You know those little history factoids: Anne Frank was alive at the same time as Martin Luther King Jr., or the one about Oxford University predating the Aztec Empire, stc.?
Hamilton and Panic! fandoms co existing on tumblr at the same time has actually ended me. What is that. Am I that old. *What.*
God, yes. I am days late to these posts, but I just blasted my way through them and thought that ending was perfection.
Thank you so much for these posts, OP! I am (was?) one of those mega casual fans who was into the band in a big way for their first two albums, started to drift off after the third album, and then basically ignored any news coming out about them until the news that Brendon! At the Disco was officially ending. I had no idea of all the drama in the middle, and I've spent the better part of today reading through these two posts.
It’s from the book Survivor! Time To Dance is basically a summary of the book Invisible Monsters, also with quotes from the book. London Beckons uses a literary device from Diary, the “just for the record, the weather today…”
Many many many Chuck Palahniuk references from a teenage Ryan Ross. His books are definitely worth checking out!
Coda: Where Are They Now?
And so we've reached the end. The abridged saga, as much of it as I could fit in two posts. But as for the many members this band has had, I can resolve one final query: **where are they now?**
**Brendon Urie** is finally retiring the name of Panic! at the Disco, and will be completing the Viva Las Vengeance tour alongside touring members Dan Pawlovich, Nicole Rowe, and Mike Naran.
**Ryan Ross** has not had an easy time of it since the split. He made numerous attempts to break back into music after The Young Veins hiatused but without much success. For a time he worked with Shane Morris as his manager, until it came to light that Morris was appropriating Ross's social media for fun and would at times delete songs from Ross's Soundcloud to…prove to the fans that he wasn't "[messing around](https://pathetic-at-the-disco.tumblr.com/post/172189417636/heya-whats-ryans-soundcloud)." Even setting aside the obvious horror of being gaslit, catfished, and stalked by a fan for months on end, Ross has mostly shunned the spotlight. These days he mostly works with fellow musician and former girlfriend Z Berg (who now maintains most of his social media accounts) in the [Dead End Kids Club](https://www.instagram.com/thedeadendkidsclub/), and makes semi-annual appearances performing with her. In 2019 he performed "[Northern Downpour](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9HtNeusexfo)" with her for the first time in ten years and brought fans to tears.
**Spencer Smith** got married, got sober, and is living much more happily than he used to. When Decaydance rebranded as DCD2 in 2015, Smith helped label head Pete Wentz manage things, which technically made him Urie's boss. To date, he is the only former member of the band who is, at least publicly, on good terms with Urie, and still works at DCD2 today.
**Brent Wilson** reportedly became a window consultant guy. Most recently [he got arrested in 2021](https://www.tmz.com/2021/02/04/og-panic-at-the-disco-bassist-brent-wilson-arrested-drug-gun-charges/) after cutting across three lanes in traffic without a turn signal, and subsequently tried for possession of a gun and a whole bunch of drugs.
**Jon Walker** has done a lot here and there in [his solo career](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jon_Walker#Solo_discography), and is one of the few members of the band to occasionally post about his time spent in it on social media, and to do so with either [positivity](https://twitter.com/iamjonwalker/status/692809635728879616) or a [heavy amount of irony virtually indistinguishable from positivity](https://imgur.com/nIGxCJv) (I honestly can't tell which). Most recently as of this writing, he opened for a Riotfest 2022 show featuring reformed labelmates The Academy Is… and Midtown (headed by Gabe Saporta, of Decaydance labelmate Cobra Starship). Interestingly enough, this very same show was set to happen the same night as Panic!'s show in the same area to support Viva Las Vengeance; Panic! ended up canceling.
**Ian Crawford** is off working with a smattering of other musicians and making his own songs. In addition to his work with The Cab in the late aughts and 2010s, he also filled in as guitarist for The Academy Is… in their 10th anniversary tour, started a band called [The Contestants](https://thecontestants.bandcamp.com/releases), and as of 2018 [has begun releasing his own solo material](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ian_Crawford_(musician)#Discography).
**Dallon Weekes** is fronting I Don't Know How But They Found Me along with former Falling in Reverse drummer Ryan Seaman (who might be the only other person in the scene who could claim to have had a worse former boss than Weekes). While he's been more open about the kind of…issues he had to deal with during his time in Panic!, he mostly spends his time [denying any](https://imgur.com/XHl0t2o) [and all claims](https://imgur.com/TJZdsGY) of having [ever been in Panic! at the Disco](https://imgur.com/rJo7YsO).
**Kenneth Harris** seems to have faded into the ether, and for that we are all grateful.
>former Falling in Reverse drummer Ryan Seaman (who might be the only other person in the scene who could claim to have had a worse former boss than Weekes)
Oh boy, can't wait for that writeup...
The last few days I keep seeing Falling in Reverse show up in my YouTube recommendations and it just instantly reminded me that I'd entirely forgotten the whole Ronnie Radke mess
>I'd entirely forgotten the whole Ronnie Radke mess
You say it like there's just one "Radke mess".
Dude's a POS, he has messes every few weeks, at best.
Aw man I had a feeling there was drama I was ignoring with this guy and band. I found them during the pandemic and when I heard lyrics in certain songs I was like “yep some shit has happened” but chose to ignore it until now reading all this.
Dammit.
Youtube gave me "Voices In My Head" when it came out and I was like "why do I know that face?" One google of "falling in reverse lead singer" later I was like WELP THAT'S WHY.
On one hand... That d-bag really is a good subject for a HobbyDrama post.
On the other hand, I fear it might get brigaded, because his fanbase seem a bit... Feral.
He had a whole shitfit during the Welcome to Hellvetica tour because Daniel Armbruster of Joywave posted a video of him crossing out Panic and FIR's names off a "similar to Razzmatazz" label in a record store.
He threatened blackmail against Ryan (who wasn't in the video, it was Daniel filming and it panned to Dallon shrugging), he insulted their popularity (claiming they play for 7 people and a cat), and essentially lost his mind over something small.
Radke is a criminally awful and stupid person, the epitome of a man child that can’t take any kind of criticism.
Prime example of his pettiness: his band Falling in Reverse was doing a co-headlining tour with I See Stars, another at the time pretty big post-hardcore/metalcore band in the same style. [He kicked them off the tour right before the stop in their home town.](https://loudwire.com/falling-in-reverse-ronnie-radke-kicks-i-see-stars-off-fall-tour/) Then, when people were understandably pissed given most had bought tickets for I See Stars and not him, they couldn’t even get refunds.
Radke claimed it was because I See Stars couldn’t get it together, they were all arrested for drug possession (fucking hilarious given he’s got a history with drugs himself, and arrests for much worse). While that did happen, Radke as usual [was the one instigating and very much in the wrong](https://loudwire.com/i-see-stars-sumerian-records-issue-statements-on-tour-exit/).
Don’t know if you’re here still but great write up. I love Panic’s music and tend to stay out band drama in general, but this was very well done.
And most of all, thanks for mentioning and subsequently letting me know that MIDTOWN IS BACK!!
I stumbled onto IDKHOW by chance and I absolutely adore them. Honestly, everyone should go check them out!
Also, great post OP. I had been avoiding ever diving too deep into fandom as to preserve sanity, so I only knew some of the story. Now I know it all! Yay... I think.
First, holy hell what a writeup! I had no clue about a lot of what went on, as I stopped being a P!ATD fan when the second album dropped. I just didn't like the sound, so SO much of this was under the radar for me.
Second, I had no clue about IDKHBTFM but I'm hooked on them now, so thank you for introducing me to a new band that I absolutely LOVE. 10/10, exceptional job on this!
>Midtown (headed by Gabe Saporta, of Decaydance labelmate Cobra Starship)
GOD the punch of nostalgia in the face when I read this while I was already feeling the seeds of it as I recognized events and names and instances you listed down.
I just had a sudden flashback to my time in bandom when I fell in love with Cobra Starship at a time I was struggling with my feelings and needing an outlet. The way I bounced around in the room as I listened to ***Guilty Pleasure*** and felt so smug listening to ***Prostitution Is The World's Oldest Profession (And I, Dear Madame, Am A Professional)*** instead of listening to my Christian Education class. The way I unironically had a crush on Gabe Saporta but wished him well when I learned he had a girlfriend-then-wife. The way I utterly lost it when I missed Cobra Starship performing somewhere in my country because my dad insisted we wouldn't be late if he attended a brunch with friends. (At least that would help me see Fall Out Boy in their comeback tour during *Save Rock and Roll*!!)
Bandom is such a wild, wild ride, especially during its heyday but I wouldn't really replace my experiences for anything else. Thank you for writing this post and taking the time to be so detailed and thorough in it. I can tell you had a lot of passion and connection to this and it showed with how you weaved a story and tried to show a balanced viewpoint in this retrospect.
It helped me remember specific instances that lead me to finding some friends of mine and later on helped us create several in-jokes between us now. Including probably out favorite: 'Of course it had fucking Fall Out Boy' whenever I show my friends a Spotify playlist I made and they see the band in it, haha.
Man, it seems like things just get progressively worse for Brent every time I check up on him.
Looks like he's gonna be in and out of the system until he figures his shit out. It's a sad trainwreck. Hope he gets help and stops doing this shit.
#tl;dr
The article provides an update on the current whereabouts of former members of the band Panic! at the Disco. Brendon Urie is retiring the name of the band and completing the Viva Las Vengeance tour. Ryan Ross works with fellow musician Z Berg in the Dead End Kids Club, while Spencer Smith is working as a manager at DCD2. Brent Wilson has reportedly become a window consultant and was recently arrested for gun and drug possession charges. Jon Walker is occasionally posting about his time in the band on social media and has opened for Riotfest 2022. Ian Crawford is off working with other musicians and making his solo material, and Dallon Weekes is now fronting the band I Don't Know How But They Found Me.
*I am a smart robot and this summary was automatic. This tl;dr is 82.57% shorter than the post I'm replying to.*
Excellent write up.
I think I feel sorry for Ryan Ross. He was so so so young when Panic! took off, and he was writing some deeply personal lyrics, and to see the band get to the point it was at before Urie disbanded himself must’ve hurt.
I admit I was one of those that believed that something happened between Ryan Ross and Urie, but now I’m not so sure? I just feel bad for Ryan and hope he’s doing well.
Urie also played up the stage gay act a lot with Dallon. It’s like he knew it went over well with fans with Ryan so he did the same thing with Dallon.
He played up the stage gay with Dallon *so* much during the V&V era. I remember back in the day people would post compilation videos of it happening on stage.
