11/07/20
4:56 PM
Brendon Urie has become somewhat of a pop icon within the industry over the last few years, but looking back on the development of a band now labeled as “pop rock” with its frontman being the entire sum of the once baroque-emo-electro-punk band, it’s been quite a wild journey to observe their progression in the eyes of a fan as well as a critic.
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Rewinding back through Panic! at the Disco’s multi-genre discography and retracting the personal and vocal growth that Urie built up over the years alongside a few band members, (both founding and touring) it’s intriguing to retrace the path that Panic! at the Disco took. The four friends and founding members from two different high schools decided to play in a band and the result was a triple platinum album in A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out. If you were alive in the mid 2000’s, there’s a pretty decent chance that you recognized Panic! within the first three seconds of their career-making single— the sound of the ringing Pizzicato strings from the track titled “I Write Sins Not Tragedies” along with the rest of the discography containing equally perplexing titles, made up an unfamiliar combination of electronic and emo punk that was somewhat controversial to the scene.
The neo emo album is made up of what seemed like an unlikely composition at the time— you have the expected components like guitar, bass, and drums, but where the distinction begins to take place is the inclusion of baroque pianos, drum machines and synths layers on top of a more gothic tone— and in 2005’s emo scene? Are you kidding?! The slick riffs and irregular, yet foundational rhythmic make-up of the album adheres to the traditional standards of the genre while progressing over its preconceived boundaries. The band’s instrumentation and production by Matt Squire paired with a young Brendon Urie’s vocality create the sarcastically bold sound of Panic! at the Disco’s debut album. Looking at the album as a whole, A Fever You Can’t Sweat out resembles a theatric translation of a cabaret show into a dynamic thirteen track album, as if it were arranged to be a dramatic play.
In substance , the overall nature of this album reflects a lot from the literary inspiration and the surrounding aesthetic of the band’s song writers Brendon Urie and Ryan Ross. The stark Vegas burlesque and the satirical outlook on vanity and lust is magnified by their interest in the written works of Chuck Palahniuk (Invisible Monsters, Fight Club, etc.)— a writer who categorizes into transgressive fictionalism- a narrative where characters feel the desire to emancipate from social norms. Every one of the titles in A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out is derivative of Palahniuk’s writing,. “The Only Difference Between Martyrdom and Suicide Is Press Coverage” and “There’s a Good Reason These Tables Are Numbered Honey, You Just Haven’t Thought of It Yet” as track titles foreshadow the non-linear type of lyricism that seem to fit… almost too well; a lot of the writing seems obscene, obscure, and irreverent— delving into vain, sexual, and exhaustive details of written accounts that responds well into the album’s overall design. But while the lyrics and songwriting in this album are cohesive and unique, the topical focus in the words revolve around seemingly toxic material; the thematic outline and lyrical constitution might look to be inappropriate and sometimes even discomforting throughout the album behind its musicality. However, although the album is filled with innuendos and questionable jabs toward more serious subjects, the attitude that the writers have doesn’t seem pretentious or ill-natured, but is a probable banter to display their emotional and mental casualties as many of these topics seem to stem from the writers’ personal histories and solidifying them into tangible works of music make Panic!’s songwriting exhibit the external glamour in the acts of life and vilify the crude realities in a hollow ecstasy.
…15 years later and it’s been an entertaining transition to see a band that sang about breaking away from given expectations and straying from mainstream circumstances, make folk music, then alternative indie, then electronic synth pop, then jazz pop, and finally landing on being mainstream and fitting into a popular form of music. “Can't take the kid from the fight, take the fight from the kid” I guess.
Listen to the album below: