Set It Off frontman Cody Carson talks us through their new self-titled album and why it is their most definitive and distinctly personal record to date.
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Cody Carson feels as though the best way those who know him would describe his demeanour would be that of a golden retriever.
A beacon of joy. Incredibly easy-going. Always up for finding fun and laughter in whatever he faces.
Generally, not that angry.
It’s this factoid that makes a lot of what comes out when he injects his feelings into Set It Off all the more scathing. That’s especially prominent when you consider where they are right now and what has come to define their latest album. A collection of songs that ripple with malicious intent, coated in bile, and not holding back when it comes to calling out the bullshit.
“I seem to attract people who are there to take advantage of kindness,” he shrugs. “It unfortunately has happened way too many times to me. I remember going back and thinking about the version of me when we first started the band, where I felt that everybody was going to be nice, and I was so naïve. You harden yourself to it the more times that you get screwed over. Your guard goes up, and another brick is added to your wall.
“But with this album, I wanted to reinject the energy back into what Set It Off is. And by channelling the anger I felt from these situations, we are now having the most fun we have ever had.”
Getting that heaviness off your chest is one thing, but seeing it pay off is another. In taking things back into their own hands, now a proudly independent band, creating a sound and style that resonates with Cody, guitarist Zach DeWall and drummer Maxx Danziger equally, and having complete control over every aspect of what this band has, does and will mean to them, they are riding high in ways they never have before. It’s why they wanted to call this collection of songs ‘Set It Off’: it is everything this band represents in one ravenous, rallying, raw burst.
“We just knew that this one is the most us that we have ever been,” Cody continues, unable to keep the smile from spreading across his chops. “We managed to take influence from every album that we have put out and finally feel the cohesive glue that holds it together. We’ve been through so much and been to so many places, but it all still feels brand new even now. It feels like it has just started again, and that’s an amazing thing to be experiencing.”
THE SOUND
At first, there was no intent to make an album when Cody first booked studio time for this new era as the ‘Elsewhere’ cycle came to a close. The plan was to have a great time, see what came to fruition and write some banging singles. That first session, spent with Point North’s Jon Lundin, produced the stark and spine-tingling ‘Punching Bag’, initially unleashed back in 2023. It was created without any rhyme or reason, as pure an example of how he was feeling coming out in real time.
It’s a song that also demonstrated to him how the band’s journey through sounds over their 15-year career reflects how he discovered music as a kid. Coming from a family where his Ma and Pa were in a band, covering 70s and 80s classics, he already had the likes of Earth, Wind and Fire and Tower of Power in his heart. From there, his sister would show him Destiny’s Child and Craig David, before he would discover Eminem’s lyrical genius for himself. Then came Linkin Park, Limp Bizkit and Korn, a dipping of the toes into the heavier side of life. And then came the boy bands, rounding out one of the most wonderfully vibrant music tastes you can conjure.
“I was visiting genres, and then I started visiting them all at the same time with the band,” he admits. “I feel like, because I truly enjoy all of those different genres on their own, that is why we have been able to do that ourselves, and it feels genuine and real. And now the nu-metal phase is finally being shown off, and it feels so good.”
And that’s saying something, because this really is the heaviest and darkest that Set It Off have ever sounded. ‘What’s In It For Me?’ is pure Breaking Benjamin-level battery, ‘Parasite’ is overflowing with the sort of gripping ferocity that bolstered the likes of Static-X at the turn of the millennium, whilst ‘Rotten’ is metalcore fury unleashed, panic chords and low gutturals aplenty. Of course, there is still plenty of pomp, theatre and pop sensibility, it wouldn’t be Set It Off without it, but the fact that the band have found a way to bring such aggressive sounds into their universe is a testament to just how clearly they have been craving this sort of release.
And that’s not just the case with Cody; it’s something that reflects throughout the band.
“There were times when Maxx would be sitting at the kit during the making of [2019 Album] ‘Midnight’, not doing a lot, because of the way those songs were written, and he voiced his concern over it. He didn’t want to just be waiting, he wanted to be playing more intricate parts. From that moment forward, I made a vow that would be prevalent, and it wasn’t before. It was so important going into this that it was the band Set It Off. It was guitars, drums and bass at the forefront. I wanted to keep the melodic sense and the orchestral sense because that is part of what makes us who we are, and still being able to go into big band songs, but I wanted it to be about the three of us before anything else.”
For Cody, one of the elements that stood out to him within that was screaming. It was something he did at the beginning of the band’s journey, but youthful naivety and poor technique meant he had to stop pretty sharpish. But as this process went along, and whilst writing such bruisers as the aformentioned ‘Rotten’, possible featured artists not working out made him realise that he had to do it and do it the justice it deserved.
From a lesson with screaming coach David Benites to practising in whatever spare time he had at home to trying it out whilst on stage, he has now added a very special skill to his tool belt. It’s another element of what it means to be in Set It Off that has allowed such a thing to take place. That if you want something done, you’d better be prepared to do it yourself. Because working it out and carrying on moving is always more effective than sitting still and settling.
“I love when on albums we force ourselves into a position where we have to learn something new,” he beams. “The worst case is we try something, and it doesn’t make the album. But we always find a way to figure it out. That’s how it felt with every one of these songs, and if we didn’t go into albums like that, I would be bored. My least favourite thing my favourite bands could do is stay the same from album to album.
“In this world that we’re in, when people are patting you on the back and telling you how well you are doing, it’s easy to think, ‘We’re killing it, we can put our feet up’. We’ve never been the band that puts our feet up. When you feel like that, that’s when the work really starts. It’s a constant journey of self-discovery and reflection, and you learn a lot about life doing this, too.”