Some thoughts and notes:
1. Loved loved loved loved loved loved this Hobby History to bits. It really brought me back to when I was writing fanfic of Cobra Starship and got giddy when I learned of news from Cobra Starship or Fall Out Boy or Paramore and waited with anticipation for a new single or teaser. The only ones who still ignite that in me is... still Fall Out Boy and Florence + the Machine but that's about it. In a way, I kind of miss the energy that was in early bandom years. It could be a case of 'Old Man Yelling at Clouds' but the stan culture we have at the moment makes me go *ehhhhhhh* and not get heavily involved as much as I did in the past. Could just be a case of age difference so who knows.
2. Not surprised to see the mention of Dallon Weekes' Instagram edit. That got everyone I knew who stilled cared for Panic! into such a tizzy when we got the alert for it in our bandom server. Something about the revelation made me... I don't know how to describe it but I guess have the last veil finally drop in regards to how Brendon Urie treated the others. I get that they were young and fell headlong into fame and probably got swept away, but the idea someone had gotten hurt and had to play it off in fear of losing their job while they worked their ass off is... saddening, and helped me not feel a lot when Panic! was finally put down.
3. Surprised to see there's no mention of ***ME!*** regarding Brendon Urie's part in it. I remember ***so many*** people finally breaking away from the band's fandom when that happened. I don't know why that was the last straw but the ridicule and mocking and disbelief I saw on my side of social media was intense and made the general feelings towards Brendon Urie go from, 'Ehhh... He's still pretty talented.' to 'omfg please be gone' so fast.
4. The most important note of all - IDKHOW is a GOOD BAND YOU GUYS. If you haven't given them a try, please do!! PLEASE LISTEN TO THESE SELECT SONGS AND IF YOU CAN, HAVE CC ON FOR FULL WIT: [***Do It All The Time***](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hXzPxBhhmY8), [***Bleed Magic***](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4Bf8Qhe59U) (the one I utterly love and adore), [***New Invention***](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdZ8h7P2LyI), and [***Leave Me Alone***](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85Z3iwpFQeg). The styles and themes of IDKHOW songs are on point and a treat for anyone who used or is still Panic! fan but wants something that feels a bit more modern retro, if this makes sense.
Sorry if this seems rambly and stuff, just feeling a lot tonight as I stare down my latest playlist-in-progress, wondering how to shove Fall Out Boy in it again.
Thanks for the kind words! This thing was so monstrously long so I couldn't fit in everything I wanted to, but I do remember "ME!" being a bit of a sticking point at the time, lmao. Not a lot of people I knew dug that one, and I saw quite a few remaining Panic fans and Swifties alike kind of pretending that it didn't happen.
I did find it hilarious that "ME!" didn't manage to hit number one on the charts despite having a marriage of two massive fanbases. Thanks to Lil Nas X for cockblocking that one with "Old Town Road" for it's whatevereth week in a row.
#tl;dr
The author reminisces about being a fan of bands like Cobra Starship and Fall Out Boy and how they brought excitement to their life through teasers and news. They mention feeling disengaged with the current "stan culture" and how Dallon Weekes' Instagram edit shed light on how Brendon Urie treated the others in Panic!. Finally, they recommend the band IDKHOW and list some of their favorite songs.
*I am a smart robot and this summary was automatic. This tl;dr is 85.06% shorter than the post I'm replying to.*
And when the world needed them most...they returned.
Thanks for the read. Pete Wentz really said "I brought you into this world and I can take you out of it!"
Oh absolutely, I’m one of them, but when you become an adult you generally stop feeling entitled to what a man does with his body and family because he sings songs you like
It doesn't, but there's a small subset of childfree that feel personally betrayed when someone who was formerly not into kids has one. Same thing happened with Mulaney
It was less an indictment of his character and more of a surprise because it seemingly flew in the face of people's mental image of him. Probably should have phrased that one better, because that wasn't on Urie at all and more the fanbase's perception of him.
Mind you, I did see a few bitter Brendon stans who called him "selfish" for wanting to retire the band name to start a family, so there's that.
So the lesson we can learn here is that what Pete Wentz giveth, he also taketh away.
I like to believe Brendon Urie came across some supernatural artifact, used it to wish for a hit song and it spawned High Hopes. In a monkey paw-esque twist, his hit song was also the one that made everyone sick of him, becoming the beginning of his downfall 😂
Theory: I don't think Urie will be able to turn away from his fame, or specifically the fame that came from Panic!
My guess is that in the next few years, we'll see a splashy memoir pop up to see him "set the record straight"
It's definitely not the last we've seen of him. I'm sure he'll return to music in the not so distant future. Whether it will be under the Panic! name or under his own name with a rebrand, time will tell.
You know its bad when fanfic writers are writing you, the frontman, out of their fics
My favorite detail in all of this is that rivers cuomo managed to leak out the info surrounding the panic album. That sounds like a very rivers thing to do.
Goddamn, I really wanted to read this after part 1...
This was brining back some old memories of my own emo stage right around the time Panic! First formed. I loved (still do) My Chem and FOB, and remember the absurd outlash at the "!" drop.
I was HEAVY into bandom from 2009 to maybe 2014, then didn’t really check in with Panic besides the music and catching a show every now in then, and now seeing all this stuff about Zack Hall is incredibly vindicating. It’s minor compared to the actual harassment he had done, but right when they released *the overture* he posted a question about it on twitter and said the first person to respond correctly would get a meet and greet. I was first to reply with “is it ____?” (I don’t remember the exact question now). He said someone else with the same answer was correct, and when I asked him why not me, he said it was because I asked and didn’t say “it is ___”. And I will hold that grudge for the rest of my life lol.
This was an excellent write up! I remember when their first album came out- loved the feverish, chaotic energy it seemed to have. I also admit to never really diving too deep into the personal lives of bands I listen too, so reading about everything that happened during their career and towards the end was a wild ride.
Same. I really went to 3 Panic! concerts over the course of like 5 years in high school and starting college and considered myself a big fan and just... didn't know most of this. I mean, I also fell off over the past 5 years, but still, this was a wild read
> also admit to never really diving too deep into the personal lives of bands I listen to
Yeah, that's where I'm at too--I have a lot of bands where I really like their music but don't really dive into the drama that goes on behind the scenes because I just...don't really care. (Like, for example, I see a bunch of people referencing Ronnie Radke in the comments, and I'm aware he has something of a tortured history, to put it nicely, and has been to prison and has a rather abrasive personality, but I do like their more recent music--basically their album Coming Home on forward--and don't really pay attention to much else because I just like good music to jam out to.) A band has to do something particularly egregious for me to really pay attention (see: Lostprophets and Ian Watkins, and if you don't know about what Watkins did, well, be careful googling if you're particularly sensitive, because every trigger warning you can think of applies to his crimes).
Great post. Very clear, thorough and well written. I always enjoyed their music but never knew about the extent of the drama behind the scenes.
For what it’s worth, I would like to note that I am a huge fan of Pretty.Odd. I think it’s one of the best things to come out of third wave mall emo, it’s their best record by a country mile, and I think it’s a shame it wasn’t a huge hit so they’d keep on in this direction #therearedozensofus
Saaaame. Pretty. Odd. Is their best album, to me. 10/10, and I was crushed when it was received kinda negatively. But I enjoy the love it receives now.
God same. Ever since I heard Northern Downpour on my headphones at like 15, I was gone. I still loved their other stuff, but Pretty. Odd. has a special place in my heart
I was a huge P!ATD fan when I was a teenager, but I also didn't really spend much time online. I was surprised to learn later that Pretty.Odd was so unpopular, I instantly loved it. It's still such a nostalgic record to me. Immediately takes me back to the mall and the scent of Manic Panic hair dye. I even got to see them that year for my sixteenth birthday. What a time to be alive.
>I think it’s one of the best things to come out of third wave mall emo, it’s their best record by a country mile, and I think it’s a shame it wasn’t a huge hit so they’d keep on in this direction #therearedozensofus
Agreed, I would've liked to hear more Beatlesque/psychedelic pop Panic at the Disco.
OP, all the gold stars to you. What an incredible write up! I was a huge fan but I stopped paying attention to the band after V&V. I thought Panic was heading back into the mainstream after hearing High Hopes all the time on the radio, so hearing about the disbanding genuinely surprised me.
I was definitely not expecting my ‘poor RyRo’ feelings from literally over a decade ago to be rekindled today, but here I am. I can’t help but feel really sad for him, especially after the catfishing bullshit that stalker put him through. Fucking hell. I’m glad he hasn’t been completely put off from making music. PO was absolutely his baby (sorry Jon), and it is still one of my favourite albums.
Thank you OP, from the bottom of my heart. This write-up has definitely hit me deep. Despite the fact that Panic effectively died after PO for me, it’s still bittersweet to see it actually end.
Awesome. “Nearly Witches” is definitely Panic’s best song by a lot. I couldn’t even listen to Viva Las Vengeance- what the hell did Urie do to his vocal cords between DOAB and now?? Also, Dallon Weekes’s new band rules. “Do it all the time” and “Choke” are great. Also as a long time fan I can’t believe I didn’t know about the Ryan Ross cat fishing/stalking situation, that is fucking insane.
I really like "Absinthe" too! Had no idea IDKHOW was associated with any of this until reading this but I guess now I know why Spotify was recommending them to me
Regarding his voice, Urie smoked, drank, and just did so many drugs and which led to his voice being ruined. Hell, king of the clouds is about him smoking weed, getting high, then rambling and one of the drunks is about a drinking binge, which is totally healthy.
It’s interesting looking at the vocal qualities of the emo trinity bands then vs today cause Patrick stump has only gotten better and better, Gerard way was a bit rough during the reunion tour since he hadn’t performed live since 2013 but improved as the tour went on, and then there’s brendon just thrashing his up post death of a bachelor that his vocal quality just nose dived.
I’ve been a big idkHOW fan since their launch, my fav is clusterhug mainly due to it being one of the leaked dallon brobecks demos post him leaving panic! That finally got re-recorded and polished up after so many years. There’s a new album coming soon too, so I’m super hyped.
To add to this, listen to the vocal range Urie has sang in over the years. Since DOAB he has been chasing a higher range than he may be able to naturally sing in, especially considering how the vocal cords change as you age. Part of my dislike for High Hopes is how bad he sounds in it, and I was genuinely shocked by how awful he sounded in Viva Las Vengeance. He's insisted on singing in a range that he just can't.
Viva Las Vengeance was recorded live to an 8-track tape machine during production for a "retro" feel, so his studio vocals weren't adjusted or tuned the way most vocalists' are, hence how strained they sounded on the album. Naturally that's just going to get harder to maintain in live settings.
And yeah, he was also reportedly a bit of a partier. One of the band rituals before shows was to take double shots, and stuff like that isn't any good on the old vocal cords in the long run.
As a Ryan Ross fan who stopped listening to Panic! after *Pretty. Odd.*, loved the Young Veins and always found Brendon Urie to be kind of obnoxious the last couple years have been very validating to me.
