I’m a die hard Panic! at the Disco fan, but the quality of their recent work makes it really difficult for me to confidently admit that. Brendon’s vocal technique has deteriorated severely starting with the fame he gained with his high notes in This is Gospel, so he insisted on doing wild high notes often in his singles. Performing these songs every night without any proper voice training alongside heavy substance abuse killed his voice. Urie was on Broadway for a period of time as the lead in Kinky Boots, and he’s incorporated musical theater techniques in his singing. In my opinion, this doesn’t work with the genre of music he makes. In terms of instrumentals, the quality of them has gradually deteriorated as more members left the band. The last album Panic put out before it was Urie’s solo act, Death of a Bachelor, is also the last album to have entirely good instrumentals. Although he is mildly talented in some aspects, it’s evident through the songs he’s been solely responsible for that most of the band’s appeal came from influences other than him. Panic’s newer lyrics feel shallow and empty now that Brendon is the sole songwriter as well. For the first two albums A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out and Pretty Odd, Ryan Ross, one of the band’s two founding members, wrote all the lyrics and instrumentals. Fever heavily explored Ryan’s frustrations with his dying deadbeat drug addict father, and Pretty Odd took influences from The Beatles, as well as the heavy drugs the band was currently taking. I adore Ryan’s work, and I’m similarly fond of these albums. Ross was poetic in his prose, with emotion, figurative language, and cultured references.
“The I.V. and your hospital bed
This was no accident
This was a therapeutic chain of events
This is the scent of dead skin on a linoleum floor
This is the scent of quarantine wings in a hospital
It's not so pleasant and it's not so conventional
It sure as hell ain't normal but we deal, we deal
The anesthetic never set in and I'm wondering where
The apathy and urgency is that I thought I phoned in
No it's not so pleasant and it's not so conventional
It sure as hell ain't normal but we deal, we deal”
(“Camisado”, written by Ryan Ross)
This was no accident
This was a therapeutic chain of events
This is the scent of dead skin on a linoleum floor
This is the scent of quarantine wings in a hospital
It's not so pleasant and it's not so conventional
It sure as hell ain't normal but we deal, we deal
The anesthetic never set in and I'm wondering where
The apathy and urgency is that I thought I phoned in
No it's not so pleasant and it's not so conventional
It sure as hell ain't normal but we deal, we deal”
(“Camisado”, written by Ryan Ross)
Their third, fourth, and fifth albums, (Vices and Virtues, Too Weird To Live, Too Rare To Die, and Death of a Bachelor) were coddled by Dallon Weekes (I Don’t Know How But They Found Me) and Pete Wentz (Fall Out Boy)
"I've never so adored you
I'm twisting allegories now
I want to complicate you
Don't let me do this to myself
I'm chasing roller coasters
I've got to have you closer now
Endless romantic stories
You never could control me"
(“Far Too Young To Die”, written by Brendon Urie and Dallon Weekes)
I'm twisting allegories now
I want to complicate you
Don't let me do this to myself
I'm chasing roller coasters
I've got to have you closer now
Endless romantic stories
You never could control me"
(“Far Too Young To Die”, written by Brendon Urie and Dallon Weekes)
“He was the congregation's vagrant
With an unrequited love
When your passion's exaltation
Then finding refuge is not enough
She was the youngest of the family
And the last to be let go
When they decided they would try and make it on their own”
(“Memories”, written by Brendon Urie and Pete Wentz)
With an unrequited love
When your passion's exaltation
Then finding refuge is not enough
She was the youngest of the family
And the last to be let go
When they decided they would try and make it on their own”
(“Memories”, written by Brendon Urie and Pete Wentz)
Once all of Urie’s colleagues understandably left him, he desperately tried to convince the public he was a real songwriter, similarly to a wooden Pinocchio insisting he’s a real boy. The band’s (if you can call one person a “band”) sixth album, Pray for the Wicked fell on its face, and the floor left nasty rug burns. With its leading single, “Say Amen (Saturday Night)” boasting a nearly inhuman C7 note that would be performed during every concert following its release, Urie seemed to underestimate the vocal strain this feat would eventually cause. The album itself carries themes of egotism and glorified excess alongside futile attempts to convey deep emotion, with tasteful lines such as “We were borderline kids with a book of disorders | Medicatin' every day to keep the straightness in order” (Old Fashioned) and “I'm a moon-walker, I'm like MJ up in the clouds | I know it sounds awkward | I'm filthy as charged, filthy as charged” (Dancing’s Not A Crime). Four years later, Urie announced his seventh (and thankfully final) album, Viva Las Vengence. The lyrics are hollow to the point of caving in on themselves the second you begin to listen.
“Gilly thinks that he's a DJ
Makes me want to slit my wrist
Breaking mirrors on the subway
No one dances to his hits
Glitter whippits on the freeway
Mamas and papas sh*ttng bricks, yeah
Give your boy a little leeway
No one dances to his playlist
Yeah, you gotta let him go”
(“Something About Maggie”, written by Brendon Urie)
Makes me want to slit my wrist
Breaking mirrors on the subway
No one dances to his hits
Glitter whippits on the freeway
Mamas and papas sh*ttng bricks, yeah
Give your boy a little leeway
No one dances to his playlist
Yeah, you gotta let him go”
(“Something About Maggie”, written by Brendon Urie)
Brendon’s penmanship, mixed with unnecessary runs that are seemingly done at random and a backing track made up of various instrumentals in a trench coat trying to disguise themselves as a decent song combine to make music that is doomed to fail no matter what. Even in songs where I feel that some elements are good and appealing, such as lyrics in “King of the Clouds” or instrumentals in “Roaring 20s”, something else will cancel that out and render it unbearable. Even in the example of terrible Urie lyricism I gave, “Something About Maggie”, the bridge instrumentals are absolutely stunning. It’s a shame they were wasted on such a dismal song.
Panic! At The Disco’s rapid downfall, concluding with Brendon Urie announcing their end on January 24, 2023, is an immense disappointment. What started as an alt rock cover band featuring childhood friends Ryan Ross and Jon Walker was skyrocketed to fame by Fall Out Boy bassist/lyricist Pete Wentz’s record label after he discovered the group through MySpace became a sellout solo act, consisting only of a member who only joined because Ross was unable to provide vocals during a show. The progression of their albums serves as an auditory downward slope, with the quality of their art plummeting with each new release. When I listen to Urie’s most recent songs, they leave me hoping for new releases from the members who left and brought Panic! At The Disco’s charm with them.