Biography

Panic! at the Disco is an American rock band from Las Vegas, Nevada, formed in 2004 and featuring the current lineup of vocalist Brendon Urie, accompanied on tour by bassist Dallon Weekes, guitarist Kenneth Harris and drummer Dan Pawlovich. Founded by childhood friends Ryan Ross, Spencer Smith, Brent Wilson and Urie, Panic! at the Disco recorded its first demos while its members were in high school. Shortly after, the band recorded and released its debut studio album, A Fever You Can't Sweat Out (2005). Popularized by the second single, "I Write Sins Not Tragedies", the album was certified double platinum in the US. In 2006, founding bassist Brent Wilson was fired from the band during an extensive world tour, and subsequently replaced by Jon Walker.

Influenced by 1960s rock bands the Beatles, the Zombies and the Beach Boys, and preceded by the single "Nine in the Afternoon", the band's second studio album, Pretty. Odd. (2008) marked a significant departure from the sound of the band's debut. Ross and Walker, who favored the band's new direction, departed because Urie and Smith wanted to make further changes to the band's style. The duo subsequently formed a new band, The Young Veins, leaving Urie and Smith as the sole remaining members of Panic! at the Disco.

Continuing as a duo, Urie and Smith released a new single, "New Perspective", and recruited Dallon Weekes as the group's bassist and Ian Crawford as the band's lead guitarist to accompany the band during live performances. Weekes was later inducted into the band's lineup as a full-time member in 2010, nearing the end of the recording of the band's third studio album, Vices & Virtues (2011). The album was recorded solely by Urie and Smith, with producers John Feldmann and Butch Walker.

As a three-piece, Urie, Smith, and Weekes recorded and released the band's fourth studio album, Too Weird to Live, Too Rare to Die!, in 2013. Prior to the release of the album, Smith unofficially left the band due to health and drug-related issues, leaving Urie and Weekes as the remaining members.

In 2015, Smith officially left the band after not performing live with the band since his departure in 2013. Shortly thereafter, Weekes reverted to being a touring member once again, leaving Urie as the only member of the official lineup. In April 2015, "Hallelujah" was released as the first single from Panic! at the Disco's fifth studio album, Death of a Bachelor (2016).

History

Formation and early years (2004–2005)

Panic! at the Disco was formed in 2004 in the suburban area of Summerlin, Las Vegas, by childhood friends Ryan Ross, who sang and played guitar, and Spencer Smith, who played drums. They both attended Bishop Gorman High School, and they began playing music together in ninth grade. They invited friend Brent Wilson from nearby Palo Verde High Schoolto join on bass, and Wilson invited classmate Brendon Urie to try out on guitar. The quartet soon began rehearsing in Smith's grandmother's living room. Urie grew up in a Mormon family in Las Vegas and early on missed some rehearsals to go to church. Ross initially was the lead vocalist for the group, but after hearing Urie sing back-up during rehearsals, the group decided to make him the lead. Initially, Panic! at the Disco was a Blink-182 cover band.

In the group's early experimental demos, the band created a sound that was different from the many death-metal groups that were performing in Las Vegas at the time. The band signed a recording contract without having performed a live show. "We never went out and played shows before we got signed because the music scene in Las Vegas is so bad. There's not a lot going on," Smith said. "In our practice space, there were something like 30 bands, and every day we'd walk into that room and hear the exact same death-metal bands. So it kind of influenced us to be different. And to get out of Las Vegas." Urie began working at Tropical Smoothie Cafe in Summerlin to afford rent for the band's new practice space. The four left their educations behind to concentrate on music; Ross had a falling out with his father when he dropped out of college, and when Urie dropped out of high school his parents kicked him out of the house. He stayed with friends until he could afford to rent an apartment.

Ross and Urie soon began to commit to their laptops the demos they had been developing and posted three early demos ("Time to Dance," "Nails for Breakfast, Tacks for Snacks" and "Camisado") on PureVolume. On a whim, they sent a link to Fall Out Boy bassist Pete Wentz via a LiveJournal account. Wentz, who was in Los Angeles at the time with the rest of Fall Out Boy working on the band's major-label debut, From Under the Cork Tree, drove to Las Vegas to meet with the young, unsigned band. Upon hearing "two to three" songs during band practice, Wentz was impressed and immediately wanted the band to sign to his Fueled by Ramen imprint label Decaydance Records, which made the band the first on the new label. Around December 2004, the group signed to the label. As news broke that Wentz had signed Panic! (who had yet to perform a single live show), fans on the Internet began to bash the group. "Almost right away we knew what was going to happen," Ross explained in a 2006 interview. "We had two songs online and people were already making assumptions on what kind of band we were and what we were going to sound like."