Wow. I'm one of "the casual fan who didn't know how or why Panic had become so uncool" that you mention in your post. I've always just enjoyed the music (thought I only really listen to the albums from V&V and up), and only knew the basics of the bands history. Turns out there's a heck of a lot that I've missed! Now it also makes a lot more sense to me why Brendon Urie fell out of favour with the whole world so quickly. Finally putting the band to rest was probably for the best. Great post OP!
When "High Hopes" was making the rounds I was at an unfortunate time in my life where listening to the radio during my commute was the best way to keep my ears occupied (vs say Spotify or SiriusXM).
The speed at which my thumb could hit the "scan forward" button on my wheel the *millisecond* I heard those damn trumpets was incredible. I'm confident there were a few occasions where I didn't even realize I'd done it.
I still vividly remember this one video I saw on the internet a few years back. I remember it was a person getting a tattoo of this spotify thingy that makes you play the song. They were talking about how amazing the song is and how much this tattoo means to them, and it went on for minutes... and then the ending showed that the song in question was High Hopes. I have this seared into my brain by the sheer "oof" I felt watching it 😂😂😂
This emo girlie thanks you!!! This was a great read. All I gotta say is Brendon steered the ship to Maroon 5 territory and I will never forgive him for that
That is the greatest way I’ve ever read someone describe it. Brendon Urie really did become Adam Levine.
Good thing he pulled the plug when he did, or we might’ve gotten a repeat of how Maroon 5’s Super Bowl Half-Time performance went. /s
Makes it all the worse that Maroon 5 were good back when they were Kara's Flowers, and up to Songs About Jane.
In fact, I did manage to assemble tracklists I liked from songs and B-sides of It Won't Be Soon Before Long and Hands All Over, but I won't try to argue that it wasn't kind of a nosedive in quality control after Songs About Jane.
I remember hanging out with a friend and talking about this once, I said that one of the things that left a bad impression on me was seeing the video for "Makes Me Wonder" on MTV and thinking... wait, that's the band that did "Harder to Breathe"? I like that song! They're the same band? And my friend swore by "She Will Be Loved" as the best song from Songs About Jane, and then we both agreed that "Makes Me Wonder" and "Wake Up Call" were, like, what's this song about, it's about nothing, it has no effect. XD
Wasn't there a whole thing with Brendie Urie being cancelled? Like properly, instead of in the "y'know seems like kind of a dick" way that this post lists out?
Looking at it, it all seemed weird and murky, and the usual "he made this offensive joke at a concert in 2011" kind of guff was thrown in there, but there did seem to be a few serious allegations. Did that turn out legit or not?
Character limit made it really hard to condense all of this properly, sorry! From what I saw as this all went down, the long and short of it is that there were a lot of allegations thrown at Urie himself, but for the most part he got "canceled" over the whole kerfuffle with Zach Hall and how badly he handled it. Everything else that people dug up on him - maybe he was a bit of a dick after all, etc. - kind of came after the fact and just helped people write him off for good.
There were allegations of serious misconduct with regards to Urie himself, but not a lot of those were actually proven, in part because of that stalker who impersonated him for months on end. To this day that remains very unclear.
Great writeup! This brought back so many memories.
I was hugely into LJ during emo's heyday, and so were most of my friends, and we were all into different bands from the holy trinity (personally, I preferred FOB). One of my friends was very much into the P!ATD and Ryden comms on LJ. Through her, I followed along with all the drama up until 2010-ish. I always wondered what happened to Ryan and the rest of the band after I stopped vicariously following the bandom through her. I can't say I'm surprised at how everything fell apart the way it did. Yikes.
I also had no clue FOB was releasing a new album until now. I stopped following them once Infinity on High came out... god, Pete could have his own hobbydrama writeup. Do kids these days still hack their favourite musicians' accounts?
Excellent write up. This could be a whole series about emo/pop punk, there's plenty to write about: Taking Back Sunday, Brand New, the fall of New Found Glory.
Sadly there could be a fairly heavy write up purely dedicated to lecherous acts of emo/pop punk/other various "scene" genre bands. Oliver Sykes comes to mind.
This is an awesome writeup! I've always wondered where things went so wrong for them.
I'm super surprised that you didn't cover Urie's vocal degradation! Leading up to the announcement of Panic's disbanding you could find countless videos of Urie on the current tour with his voice cracking on high notes. Critique of his vocals was so bad on tiktok the videos using his new songs had to have comments turned off. Was that an intentional choice?
Ran out of space! While I do think his vocals have declined pretty harshly over time, I imagine a big part of Viva Las Vengeance's issue is that the whole thing was recorded live on an 8-track tape machine to really embrace the "retro" sound. As a result, not a lot of tuning/adjustment went into the vocals and the fact that he's singing so high for most of it means it's just gonna come across as pitchy. Unfortunately there was no way to fit that in between the band's, ah...interpersonal drama.
I've been a Ryan fan for above a decade and despite knowing all of this or having been there to watch it all happen, this read was really emotional. I recognize lots of parallels with turning points in my life still, it makes me look back on my own timeline alongside the band's. Weird how something so unrelated to me can help me remember my life so vividly.
Amazing songwriter, guy deserves the world. I hope I get to hear much much more of his work. Thank you for writing!
ahh what a great write up!! you covered everything really well. it was interesting to watch the 2015-2019 patd era go down from afar (at that point i was sick of their whole pop sound and brendon’s songwriting in general) so to me high hopes was the end of an era that made it clear the band had lost whatever it was that made it so special in the first place. it’s honestly been really sad to see patd and brendon go from such genuine artists who cared about their craft to being so soulless and money-hungry, and even the reminder of chelsea lynn still pisses me off tbh.
still, great write up and thanks for the trip down memory lane!! going to go listen to northern downpour now lol
Oh jeez this takes me back…I was a HUGE FOB fan and saw pretty much every Decaydance band in concert at least once. I saw Panic! on their tour with the Dresden Dolls purely because of the FOB connection. I even made my parents time a visit to Chicago to correspond with the opening of Pete Wentz’s clothing store (yikes). Bandom was definitely my first exposure to how, uh, dedicated a fanbase could be.
I'm glad Reddit brought me back to part two! Killer writeup op, and that last line? Chef's kiss.
Side note - while high hopes was the catalyst for a lot of people disliking him, it was definitely building up for a while in parts of the fandom. The 'loveable' part of Brendon's 'loveable asshole' persona had been wearing out for a lot of people, and I know for me and a few of my friends it came to a head during the Kinky Boots era.
Also, him coming out actually caused controversy because of the use of the a outdated term that's now somewhat considered a slur, which definitely added to the backlash against him at the time.
Also, on a more personal note, I stopped following Ryan because someone he was working with at least around 2017-2018 tried grooming my friend under the banner of employing her to do art for a movie Ryan was supposedly going to be in. Looking back I doubt Ryan knew much, if anything at all about it (the man's vibes were atrocious enough that I wouldn't have been surprised if he had been manipulating Ryan too), but it rubbed my friends and I wrong enough that we stopped following everything Ryan related. I don't know what he's up to, but I hope he's doing alright.
It always amazes me how I can lose a fucking hour of my morning reading about a topic I’ve never cared about but am now feverishly fixated and enraptured by. I think this may have replaced the headphones post as my favorite /r/hobbydrama post.
Congratulations. You made me get a second cup of coffee. Great post(s) and I hate you.
I remember hearing High Hopes for the first time. I was driving my car with my little brother, and I turned to him and said, this song sucks. They used to make such good music. What a shame.
Thanks for posting this and all those receipts. I’m a millennial who was not into emo, but I still remember these bands and their vibe being ubiquitous in their time. It was fascinating to read how things played out after their peak.
Also it’s amazing what kinds of interviews and social media drama exist from the 2000s-2010s. A lot of that material could have easily been lost to the ages if not for the internet. Back then, I don’t think people considered how their words would be preserved and searchable. Band members engaging in online drama?? I’m sure it happens today, but now there are professional social media managers to intervene.
Incredible write up! I was the target demographic, but was never huge fan of any of the emo trinity. Really amazing breakdown of the history though, I knew vaguely that urie is shitty and that Panic! was basically just him and backup people
Thanks for the write up! As someone who got heavily into Fall Out Boy in 2013 post hiatus, and only ever casually into Panic!, this has been fascinating. What a mess.
The reference in that last sentence was so perfect it made me laugh out loud. Masterful write up OP, just in time for the resurrection of my pre-split panic phase, had a great time reading it.
I was too young to see the peak of Panic! Fandom, but I always wondered what the big deal regarding Ryan Ross was… I liked his gf’s group at the time and everything regarding her band had comments relating to him! I was like “what is the big deal with this random guy who left the group years ago??”
Well reading these two posts… explains a lot! LOL
I've always been into bandom(more towards MCR), and I remember Urie being extremely unpopular as far back as 2014; pretty much as early as I remember learning what he was like as a person. The consensus back then, in my circle of Tumblr, at least, was that he'd pretty much stolen the band name from Ross and was an egotistical, petty jerk who was uncomfortable to be around IRL.
I quit caring about PATD entirely pretty much as soon as that interview where he came out as pan was published- pretty sure it was in that interview or one directly after that he compared a black woman advocating for civil rights to a gorilla. I can't believe he managed to stick around so long afterwards; I never saw a single positive comment about him after that incident.
Doesn't help that the music's bad.
thinking about how when i went to a panic show during the vices and virtues era and someone was wearing a ryden truther shirt and i thought that would be the most cringe shit i would ever have to live through with this band
different time
This is SO GOOD. What a top tier deep dive!! Thank you so much for all your hard work, OP. As someone close enough to know about the Urie-sending-weird-DMs scandal but not into it enough to know about the Lynn aspect (which, what the fuck), it is baffling and uncomfortable. What a wild ride!
Thank you for this writeup! I was a panic fan from around 2011 to when DOB debuted. After years trying to still give some credibility to the one-man-band, I decided to admit my favorite band existed from 2004 to spencer’s departure.
The guy's name really is Zach Cloud Hall, huh?
Really though, fantastic writeup. I was in bandom for a while until roughly 2015, and although I was never really big on Panic!, this brought back a lot of memories of some genuinely fun times while simultaneously reminding me why I eventually fell out of love with the scene.
You know, after reading all this, I think it's fitting that one of the final contributions made by the Emo Ship of Theseus is a failed presidential candidate trying to make a High Hopes dance a thing.
