paced the night like a director, swinging from fury to humor to sincerity and back again. By the time the arena was glowing with phones during "Popular Monster", it was clear that the set was built not just to showcase songs but to guide the crowd through peaks, valleys, and shared release. It was a rare example of a setlist engineered as much for experience as for performance.

Then came the heaviest moment. Ronnie growled into the mic, "For all you people chanting Ronnie...Ronnie isn't fucking here anymore. IT'S RONALD!" The dedication to the High Desert facility was laced with venom, and with Alex Terrible on stage the song became a juggernaut. Their gutturals collided like wrecking balls, leaving the pit in utter carnage and the stage shaking from sheer weight. From there, "Watch the World Burn" was the final surge, cinematic, chaotic, and devastating. But the true closer came with parody and irony as "We Are the Champions" rang out while Ronnie strutted across the stage with a championship belt on his shoulder. It was mockery and victory lap rolled into one, a tongue-in-cheek statement only he could deliver in his own city.

I've never been the biggest FALLING IN REVERSE fan, not for any particular reason, they just never made my playlists regularly. I know the music, I know the songs, but they've always been background noise more than a focal point. That said, when I had the chance to shoot this show and write about it for the fans, I felt like I was the right rockstar for the job. I've read all the takes, positive, negative, and everything in between that orbit this band and especially Ronnie himself. With that being said, fuck the haters. This was a fun night. It had everything: pyro, massive video walls, strobes, sing-alongs, jokes, sincerity, and the kind of arrogance that only works in Vegas. FALLING IN REVERSE delivered, and every fan in that arena left smiling. I left smiling. Will I spin them on repeat? Probably not. Will I talk about this show and what I saw to anyone who asks? Uhhh, fuck yeah.

Walking out of Planet Hollywood, it was impossible not to see how neatly the show tied everything together. It wasn't just a concert, it was theater with pyro, puppets, strobes, sing-alongs, sincerity, and venom stitched into one. Ronnie Radke thrives on contradictions: equal parts villain and showman, arrogant and vulnerable, mocking and sincere. Love him or hate him, he controlled the room from the first word to the final belt-raise. FALLING IN REVERSE didn't just play a set in Las Vegas; they staged an event that crowned themselves champions and dared anyone in attendance to disagree. Nobody did.

Check out some more photos from the show!
All Photos By Rocky Kessenger/@through_the_metal_lens