Being a part of bandom (the fandoms of alternative bands) was a huge part of my life growing up. Panic! at the Disco was my favorite band for years, and the exact moment I got into the band remains a vivid memory. It was early middle school at Erasmus, and I had hurt my ankle in gym. When I got home, I wanted nothing more than to lay down, and I put YouTube Music on autoplay and tossed my phone down. Randomly it landed on a Panic! at the Disco song, and the band quickly became an obsession for me. While I don’t keep up with the band anymore, I’m still a walking encyclopedia on all things Panic!, at least for those earlier albums.

I don’t think I’d be the person I am today without being in bandom. Bands like Panic! at the Disco, Twenty One Pilots, and My Chemical Romance helped me build so many friendships on Tumblr and Twitter, which I still value to this day. While my music taste has definitely evolved and a lot of the musicians I once loved have proven to be less than great people, a lot of the songs that helped me survive middle-school and high-school still find their way onto my current playlists. My love for these bands has been reignited with the pandemic, specifically My Chemical Romance, which reunited after their 2013 breakup just before the lockdowns.