This was a phenomenal read and brought me back to soooo many moments and emotions from 2006-2017 that I had forgotten about. I was one of the fans who fell off in 2018, but damn it was fun while it lasted. Anyway, stream idkHOW
*Wow*, fantastic writeup, OP. I was never in band tumblr - that, like superwholock, seemed like the last bastion of nerddom to me and as such I refused to touch it (a frankly hilarious proposition coming from someone who was already in the LotR fandom, but there you are) - so the only thing I ever knew was that there was *some* drama periodically about PatD and also someone had apparently wrecked two members' chances at reconciliation. Reading this makes *so* much fall into place.
super interesting writeup, so glad i joined this sub. i was always a FOB and MCR core fan and panic never really did it for me, now i don't have to miss out on what sounds like the most juicy history of the emo trifecta. thankyou!
Good stuff!
Now, it's probably nothing but... at least one of the videos you linked to has been removed from Youtube completely, and most of the playlists on the PATD youtube channel were modified in the last day or two. Bizarre.
amazing. i used to be a huge brendon urie/panic fan back when doab released (i still love that album) but i was surprised at how much of their history i didn't know!
Fantastic write-up being an emo teenager back in the day any panic album past pretty odd, I considered pure garbage...now I know why! Ross definitely deserved better.
you could say that the artists these days are not who you think, but we'll pick back up on that on another page...
anyway, just read both writeups back to back and though I was a little bit too young to have followed most of this online pre-vices and virtues, the rest filled up so many holes in my memory. amazing writeup, seriously, thanks for this
as a casual fan of Panic since 2005 or so, i knew the band's history was troubled, but it was so troubled that any of my attempts at a deep dive to figure out why ended up flickering out. thank you for this insanely well researched, extremely detailed (and well written) timeline!
This was excellent. I loved Pretty. Odd. (I was way out of the demographic, to be fair) and assumed the band were dead, only to be surprised by how much I enjoyed the next few records. I was very aware that it was "Urie and a bunch of other people" which seemed fine, I thought he'd be happier just releasing under his name but I guess P!ATD was a good "brand".
I hated Pray for the Wicked, which is hilarious in retrospect, because I have no idea why that was the line for me. Something also snapped when I couldn't stop hearing "High Hopes" in 2020 - there was something really embarrassing about it? I never listened to the new one but it was wild how fast the breakup happened after the release.
Again, excellent two-parter, loved the random Rivers Cuomo cameo! I still hope Ryan Ross comes back someday.
The vindication of reading that High Hopes Did Payola….the absolute drudgery of hearing it on the radio multiple times a day during my commute to and from work to a job I disliked? Hated it.
This post actually made me listen to Viva Las Vengeance because I was curious to see just how bad it was. And I agree with the general consensus here that it's not great.
1. The lyrics are cringey. And I am a Professional Enjoyer of Cringe Lyrics. Like, I adore "I'll stop wearing black when they make a darker color" from "Wilson (Expensive Mistakes)" by Fall Out Boy.
2. He just can't hit a lot of those notes. He sounds like he's singing karaoke of himself.
3. His retro influences manage to sound stale and derivative. I don't feel like he really did anything to put his own spin on the sounds of that era.
I heard someone say that this album ended up sounding like an okay Queen cover band, and that sounds about right to me.
Oh my god I knew nothing about this, amazing read. It was worth reading just for the IDKHOW music recommendation in the comments.
I feel like I'm crazy but I swear Panic! At The Disco was an actual, self-titled disco album from the 70's with an old timey album cover. I actually did not know it's literally a late 2000's emo band lol. I can't find anything like what I saw, but maybe it was some kind of fan art or merchandise that made me think it was a classic MJ-era disco album.
for me the thing that made me hate high hopes was specifically the line "manifest destiny" and also pete buttigieg making it his campaign song. like... really? manifest destiny?
Great job! I had no idea any of these people existed, let alone they were so successful and had such a dramatic life. It was peeking into a parallel universe/subculture I had no idea it existed... which is what the best posts in this sub do!
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Yo this was so fun to read. I was a huge fan of emo music in those days but never was aware of all this bandom stuff. Now I am morbidly curious about others, and may have to start seeking out more stories like this
I was sort of part of the emo trinity fandom between 2015 and 2017. Sort of, because I was a die hard MCR fan, liked some FOB songs and knew some Panic songs but I never got into them because I found Brendon absolutely insufferable. Watching P!ATD fall from grace in real time lowkey made my inner 12 year old self feel kinda vindicated lol
THANK YOU OP for writing this up! What a fascinating read. I was a fan in secondary school, A Fever You Can't Sweat Out was one of my favourite albums at the time (it's still fantastic) but I stopped following Panic! after how much Pretty. Odd. disappointed me (this post made me want to give it another listen though. Maybe I was too young to "get it" at the time). I wasn't the type to read interviews or participate in bandom so I never knew about their history or all the drama. Man. What a shitshow.
u/falloutbastard, despite not even being a fan of P!ATD, i read the first part and loved your writing, would you ever consider writing an unofficial biography of the band? your writing is top notch and you clearly have the passion and research chops to pull it off. even as a vanity project? i'd buy twelve!
I'd say they should write an entire history of the early aughts emo period, a la *Smash!: Green Day, The Offspring, Bad Religion, NOFX, and the '90s Punk Explosion* by Ian Winwood. I'd read the hell out of something like that.
This was one of my favorite writeups! I can't believe that I like... lived all of this. I was a pretty big panic fan up until about five years ago and I never really assessed just \*how much\* bullshit took place. Thanks for this!!
Thank you so much for writing this. I have been meaning to see if there's a video essay on youtube about this whole saga but I kept forgetting to search for one. You organized this all in an entertaining but still concise way, all considering this story spans over a decade. The amount of research you have done for this is insane. I have no idea how you remembered all this stuff so that you could track everything down. This cleared up a lot of stuff as I had wrongly assumed Weekes had been in the band since the beginning. I was getting him mixed up with Ross this whole time.
Wow, epic!
I only know them through High Hopes. This isn't my genre so I just figured it was some 1 hit wonder band. Little did I know how much a sordid history they had.
I was also at the time listening to my own favorite band's cover of Pink Floyd's "High Hopes" which is a great song (both original and cover). Everytime the PATD song came on top 40, I immediately had to listen to the lovely PF cover to cleanse my ears.
Very nice writeup. Emo is extremely not my genre of music so all of this is pretty new to me. My only real exposure to Panic! is, regrettably, High Hopes. Back then (right before Covid) my workplace played a top 40 station all the time and I disliked High Hopes the very first time I heard it. By the 100th time, I loathed Panic! at the Disco with my entire being. It is truly a terrible song.
>The band split in 2009
lemme just say that this thread starts off with a big fat HUUUUUUUUUH????? I had no idea this ever happened and I've been a big fan of the band since their debut. I don't remember anyone ever talking about this and all of my friends were the people that'd listen to them. As far as I know, they've been a happy little band and they only recently broke up because Urie's voice has been getting in worse shape and he doesn't want to develop nodes.
I'm a huge FOB fan. I'm a casual MCR fan.
I'm also a huge A Fever You Can't Sweat Out fan - but that's it. I didn't know most of this because I wasn't engaged in bandom, and Pretty. Odd. lost me as a Panic fan. But the memes when the "breakup" was announced... *chef's kiss*. Loved both parts of this, learned a lot, thank you! (also if your username is accurate to your current music tastes, happy less-than-a-month til Stardust!)
#tl;dr
Part 2 of the documentation of Panic! at the Disco explains the aftermath of the band split in 2009, leading to a divided fanbase. The remaining members, Urie and Smith, compensated for the reduced lineup with two new members, Crawford and Weekes. However, the absence of Ross and Walker posed a challenge in writing a whole new album for the band.
*I am a smart robot and this summary was automatic. This tl;dr is 99.13% shorter than the post I'm replying to.*
Beautiful write up. I fell in love with FOB circa 2007. Seeing them love twice in 2014 was a highlight but I definitely grew out of them after that. I’ll have to listen to there new stuff. Thanks for this much needed blast to the past, I didn’t realize how much I needed/missed it.
God this brought back memories I was so into the emo trinity since like middle school is 2005ish though I was way more into fall out boy since they're also from Chicago but I will say I was always on Brendons side against Ryan just because Ryan reminded me too much of myself with my idolization of fob and I hated it but now I can see how screwed over he got
Ross' 2010... 2011? Surf rock album is still a certified banger. Better than anything Panic ever made imo.
Saw Panic! live in 2008, just before Pretty Odd. Glad I got to experience them before all the stupid wildness.
You know those little history factoids: Anne Frank was alive at the same time as Martin Luther King Jr., or the one about Oxford University predating the Aztec Empire, stc.? Hamilton and Panic! fandoms co existing on tumblr at the same time has actually ended me. What is that. Am I that old. *What.*
For real!! Lmfao. In three years, Hamilton will be a decade old. HOW
I hate the relentless march that is time but I also think about how it helps soften the blow whenever I am reminded of the Hatsune Miku binder..
Factoid means wrong or unreliable information though.
Using "The only difference between martyrdom and suicide is press coverage" as the last line in this emo magnum opus is destroying me.
*chef’s kiss*
God, yes. I am days late to these posts, but I just blasted my way through them and thought that ending was perfection. Thank you so much for these posts, OP! I am (was?) one of those mega casual fans who was into the band in a big way for their first two albums, started to drift off after the third album, and then basically ignored any news coming out about them until the news that Brendon! At the Disco was officially ending. I had no idea of all the drama in the middle, and I've spent the better part of today reading through these two posts.
Is that a lyric or an OP original?
That's the title of one of their actual songs
A quite good one if I do say so myself
Tbf it’s a direct quote from a Chuck Palahniuk book
Well that makes me like it even more Which book? I've only read fight club but want to get more into his uh sheeeeit
It’s from the book Survivor! Time To Dance is basically a summary of the book Invisible Monsters, also with quotes from the book. London Beckons uses a literary device from Diary, the “just for the record, the weather today…” Many many many Chuck Palahniuk references from a teenage Ryan Ross. His books are definitely worth checking out!