Meanwhile, Wentz began to hype the band wherever possible: from wearing "Pete! at the Disco" T-shirts onstage to mentioning the group in interviews. Wentz gave a quick shout-out to the band during a press junket on the day before the 2005 MTV Video Music Awards: "I've got a couple of bands coming out soon on Decaydance, one being this band called Panic! at the Disco," Wentz said. "Their record is going to be your next favorite record. It's called A Fever You Can't Sweat Out – get it before your little brother does." At the time of the band's signing, all of the band members were still in high school (with the exception of Ross, who was forced to quit UNLV). Urie graduated in May 2005, and Wilson and Smith finished school online as the band left for College Park, Maryland, to record their debut record.

A Fever You Can't Sweat Out (2005–2007)

The band relocated to College Park, Maryland, to record its debut album from June to September 2005. Although they only had shells of songs when they arrived, the rest of the album shaped up fast through the marathon session. "We didn't have a day off in the five-and-a-half weeks we were there, 12 or 14 hours a day," Ross said in a 2005 interview. "We were making things up in our heads that weren't there, and on top of the stress of trying to finish the record, we were living in a one-bedroom apartment with four people on bunk beds," recalled Ross. "Everyone got on everybody's nerves. Someone would write a new part for a song and someone else would say they didn't like it just because you ate their cereal that morning."

The album is split into two-halves: the first half is mostly electronic dance punk, while the second half features Vaudevillian piano, strings, and accordion. The band grew tired of writing only with drum machines and keyboards and, inspired by film scores (specifically the works of Danny Elfman and Jon Brion) decided to write a completely different half. "By the end of that, we were completely exhausted," said Ross of the studio sessions. After its completion, "we had two weeks to come home and learn how to be a band," Ross said. The group played its first live show during the summer of 2005 at local Las Vegas music venue The Alley on West Charleston. Afterwards, the band toured nationally on the Nintendo Fusion Tour with mentors Fall Out Boy, as well as Motion City Soundtrack, The Starting Line, and Boys Night Out for the rest of 2005.

The band's debut album, A Fever You Can't Sweat Out, was released September 27, 2005. Sales began relatively slow. It debuted at No. 112 on the Billboard 200 album chart, No. 6 on the Billboard Independent Albums chart, and No. 1 on the Billboard Top Heatseekers chart, with nearly 10,000 albums sold in the first week of release. Within a span of four months, Panic! would see the video for its first single, "I Write Sins Not Tragedies", rocket up the Billboard Hot 100 as sales of Fever passed the 500,000 mark. At the end of March 2006, the band announced a headlining tour. By August, the group's debut record was certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), and the music video for "I Write Sins Not Tragedies" won Video of the Year at the 2006 MTV Video Music Awards. "Some aspects of the fame are annoying, but at the end of the day it's something we're most grateful for. It's certainly opened the door to a whole new batch of opportunities," Ross said of the band's newfound fame and instant success.

In May 2006, Panic! at the Disco announced that original bassist Brent Wilson had left the band, "posting a statement that was both diplomatic and entirely inscrutable yet to mention any reason why Wilson is leaving Panic," according to MTV News. In June, Wilson asserted to MTV News that he was kicked out of the band via a phone call. "It was done as a phone call and the only person who spoke was Spencer. Apparently Brendon and Ryan were on the speakerphone too, but they didn't say a word. They never even said they were sorry," explained Wilson. Smith wrote a lengthy e-mail back to James Montgomery of MTV News, stating, in part, "We made the decision based on Brent's lack of responsibility and the fact that he wasn't progressing musically with the band," and revealed that Wilson did not write nor play any bass present on Fever: Instead, Urie recorded these parts. Wilson demanded a cut in royalties, and threatened to take his former band to court.

In 2006, the band supported The Academy Is... on the band's worldwide tour "Ambitious Ones and Smoking Guns" from January to May. Beginning in June, the group headlined its first unnamed national tour, that would last until August. During the group's performance at the 2006 Reading Festival in August, the band was greeted by excessive bottling, one of which hit Urie in the face that knocked him unconscious. Despite this, the band continued with its set after Urie recovered. The band's second headlining tour, dubbed the Nothing Rhymes with Circus Tour, began in November. In roughly one year, Panic! at the Disco went from being the opening act on a five-band bill to the headliners on a massive arena tour.

The Nothing Rhymes with Circus Tour feature the band's first highly theatrical live shows, which featured every song with dance numbers, skits and tricks performed by a six-member troupe, as the band donned intricate costumes, loosely re-enacting moments from the songs. Kelefa Sanneh of The New York Times noted the sudden success and circus-inspired tour of the young band in a concert review: "There’s something charming about watching a band trying to navigate sudden success, aided by a contortionist, a ribbon dancer and all the rest of it." MTV News favorably likened its theme and wardrobe to "Janet Jackson's audience-dividing, hypersexual The Velvet Rope Tour." The group, fresh off the major success of A Fever You Can't Sweat Out, took a break after non-stop touring, and the group members began formulating ideas for their next album together during the winter of 2006.

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