THE LYRICS
Listening to the barrage of bile that Cody has brought up on ‘Set It Off’ will make you glad that these songs aren’t about you. But this isn’t new if you have been with the band for a long time. You only have to look at ‘Wolf In Sheep’s Clothing’, taken from their 2014 epic ‘Duality’, to see how hot-blooded he can get. Though despite it being such an incredible takedown, it was never officially a single. It’s only in the years that have followed that it has found a place in the band’s lore, almost entirely behind their backs.
“There was this subculture of people who consume anime and other cartoons who were making animated music videos to the song,” Cody remarks, still a sense of disbelief that his creation found such a home. “Then there was nightcore, where they speed it up. I was seeing millions of views for this song, and we had never given it a music video. Like, shit. We messed up.”
It’s for this reason that the band felt like it deserved another moment to shine a decade on as part of this record. Though it’s not just in giving it a terrifying facelift that Cody found meaning within the song. It was also in the fact that those words that he wrote as a pissed off twenty-something, about a particular person who had wronged him so, could resonate with people in such different ways. Be it in the far reaches of the Internet or right in front of him at a show, he now understands the power of the words that he writes.
“When someone is singing your songs back with such ferocity and passion, you can tell that they are attaching it to something that is going on in their life,” he humbly remarks. “It’s so different to what I was going through when I wrote it, but it’s so important to them. That brings me back to when I was standing in that crowd watching my favourite bands and feeling the same way. Looking at the singer, hoping they look back.
“That’s why I perform the way that I do. I wanted everyone to feel like they are a part of something. For those 90 minutes or so, we are escaping, and the anger and the rage in these songs, it’s never truly appropriate in public to have a meltdown, but at a rock show, you’re able to get it out of your system. That’s why I write these songs, it’s the best therapy tool I have, and I love it.”
Over time, it has become evident to him that the people who love Set It Off really love it when Cody is angry. Far more souls have found solace in the anguish of this era and the devilish nature of ‘Duality’ than in the bright and breezy positivity of ‘Upside Down’, and that’s okay. Because Cody feels as though it just indicates that we are all in the same position. Sick and tired of being lied to. Fed up of reading the news and not knowing which details are true and which are trying to push us in a different direction. Had it up to here with people and situations that make this existence that little bit harder to stomach. We all need that release to take the pressure off a little bit. And even though it sometimes comes across extreme – the “And I don’t trust a single fucking one of y’all” that sits at the core of ‘Evil People’, one example of such blanket disdain – sometimes that is necessary to be able to move on.
“The more you talk about something, the more you realise how you feel about it,” he remarks. “Maybe you weren’t fully facing it before, but now you are forced to, and all of these different emotions start to come up. This is how I feel. This is what has been bothering me. How can I put that on paper and make sense of it? It’s vulnerable. It’s scary. It’s necessary and satisfying.
“I’ve had so many experiences in life that revolve around the fallout of friendships and relationships, and you want to believe that one day it is all going to resolve. But then you realise that people don’t change, and circumstances don’t change, and that’s okay. It’s okay to feel this way. What our songs can do is let people know that it’s okay for that door to be open. It’s okay to be angry about these things and to get them off your chest. It’s how we figured out how to deal with it, so you can too.”
THE TITLE & THE ARTWORK
At one point, ‘Set It Off’ was almost called ‘Six,’ with the band starting to focus on the sentimentality of what number album this is for them and considering how to craft a backstory for it. Using their name just made the most sense, though. But Set It Off is more than a name; it is an intent, and that’s what these songs are. They have made it this far with those three words as, in many ways, the only constant, and they have persevered through every up, down and side to side that has materialised before them.
“We’re not strangers to having to prove ourselves,” Cody proudly states. “That element of perseverance and the intensity of it will always and has always been there. I want to be a reminder to the people who listen to us that this is not a roadblock but a hurdle; it’s going to hurt every time, but you’re going to get through it and learn from it. Every single time, you’re going to get stronger. You’re going to get beaten up, but that’s normal. There is normality in struggle, and that you’re just going to become better for it. That’s what our band has been able to represent.”
And in umbrellaing these songs with those words, they also felt like the artwork deserved to be as meaningful. On the surface, a dark and lonely sight, it depicts a girl stuck underneath a sheet of ice. She has clearly been there a long while, watching the world walk over here, ignoring her presence. But look closer, and you will see that the ice is starting to crack. Her time to rise above is getting nearer, and those who have doubted her are going to see what she is truly capable of.
“That’s what we have been doing,” Cody adds. “And it’s been so fun putting together our current live setup, where we have been adding monologue voice-overs from this girl’s perspective. She has been trapped for so long, she has seen all these people walking over her, smiling, dancing, laughing, toasting to nothing. But tonight is the night that we break through, and we get to do it together. Through all the pain and learning from all of that, we have made it, and that really is the general theme of this album.”
THE FUTURE
When Cody looks back over the Set It Off journey, he is grateful that there has never really been a moment when it went stratospheric. That there has been a steady incline over the years, allowing them the time and space to perfect every aspect of the project, making the position that they are in now as pleasurable and poised for whatever is next as possible. Because now with these songs, they are infiltrating an entirely new audience, a new generation of eager ears looking for an escape, and he is glad that they can be fully prepared to give them what they want.
“We’re still brand new, and that’s the best thing ever,” he concludes with one more beaming smile. “From show to show, we are seeing that we have people who have been listening since day one and people who have just found us. We know what we are building, where it belongs, and why it shouldn’t be overlooked. It’s about pushing through all of the strife. If we keep doing this, we will reach the place we have always dreamed of. Taking that energy level that we are at and love in our current state and turning it up to a completely new place. It’s keeping the faith. We know it’s on the horizon and we know that it’s going to be fun chase.”