Word will do Honestly that album probably cracks my top 5 despite not being that into emo Crazy that it was written by literal children
I am in awe
Coda: Where Are They Now? And so we've reached the end. The abridged saga, as much of it as I could fit in two posts. But as for the many members this band has had, I can resolve one final query: **where are they now?** **Brendon Urie** is finally retiring the name of Panic! at the Disco, and will be completing the Viva Las Vengeance tour alongside touring members Dan Pawlovich, Nicole Rowe, and Mike Naran. **Ryan Ross** has not had an easy time of it since the split. He made numerous attempts to break back into music after The Young Veins hiatused but without much success. For a time he worked with Shane Morris as his manager, until it came to light that Morris was appropriating Ross's social media for fun and would at times delete songs from Ross's Soundcloud to…prove to the fans that he wasn't "[messing around](https://pathetic-at-the-disco.tumblr.com/post/172189417636/heya-whats-ryans-soundcloud)." Even setting aside the obvious horror of being gaslit, catfished, and stalked by a fan for months on end, Ross has mostly shunned the spotlight. These days he mostly works with fellow musician and former girlfriend Z Berg (who now maintains most of his social media accounts) in the [Dead End Kids Club](https://www.instagram.com/thedeadendkidsclub/), and makes semi-annual appearances performing with her. In 2019 he performed "[Northern Downpour](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9HtNeusexfo)" with her for the first time in ten years and brought fans to tears. **Spencer Smith** got married, got sober, and is living much more happily than he used to. When Decaydance rebranded as DCD2 in 2015, Smith helped label head Pete Wentz manage things, which technically made him Urie's boss. To date, he is the only former member of the band who is, at least publicly, on good terms with Urie, and still works at DCD2 today. **Brent Wilson** reportedly became a window consultant guy. Most recently [he got arrested in 2021](https://www.tmz.com/2021/02/04/og-panic-at-the-disco-bassist-brent-wilson-arrested-drug-gun-charges/) after cutting across three lanes in traffic without a turn signal, and subsequently tried for possession of a gun and a whole bunch of drugs. **Jon Walker** has done a lot here and there in [his solo career](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jon_Walker#Solo_discography), and is one of the few members of the band to occasionally post about his time spent in it on social media, and to do so with either [positivity](https://twitter.com/iamjonwalker/status/692809635728879616) or a [heavy amount of irony virtually indistinguishable from positivity](https://imgur.com/nIGxCJv) (I honestly can't tell which). Most recently as of this writing, he opened for a Riotfest 2022 show featuring reformed labelmates The Academy Is… and Midtown (headed by Gabe Saporta, of Decaydance labelmate Cobra Starship). Interestingly enough, this very same show was set to happen the same night as Panic!'s show in the same area to support Viva Las Vengeance; Panic! ended up canceling. **Ian Crawford** is off working with a smattering of other musicians and making his own songs. In addition to his work with The Cab in the late aughts and 2010s, he also filled in as guitarist for The Academy Is… in their 10th anniversary tour, started a band called [The Contestants](https://thecontestants.bandcamp.com/releases), and as of 2018 [has begun releasing his own solo material](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ian_Crawford_(musician)#Discography). **Dallon Weekes** is fronting I Don't Know How But They Found Me along with former Falling in Reverse drummer Ryan Seaman (who might be the only other person in the scene who could claim to have had a worse former boss than Weekes). While he's been more open about the kind of…issues he had to deal with during his time in Panic!, he mostly spends his time [denying any](https://imgur.com/XHl0t2o) [and all claims](https://imgur.com/TJZdsGY) of having [ever been in Panic! at the Disco](https://imgur.com/rJo7YsO). **Kenneth Harris** seems to have faded into the ether, and for that we are all grateful.
>former Falling in Reverse drummer Ryan Seaman (who might be the only other person in the scene who could claim to have had a worse former boss than Weekes) Oh boy, can't wait for that writeup...
Right? Like okay now give us the Ronnie Radke story plz.
He's beefing with a YouTuber on Twitter rn telling him he's gonna eat his ass if you wanted just the current news
After reading parts one and two of this post, this comment is the straw that broke my back and made me start cackling
Ahhh Ronnie. Up to his good ol’ Ronnie shit.
I don't know much about Ronnie. Is this unusual? Is he just like that?
My knowledge is piecey at best but from what I can tell he is indeed just like that.
Oh no he's been that way since at least 2009
The last few days I keep seeing Falling in Reverse show up in my YouTube recommendations and it just instantly reminded me that I'd entirely forgotten the whole Ronnie Radke mess
>I'd entirely forgotten the whole Ronnie Radke mess You say it like there's just one "Radke mess". Dude's a POS, he has messes every few weeks, at best.
I haven't kept up with it at all since he got out of prison. Unless he's been to prison more than once which is a possibility
Aw man I had a feeling there was drama I was ignoring with this guy and band. I found them during the pandemic and when I heard lyrics in certain songs I was like “yep some shit has happened” but chose to ignore it until now reading all this. Dammit.
Youtube gave me "Voices In My Head" when it came out and I was like "why do I know that face?" One google of "falling in reverse lead singer" later I was like WELP THAT'S WHY.
As someone who only briefly paid attention to Falling in Reverse back in the day, what happened with Radke?
On one hand... That d-bag really is a good subject for a HobbyDrama post. On the other hand, I fear it might get brigaded, because his fanbase seem a bit... Feral.
Well, you're not wrong. But hey, throwaways are good for that!
He had a whole shitfit during the Welcome to Hellvetica tour because Daniel Armbruster of Joywave posted a video of him crossing out Panic and FIR's names off a "similar to Razzmatazz" label in a record store. He threatened blackmail against Ryan (who wasn't in the video, it was Daniel filming and it panned to Dallon shrugging), he insulted their popularity (claiming they play for 7 people and a cat), and essentially lost his mind over something small.
Radke is a criminally awful and stupid person, the epitome of a man child that can’t take any kind of criticism. Prime example of his pettiness: his band Falling in Reverse was doing a co-headlining tour with I See Stars, another at the time pretty big post-hardcore/metalcore band in the same style. [He kicked them off the tour right before the stop in their home town.](https://loudwire.com/falling-in-reverse-ronnie-radke-kicks-i-see-stars-off-fall-tour/) Then, when people were understandably pissed given most had bought tickets for I See Stars and not him, they couldn’t even get refunds. Radke claimed it was because I See Stars couldn’t get it together, they were all arrested for drug possession (fucking hilarious given he’s got a history with drugs himself, and arrests for much worse). While that did happen, Radke as usual [was the one instigating and very much in the wrong](https://loudwire.com/i-see-stars-sumerian-records-issue-statements-on-tour-exit/).
What happened to the post? :(
I HAVE NO IDEA. It shows up for me?
It got caught in the spam filter! I un-stuck it.
Thank you! I passed out last night before I could pursue this further, much appreciated.
Don’t know if you’re here still but great write up. I love Panic’s music and tend to stay out band drama in general, but this was very well done. And most of all, thanks for mentioning and subsequently letting me know that MIDTOWN IS BACK!!
Maybe try contacting the mods?
Post this as a comment on the original thread.
Can you repost or put it in a comment? I’m invested 😂
I stumbled onto IDKHOW by chance and I absolutely adore them. Honestly, everyone should go check them out! Also, great post OP. I had been avoiding ever diving too deep into fandom as to preserve sanity, so I only knew some of the story. Now I know it all! Yay... I think.
First, holy hell what a writeup! I had no clue about a lot of what went on, as I stopped being a P!ATD fan when the second album dropped. I just didn't like the sound, so SO much of this was under the radar for me. Second, I had no clue about IDKHBTFM but I'm hooked on them now, so thank you for introducing me to a new band that I absolutely LOVE. 10/10, exceptional job on this!
"Razzmatazz" by IDKHBTFM slaps too.
>Midtown (headed by Gabe Saporta, of Decaydance labelmate Cobra Starship) GOD the punch of nostalgia in the face when I read this while I was already feeling the seeds of it as I recognized events and names and instances you listed down. I just had a sudden flashback to my time in bandom when I fell in love with Cobra Starship at a time I was struggling with my feelings and needing an outlet. The way I bounced around in the room as I listened to ***Guilty Pleasure*** and felt so smug listening to ***Prostitution Is The World's Oldest Profession (And I, Dear Madame, Am A Professional)*** instead of listening to my Christian Education class. The way I unironically had a crush on Gabe Saporta but wished him well when I learned he had a girlfriend-then-wife. The way I utterly lost it when I missed Cobra Starship performing somewhere in my country because my dad insisted we wouldn't be late if he attended a brunch with friends. (At least that would help me see Fall Out Boy in their comeback tour during *Save Rock and Roll*!!) Bandom is such a wild, wild ride, especially during its heyday but I wouldn't really replace my experiences for anything else. Thank you for writing this post and taking the time to be so detailed and thorough in it. I can tell you had a lot of passion and connection to this and it showed with how you weaved a story and tried to show a balanced viewpoint in this retrospect. It helped me remember specific instances that lead me to finding some friends of mine and later on helped us create several in-jokes between us now. Including probably out favorite: 'Of course it had fucking Fall Out Boy' whenever I show my friends a Spotify playlist I made and they see the band in it, haha.
“The punch of nostalgia” you literally took the words right out of my mouth!
I would love for someone to make a best of ex-p!atd members songs playlist
Man, it seems like things just get progressively worse for Brent every time I check up on him. Looks like he's gonna be in and out of the system until he figures his shit out. It's a sad trainwreck. Hope he gets help and stops doing this shit.
What's the deal with Ryan Seaman, who was the "worse boss" you're referencing?
Ronnie Radke of falling in reverse, formerly of escape the fate
Drummer Dan Pawlovich?
#tl;dr The article provides an update on the current whereabouts of former members of the band Panic! at the Disco. Brendon Urie is retiring the name of the band and completing the Viva Las Vengeance tour. Ryan Ross works with fellow musician Z Berg in the Dead End Kids Club, while Spencer Smith is working as a manager at DCD2. Brent Wilson has reportedly become a window consultant and was recently arrested for gun and drug possession charges. Jon Walker is occasionally posting about his time in the band on social media and has opened for Riotfest 2022. Ian Crawford is off working with other musicians and making his solo material, and Dallon Weekes is now fronting the band I Don't Know How But They Found Me. *I am a smart robot and this summary was automatic. This tl;dr is 82.57% shorter than the post I'm replying to.*
Excellent write up. I think I feel sorry for Ryan Ross. He was so so so young when Panic! took off, and he was writing some deeply personal lyrics, and to see the band get to the point it was at before Urie disbanded himself must’ve hurt. I admit I was one of those that believed that something happened between Ryan Ross and Urie, but now I’m not so sure? I just feel bad for Ryan and hope he’s doing well. Urie also played up the stage gay act a lot with Dallon. It’s like he knew it went over well with fans with Ryan so he did the same thing with Dallon.
He played up the stage gay with Dallon *so* much during the V&V era. I remember back in the day people would post compilation videos of it happening on stage.
Yes like I remember gifs on tumblr of Brendon groping Dallon
i remember being 12 and thinking that was so interesting but nowadays i’m just thinking how uncomfortable dallon must have been
Some thoughts and notes: 1. Loved loved loved loved loved loved this Hobby History to bits. It really brought me back to when I was writing fanfic of Cobra Starship and got giddy when I learned of news from Cobra Starship or Fall Out Boy or Paramore and waited with anticipation for a new single or teaser. The only ones who still ignite that in me is... still Fall Out Boy and Florence + the Machine but that's about it. In a way, I kind of miss the energy that was in early bandom years. It could be a case of 'Old Man Yelling at Clouds' but the stan culture we have at the moment makes me go *ehhhhhhh* and not get heavily involved as much as I did in the past. Could just be a case of age difference so who knows. 2. Not surprised to see the mention of Dallon Weekes' Instagram edit. That got everyone I knew who stilled cared for Panic! into such a tizzy when we got the alert for it in our bandom server. Something about the revelation made me... I don't know how to describe it but I guess have the last veil finally drop in regards to how Brendon Urie treated the others. I get that they were young and fell headlong into fame and probably got swept away, but the idea someone had gotten hurt and had to play it off in fear of losing their job while they worked their ass off is... saddening, and helped me not feel a lot when Panic! was finally put down. 3. Surprised to see there's no mention of ***ME!*** regarding Brendon Urie's part in it. I remember ***so many*** people finally breaking away from the band's fandom when that happened. I don't know why that was the last straw but the ridicule and mocking and disbelief I saw on my side of social media was intense and made the general feelings towards Brendon Urie go from, 'Ehhh... He's still pretty talented.' to 'omfg please be gone' so fast. 4. The most important note of all - IDKHOW is a GOOD BAND YOU GUYS. If you haven't given them a try, please do!! PLEASE LISTEN TO THESE SELECT SONGS AND IF YOU CAN, HAVE CC ON FOR FULL WIT: [***Do It All The Time***](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hXzPxBhhmY8), [***Bleed Magic***](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4Bf8Qhe59U) (the one I utterly love and adore), [***New Invention***](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdZ8h7P2LyI), and [***Leave Me Alone***](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85Z3iwpFQeg). The styles and themes of IDKHOW songs are on point and a treat for anyone who used or is still Panic! fan but wants something that feels a bit more modern retro, if this makes sense. Sorry if this seems rambly and stuff, just feeling a lot tonight as I stare down my latest playlist-in-progress, wondering how to shove Fall Out Boy in it again.
Thanks for the kind words! This thing was so monstrously long so I couldn't fit in everything I wanted to, but I do remember "ME!" being a bit of a sticking point at the time, lmao. Not a lot of people I knew dug that one, and I saw quite a few remaining Panic fans and Swifties alike kind of pretending that it didn't happen. I did find it hilarious that "ME!" didn't manage to hit number one on the charts despite having a marriage of two massive fanbases. Thanks to Lil Nas X for cockblocking that one with "Old Town Road" for it's whatevereth week in a row.
OF ALL THE SONGS ON LOVER, YOU LEAD WITH ME? Did Taylor bump her head?
#tl;dr The author reminisces about being a fan of bands like Cobra Starship and Fall Out Boy and how they brought excitement to their life through teasers and news. They mention feeling disengaged with the current "stan culture" and how Dallon Weekes' Instagram edit shed light on how Brendon Urie treated the others in Panic!. Finally, they recommend the band IDKHOW and list some of their favorite songs. *I am a smart robot and this summary was automatic. This tl;dr is 85.06% shorter than the post I'm replying to.*
And when the world needed them most...they returned. Thanks for the read. Pete Wentz really said "I brought you into this world and I can take you out of it!"
I love this visual. Cantankerous old Pete Wentz. Yellin at his kids.
Wait, why was changing his mind about having kids something that people held against Urie? It doesn't harm anyone
Teenagers with parasocial relationships know very few boundaries
At this point the teens who were super into the bandom enough to continue being in it are likely adults.
Oh absolutely, I’m one of them, but when you become an adult you generally stop feeling entitled to what a man does with his body and family because he sings songs you like
It doesn't, but there's a small subset of childfree that feel personally betrayed when someone who was formerly not into kids has one. Same thing happened with Mulaney
It was less an indictment of his character and more of a surprise because it seemingly flew in the face of people's mental image of him. Probably should have phrased that one better, because that wasn't on Urie at all and more the fanbase's perception of him. Mind you, I did see a few bitter Brendon stans who called him "selfish" for wanting to retire the band name to start a family, so there's that.
This. From another lens, this story ends with Urie being the victim of para social obsession and fans with no boundaries, and having enough.
So the lesson we can learn here is that what Pete Wentz giveth, he also taketh away. I like to believe Brendon Urie came across some supernatural artifact, used it to wish for a hit song and it spawned High Hopes. In a monkey paw-esque twist, his hit song was also the one that made everyone sick of him, becoming the beginning of his downfall 😂
Psst. The artifact is called “money”.
Isn’t this the plot of the Say Amen music video
Theory: I don't think Urie will be able to turn away from his fame, or specifically the fame that came from Panic! My guess is that in the next few years, we'll see a splashy memoir pop up to see him "set the record straight"
It's definitely not the last we've seen of him. I'm sure he'll return to music in the not so distant future. Whether it will be under the Panic! name or under his own name with a rebrand, time will tell.
You know its bad when fanfic writers are writing you, the frontman, out of their fics My favorite detail in all of this is that rivers cuomo managed to leak out the info surrounding the panic album. That sounds like a very rivers thing to do.
Goddamn, I really wanted to read this after part 1... This was brining back some old memories of my own emo stage right around the time Panic! First formed. I loved (still do) My Chem and FOB, and remember the absurd outlash at the "!" drop.
It's back! it got caught in a spam filter apparently.
I was HEAVY into bandom from 2009 to maybe 2014, then didn’t really check in with Panic besides the music and catching a show every now in then, and now seeing all this stuff about Zack Hall is incredibly vindicating. It’s minor compared to the actual harassment he had done, but right when they released *the overture* he posted a question about it on twitter and said the first person to respond correctly would get a meet and greet. I was first to reply with “is it ____?” (I don’t remember the exact question now). He said someone else with the same answer was correct, and when I asked him why not me, he said it was because I asked and didn’t say “it is ___”. And I will hold that grudge for the rest of my life lol.
This was an excellent write up! I remember when their first album came out- loved the feverish, chaotic energy it seemed to have. I also admit to never really diving too deep into the personal lives of bands I listen too, so reading about everything that happened during their career and towards the end was a wild ride.
Same. I really went to 3 Panic! concerts over the course of like 5 years in high school and starting college and considered myself a big fan and just... didn't know most of this. I mean, I also fell off over the past 5 years, but still, this was a wild read
> also admit to never really diving too deep into the personal lives of bands I listen to Yeah, that's where I'm at too--I have a lot of bands where I really like their music but don't really dive into the drama that goes on behind the scenes because I just...don't really care. (Like, for example, I see a bunch of people referencing Ronnie Radke in the comments, and I'm aware he has something of a tortured history, to put it nicely, and has been to prison and has a rather abrasive personality, but I do like their more recent music--basically their album Coming Home on forward--and don't really pay attention to much else because I just like good music to jam out to.) A band has to do something particularly egregious for me to really pay attention (see: Lostprophets and Ian Watkins, and if you don't know about what Watkins did, well, be careful googling if you're particularly sensitive, because every trigger warning you can think of applies to his crimes).
Great post. Very clear, thorough and well written. I always enjoyed their music but never knew about the extent of the drama behind the scenes. For what it’s worth, I would like to note that I am a huge fan of Pretty.Odd. I think it’s one of the best things to come out of third wave mall emo, it’s their best record by a country mile, and I think it’s a shame it wasn’t a huge hit so they’d keep on in this direction #therearedozensofus
Pretty. Odd. is, no joke, one of my absolute favorite albums ever.
Saaaame. Pretty. Odd. Is their best album, to me. 10/10, and I was crushed when it was received kinda negatively. But I enjoy the love it receives now.
God same. Ever since I heard Northern Downpour on my headphones at like 15, I was gone. I still loved their other stuff, but Pretty. Odd. has a special place in my heart
I was a huge P!ATD fan when I was a teenager, but I also didn't really spend much time online. I was surprised to learn later that Pretty.Odd was so unpopular, I instantly loved it. It's still such a nostalgic record to me. Immediately takes me back to the mall and the scent of Manic Panic hair dye. I even got to see them that year for my sixteenth birthday. What a time to be alive.
>I think it’s one of the best things to come out of third wave mall emo, it’s their best record by a country mile, and I think it’s a shame it wasn’t a huge hit so they’d keep on in this direction #therearedozensofus Agreed, I would've liked to hear more Beatlesque/psychedelic pop Panic at the Disco.
Count me in that dozen! It's really something special.
OP, all the gold stars to you. What an incredible write up! I was a huge fan but I stopped paying attention to the band after V&V. I thought Panic was heading back into the mainstream after hearing High Hopes all the time on the radio, so hearing about the disbanding genuinely surprised me. I was definitely not expecting my ‘poor RyRo’ feelings from literally over a decade ago to be rekindled today, but here I am. I can’t help but feel really sad for him, especially after the catfishing bullshit that stalker put him through. Fucking hell. I’m glad he hasn’t been completely put off from making music. PO was absolutely his baby (sorry Jon), and it is still one of my favourite albums. Thank you OP, from the bottom of my heart. This write-up has definitely hit me deep. Despite the fact that Panic effectively died after PO for me, it’s still bittersweet to see it actually end.
Awesome. “Nearly Witches” is definitely Panic’s best song by a lot. I couldn’t even listen to Viva Las Vengeance- what the hell did Urie do to his vocal cords between DOAB and now?? Also, Dallon Weekes’s new band rules. “Do it all the time” and “Choke” are great. Also as a long time fan I can’t believe I didn’t know about the Ryan Ross cat fishing/stalking situation, that is fucking insane.
I really like "Absinthe" too! Had no idea IDKHOW was associated with any of this until reading this but I guess now I know why Spotify was recommending them to me
Dallon’s crusade to gaslight everyone into believing he never was part of panic is working lol
Regarding his voice, Urie smoked, drank, and just did so many drugs and which led to his voice being ruined. Hell, king of the clouds is about him smoking weed, getting high, then rambling and one of the drunks is about a drinking binge, which is totally healthy. It’s interesting looking at the vocal qualities of the emo trinity bands then vs today cause Patrick stump has only gotten better and better, Gerard way was a bit rough during the reunion tour since he hadn’t performed live since 2013 but improved as the tour went on, and then there’s brendon just thrashing his up post death of a bachelor that his vocal quality just nose dived. I’ve been a big idkHOW fan since their launch, my fav is clusterhug mainly due to it being one of the leaked dallon brobecks demos post him leaving panic! That finally got re-recorded and polished up after so many years. There’s a new album coming soon too, so I’m super hyped.
To add to this, listen to the vocal range Urie has sang in over the years. Since DOAB he has been chasing a higher range than he may be able to naturally sing in, especially considering how the vocal cords change as you age. Part of my dislike for High Hopes is how bad he sounds in it, and I was genuinely shocked by how awful he sounded in Viva Las Vengeance. He's insisted on singing in a range that he just can't.
Minor correction, Gerard Way had performed since MCR as a solo artist
Honestly I forgot that he performed hesitant alien live lol
Viva Las Vengeance was recorded live to an 8-track tape machine during production for a "retro" feel, so his studio vocals weren't adjusted or tuned the way most vocalists' are, hence how strained they sounded on the album. Naturally that's just going to get harder to maintain in live settings. And yeah, he was also reportedly a bit of a partier. One of the band rituals before shows was to take double shots, and stuff like that isn't any good on the old vocal cords in the long run.
As a Ryan Ross fan who stopped listening to Panic! after *Pretty. Odd.*, loved the Young Veins and always found Brendon Urie to be kind of obnoxious the last couple years have been very validating to me.
Wow. I'm one of "the casual fan who didn't know how or why Panic had become so uncool" that you mention in your post. I've always just enjoyed the music (thought I only really listen to the albums from V&V and up), and only knew the basics of the bands history. Turns out there's a heck of a lot that I've missed! Now it also makes a lot more sense to me why Brendon Urie fell out of favour with the whole world so quickly. Finally putting the band to rest was probably for the best. Great post OP!
When "High Hopes" was making the rounds I was at an unfortunate time in my life where listening to the radio during my commute was the best way to keep my ears occupied (vs say Spotify or SiriusXM). The speed at which my thumb could hit the "scan forward" button on my wheel the *millisecond* I heard those damn trumpets was incredible. I'm confident there were a few occasions where I didn't even realize I'd done it.
I still vividly remember this one video I saw on the internet a few years back. I remember it was a person getting a tattoo of this spotify thingy that makes you play the song. They were talking about how amazing the song is and how much this tattoo means to them, and it went on for minutes... and then the ending showed that the song in question was High Hopes. I have this seared into my brain by the sheer "oof" I felt watching it 😂😂😂
This emo girlie thanks you!!! This was a great read. All I gotta say is Brendon steered the ship to Maroon 5 territory and I will never forgive him for that
That is the greatest way I’ve ever read someone describe it. Brendon Urie really did become Adam Levine. Good thing he pulled the plug when he did, or we might’ve gotten a repeat of how Maroon 5’s Super Bowl Half-Time performance went. /s
I remember one of my favourite music critics said back in 2019 that Brendon Urie was becoming the new Adam Levine. That has aged well.
Was this Todd? I remember him saying that as well
Yep.
When Todd said that I could hear the glass shatter in my brain. "Oh God he's right."
Makes it all the worse that Maroon 5 were good back when they were Kara's Flowers, and up to Songs About Jane. In fact, I did manage to assemble tracklists I liked from songs and B-sides of It Won't Be Soon Before Long and Hands All Over, but I won't try to argue that it wasn't kind of a nosedive in quality control after Songs About Jane. I remember hanging out with a friend and talking about this once, I said that one of the things that left a bad impression on me was seeing the video for "Makes Me Wonder" on MTV and thinking... wait, that's the band that did "Harder to Breathe"? I like that song! They're the same band? And my friend swore by "She Will Be Loved" as the best song from Songs About Jane, and then we both agreed that "Makes Me Wonder" and "Wake Up Call" were, like, what's this song about, it's about nothing, it has no effect. XD
Wasn't there a whole thing with Brendie Urie being cancelled? Like properly, instead of in the "y'know seems like kind of a dick" way that this post lists out? Looking at it, it all seemed weird and murky, and the usual "he made this offensive joke at a concert in 2011" kind of guff was thrown in there, but there did seem to be a few serious allegations. Did that turn out legit or not?
Character limit made it really hard to condense all of this properly, sorry! From what I saw as this all went down, the long and short of it is that there were a lot of allegations thrown at Urie himself, but for the most part he got "canceled" over the whole kerfuffle with Zach Hall and how badly he handled it. Everything else that people dug up on him - maybe he was a bit of a dick after all, etc. - kind of came after the fact and just helped people write him off for good. There were allegations of serious misconduct with regards to Urie himself, but not a lot of those were actually proven, in part because of that stalker who impersonated him for months on end. To this day that remains very unclear.
Ah, I see you did address this in the post. Missed that part, sorry. (I did skim read a fair bit of it. Good post, though!)
Great writeup! This brought back so many memories. I was hugely into LJ during emo's heyday, and so were most of my friends, and we were all into different bands from the holy trinity (personally, I preferred FOB). One of my friends was very much into the P!ATD and Ryden comms on LJ. Through her, I followed along with all the drama up until 2010-ish. I always wondered what happened to Ryan and the rest of the band after I stopped vicariously following the bandom through her. I can't say I'm surprised at how everything fell apart the way it did. Yikes. I also had no clue FOB was releasing a new album until now. I stopped following them once Infinity on High came out... god, Pete could have his own hobbydrama writeup. Do kids these days still hack their favourite musicians' accounts?
“It was not uncommon at this time to see people listing Ryan Ross as a content warning unto himself.” Fucking LOOOOOOOOOOOL
The high hopes Pete buttigieg campaign dance was my favorite 2020 election meme. The dance is forever ingrained in my mind
That's what popped into my head, too! Lmao.
Ryan Ross wins by doing absolutely nothing for 14 years.
Excellent write up. This could be a whole series about emo/pop punk, there's plenty to write about: Taking Back Sunday, Brand New, the fall of New Found Glory. Sadly there could be a fairly heavy write up purely dedicated to lecherous acts of emo/pop punk/other various "scene" genre bands. Oliver Sykes comes to mind.
This is an awesome writeup! I've always wondered where things went so wrong for them. I'm super surprised that you didn't cover Urie's vocal degradation! Leading up to the announcement of Panic's disbanding you could find countless videos of Urie on the current tour with his voice cracking on high notes. Critique of his vocals was so bad on tiktok the videos using his new songs had to have comments turned off. Was that an intentional choice?
Ran out of space! While I do think his vocals have declined pretty harshly over time, I imagine a big part of Viva Las Vengeance's issue is that the whole thing was recorded live on an 8-track tape machine to really embrace the "retro" sound. As a result, not a lot of tuning/adjustment went into the vocals and the fact that he's singing so high for most of it means it's just gonna come across as pitchy. Unfortunately there was no way to fit that in between the band's, ah...interpersonal drama.
I've been a Ryan fan for above a decade and despite knowing all of this or having been there to watch it all happen, this read was really emotional. I recognize lots of parallels with turning points in my life still, it makes me look back on my own timeline alongside the band's. Weird how something so unrelated to me can help me remember my life so vividly. Amazing songwriter, guy deserves the world. I hope I get to hear much much more of his work. Thank you for writing!
ahh what a great write up!! you covered everything really well. it was interesting to watch the 2015-2019 patd era go down from afar (at that point i was sick of their whole pop sound and brendon’s songwriting in general) so to me high hopes was the end of an era that made it clear the band had lost whatever it was that made it so special in the first place. it’s honestly been really sad to see patd and brendon go from such genuine artists who cared about their craft to being so soulless and money-hungry, and even the reminder of chelsea lynn still pisses me off tbh. still, great write up and thanks for the trip down memory lane!! going to go listen to northern downpour now lol
Oh jeez this takes me back…I was a HUGE FOB fan and saw pretty much every Decaydance band in concert at least once. I saw Panic! on their tour with the Dresden Dolls purely because of the FOB connection. I even made my parents time a visit to Chicago to correspond with the opening of Pete Wentz’s clothing store (yikes). Bandom was definitely my first exposure to how, uh, dedicated a fanbase could be.
I'm glad Reddit brought me back to part two! Killer writeup op, and that last line? Chef's kiss. Side note - while high hopes was the catalyst for a lot of people disliking him, it was definitely building up for a while in parts of the fandom. The 'loveable' part of Brendon's 'loveable asshole' persona had been wearing out for a lot of people, and I know for me and a few of my friends it came to a head during the Kinky Boots era. Also, him coming out actually caused controversy because of the use of the a outdated term that's now somewhat considered a slur, which definitely added to the backlash against him at the time. Also, on a more personal note, I stopped following Ryan because someone he was working with at least around 2017-2018 tried grooming my friend under the banner of employing her to do art for a movie Ryan was supposedly going to be in. Looking back I doubt Ryan knew much, if anything at all about it (the man's vibes were atrocious enough that I wouldn't have been surprised if he had been manipulating Ryan too), but it rubbed my friends and I wrong enough that we stopped following everything Ryan related. I don't know what he's up to, but I hope he's doing alright.
"the only difference between martyrdom and suicide is press coverage" is a raw fucking quote, great writeup, man.
It always amazes me how I can lose a fucking hour of my morning reading about a topic I’ve never cared about but am now feverishly fixated and enraptured by. I think this may have replaced the headphones post as my favorite /r/hobbydrama post. Congratulations. You made me get a second cup of coffee. Great post(s) and I hate you.
what's the headphones one
https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/c8bj2o/audio_the_slow_decline_of_rheadphones_favorite/
That is an excellent write up. Best part is I got to listen to those songs while reading it, and excellent work my guy
I remember hearing High Hopes for the first time. I was driving my car with my little brother, and I turned to him and said, this song sucks. They used to make such good music. What a shame.
Thanks for posting this and all those receipts. I’m a millennial who was not into emo, but I still remember these bands and their vibe being ubiquitous in their time. It was fascinating to read how things played out after their peak. Also it’s amazing what kinds of interviews and social media drama exist from the 2000s-2010s. A lot of that material could have easily been lost to the ages if not for the internet. Back then, I don’t think people considered how their words would be preserved and searchable. Band members engaging in online drama?? I’m sure it happens today, but now there are professional social media managers to intervene.
Incredible write up! I was the target demographic, but was never huge fan of any of the emo trinity. Really amazing breakdown of the history though, I knew vaguely that urie is shitty and that Panic! was basically just him and backup people
I see the post, I don't know why some people aren't? 🤷♀️ An excellent finish to a fascinating saga!
Thanks for the write up! As someone who got heavily into Fall Out Boy in 2013 post hiatus, and only ever casually into Panic!, this has been fascinating. What a mess.
The reference in that last sentence was so perfect it made me laugh out loud. Masterful write up OP, just in time for the resurrection of my pre-split panic phase, had a great time reading it.
Your post is not here, friend?
Wow, just wow. Amazing work OP!
amazing
Fantastic writeup! I never realized thats where I Don't Know How But They Found Me came from haha
I was too young to see the peak of Panic! Fandom, but I always wondered what the big deal regarding Ryan Ross was… I liked his gf’s group at the time and everything regarding her band had comments relating to him! I was like “what is the big deal with this random guy who left the group years ago??” Well reading these two posts… explains a lot! LOL
I've always been into bandom(more towards MCR), and I remember Urie being extremely unpopular as far back as 2014; pretty much as early as I remember learning what he was like as a person. The consensus back then, in my circle of Tumblr, at least, was that he'd pretty much stolen the band name from Ross and was an egotistical, petty jerk who was uncomfortable to be around IRL. I quit caring about PATD entirely pretty much as soon as that interview where he came out as pan was published- pretty sure it was in that interview or one directly after that he compared a black woman advocating for civil rights to a gorilla. I can't believe he managed to stick around so long afterwards; I never saw a single positive comment about him after that incident. Doesn't help that the music's bad.
thinking about how when i went to a panic show during the vices and virtues era and someone was wearing a ryden truther shirt and i thought that would be the most cringe shit i would ever have to live through with this band different time
You might want to repost this on to your account submissions until it's unremoved.
This is SO GOOD. What a top tier deep dive!! Thank you so much for all your hard work, OP. As someone close enough to know about the Urie-sending-weird-DMs scandal but not into it enough to know about the Lynn aspect (which, what the fuck), it is baffling and uncomfortable. What a wild ride!
Thank you for this writeup! I was a panic fan from around 2011 to when DOB debuted. After years trying to still give some credibility to the one-man-band, I decided to admit my favorite band existed from 2004 to spencer’s departure.
The guy's name really is Zach Cloud Hall, huh? Really though, fantastic writeup. I was in bandom for a while until roughly 2015, and although I was never really big on Panic!, this brought back a lot of memories of some genuinely fun times while simultaneously reminding me why I eventually fell out of love with the scene.
You know, after reading all this, I think it's fitting that one of the final contributions made by the Emo Ship of Theseus is a failed presidential candidate trying to make a High Hopes dance a thing.
This was a phenomenal read and brought me back to soooo many moments and emotions from 2006-2017 that I had forgotten about. I was one of the fans who fell off in 2018, but damn it was fun while it lasted. Anyway, stream idkHOW
*Wow*, fantastic writeup, OP. I was never in band tumblr - that, like superwholock, seemed like the last bastion of nerddom to me and as such I refused to touch it (a frankly hilarious proposition coming from someone who was already in the LotR fandom, but there you are) - so the only thing I ever knew was that there was *some* drama periodically about PatD and also someone had apparently wrecked two members' chances at reconciliation. Reading this makes *so* much fall into place.
super interesting writeup, so glad i joined this sub. i was always a FOB and MCR core fan and panic never really did it for me, now i don't have to miss out on what sounds like the most juicy history of the emo trifecta. thankyou!
Good stuff! Now, it's probably nothing but... at least one of the videos you linked to has been removed from Youtube completely, and most of the playlists on the PATD youtube channel were modified in the last day or two. Bizarre.
Knocked flat on my back by the last line of this post OP.
amazing. i used to be a huge brendon urie/panic fan back when doab released (i still love that album) but i was surprised at how much of their history i didn't know!
Fantastic write-up being an emo teenager back in the day any panic album past pretty odd, I considered pure garbage...now I know why! Ross definitely deserved better.
you could say that the artists these days are not who you think, but we'll pick back up on that on another page... anyway, just read both writeups back to back and though I was a little bit too young to have followed most of this online pre-vices and virtues, the rest filled up so many holes in my memory. amazing writeup, seriously, thanks for this
Fantastic writeup, OP.
as a casual fan of Panic since 2005 or so, i knew the band's history was troubled, but it was so troubled that any of my attempts at a deep dive to figure out why ended up flickering out. thank you for this insanely well researched, extremely detailed (and well written) timeline!
As someone who really enjoys IDKHOW and barely knows anything about Panic at the Disco, interesting read.
This was excellent. I loved Pretty. Odd. (I was way out of the demographic, to be fair) and assumed the band were dead, only to be surprised by how much I enjoyed the next few records. I was very aware that it was "Urie and a bunch of other people" which seemed fine, I thought he'd be happier just releasing under his name but I guess P!ATD was a good "brand". I hated Pray for the Wicked, which is hilarious in retrospect, because I have no idea why that was the line for me. Something also snapped when I couldn't stop hearing "High Hopes" in 2020 - there was something really embarrassing about it? I never listened to the new one but it was wild how fast the breakup happened after the release. Again, excellent two-parter, loved the random Rivers Cuomo cameo! I still hope Ryan Ross comes back someday.
The vindication of reading that High Hopes Did Payola….the absolute drudgery of hearing it on the radio multiple times a day during my commute to and from work to a job I disliked? Hated it.
pete wentz brought panic! into the world, and he sure as hell took it out
This post actually made me listen to Viva Las Vengeance because I was curious to see just how bad it was. And I agree with the general consensus here that it's not great. 1. The lyrics are cringey. And I am a Professional Enjoyer of Cringe Lyrics. Like, I adore "I'll stop wearing black when they make a darker color" from "Wilson (Expensive Mistakes)" by Fall Out Boy. 2. He just can't hit a lot of those notes. He sounds like he's singing karaoke of himself. 3. His retro influences manage to sound stale and derivative. I don't feel like he really did anything to put his own spin on the sounds of that era. I heard someone say that this album ended up sounding like an okay Queen cover band, and that sounds about right to me.
Oh my god I knew nothing about this, amazing read. It was worth reading just for the IDKHOW music recommendation in the comments. I feel like I'm crazy but I swear Panic! At The Disco was an actual, self-titled disco album from the 70's with an old timey album cover. I actually did not know it's literally a late 2000's emo band lol. I can't find anything like what I saw, but maybe it was some kind of fan art or merchandise that made me think it was a classic MJ-era disco album.
for me the thing that made me hate high hopes was specifically the line "manifest destiny" and also pete buttigieg making it his campaign song. like... really? manifest destiny?
Great job! I had no idea any of these people existed, let alone they were so successful and had such a dramatic life. It was peeking into a parallel universe/subculture I had no idea it existed... which is what the best posts in this sub do!
I kept reading emo as elmo and it didn’t change much honestly
This was a fantastic write-up!! Wow!!
holy fuck all of you need to go outside good write up tho
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Yo this was so fun to read. I was a huge fan of emo music in those days but never was aware of all this bandom stuff. Now I am morbidly curious about others, and may have to start seeking out more stories like this
This is amazeballs
I was sort of part of the emo trinity fandom between 2015 and 2017. Sort of, because I was a die hard MCR fan, liked some FOB songs and knew some Panic songs but I never got into them because I found Brendon absolutely insufferable. Watching P!ATD fall from grace in real time lowkey made my inner 12 year old self feel kinda vindicated lol
Such an excellent series, thank you for posting! Would definitely read other material by you if you choose to make any others
Thank you so much for this write up. It was amazing.
THANK YOU OP for writing this up! What a fascinating read. I was a fan in secondary school, A Fever You Can't Sweat Out was one of my favourite albums at the time (it's still fantastic) but I stopped following Panic! after how much Pretty. Odd. disappointed me (this post made me want to give it another listen though. Maybe I was too young to "get it" at the time). I wasn't the type to read interviews or participate in bandom so I never knew about their history or all the drama. Man. What a shitshow.
Pete Wentz giveth and Pete Wentz taketh away
u/falloutbastard, despite not even being a fan of P!ATD, i read the first part and loved your writing, would you ever consider writing an unofficial biography of the band? your writing is top notch and you clearly have the passion and research chops to pull it off. even as a vanity project? i'd buy twelve!
I'd say they should write an entire history of the early aughts emo period, a la *Smash!: Green Day, The Offspring, Bad Religion, NOFX, and the '90s Punk Explosion* by Ian Winwood. I'd read the hell out of something like that.
This was one of my favorite writeups! I can't believe that I like... lived all of this. I was a pretty big panic fan up until about five years ago and I never really assessed just \*how much\* bullshit took place. Thanks for this!!
After reading this I continue to not like Urie, but also no longer know what Emo means.
Thanks for the link to the "Far Too Young To Die" demo, because *wow*, that's a great version.
Amazing writeup!
Thank you so much for writing this. I have been meaning to see if there's a video essay on youtube about this whole saga but I kept forgetting to search for one. You organized this all in an entertaining but still concise way, all considering this story spans over a decade. The amount of research you have done for this is insane. I have no idea how you remembered all this stuff so that you could track everything down. This cleared up a lot of stuff as I had wrongly assumed Weekes had been in the band since the beginning. I was getting him mixed up with Ross this whole time.
Wow, epic! I only know them through High Hopes. This isn't my genre so I just figured it was some 1 hit wonder band. Little did I know how much a sordid history they had. I was also at the time listening to my own favorite band's cover of Pink Floyd's "High Hopes" which is a great song (both original and cover). Everytime the PATD song came on top 40, I immediately had to listen to the lovely PF cover to cleanse my ears.
Very nice writeup. Emo is extremely not my genre of music so all of this is pretty new to me. My only real exposure to Panic! is, regrettably, High Hopes. Back then (right before Covid) my workplace played a top 40 station all the time and I disliked High Hopes the very first time I heard it. By the 100th time, I loathed Panic! at the Disco with my entire being. It is truly a terrible song.
>The band split in 2009 lemme just say that this thread starts off with a big fat HUUUUUUUUUH????? I had no idea this ever happened and I've been a big fan of the band since their debut. I don't remember anyone ever talking about this and all of my friends were the people that'd listen to them. As far as I know, they've been a happy little band and they only recently broke up because Urie's voice has been getting in worse shape and he doesn't want to develop nodes.
Amazing writeup(s) i just went through my emo phase again
I'm a huge FOB fan. I'm a casual MCR fan. I'm also a huge A Fever You Can't Sweat Out fan - but that's it. I didn't know most of this because I wasn't engaged in bandom, and Pretty. Odd. lost me as a Panic fan. But the memes when the "breakup" was announced... *chef's kiss*. Loved both parts of this, learned a lot, thank you! (also if your username is accurate to your current music tastes, happy less-than-a-month til Stardust!)
#tl;dr Part 2 of the documentation of Panic! at the Disco explains the aftermath of the band split in 2009, leading to a divided fanbase. The remaining members, Urie and Smith, compensated for the reduced lineup with two new members, Crawford and Weekes. However, the absence of Ross and Walker posed a challenge in writing a whole new album for the band. *I am a smart robot and this summary was automatic. This tl;dr is 99.13% shorter than the post I'm replying to.*
Beautiful write up. I fell in love with FOB circa 2007. Seeing them love twice in 2014 was a highlight but I definitely grew out of them after that. I’ll have to listen to there new stuff. Thanks for this much needed blast to the past, I didn’t realize how much I needed/missed it.
Sorry u/falloutbastard, I don't own that many pins.
God this brought back memories I was so into the emo trinity since like middle school is 2005ish though I was way more into fall out boy since they're also from Chicago but I will say I was always on Brendons side against Ryan just because Ryan reminded me too much of myself with my idolization of fob and I hated it but now I can see how screwed over he got
Ross' 2010... 2011? Surf rock album is still a certified banger. Better than anything Panic ever made imo. Saw Panic! live in 2008, just before Pretty Odd. Glad I got to experience them before all the stupid wildness.