REVIEW: The Best Worst Concert I've Ever Attended


So…Panic! At The Disco is a band, and I just happen to know excessive information about it. I blame having hyper focus on interests and hours of free time as a high schooler. After I went to the Pray for the Wicked tour, my relationship to the band waned. I just kinda stopped caring, then there were some unsavory information and rumors coming out about Brendon Urie, and it just became a non-part of my life.

Until a new album was announced. I wasn’t sure if the new album would be good, but I had been to two Panic! concerts with my bestie (Koedi), and we decided to go to this new album’s tour, because it seemed like it would be fun! It had been tradition!

The first single came out, and I liked it well enough. “Viva Las Vengeance” wasn’t my favorite song I have ever heard, but I dug the sound. My thought process was that if this was the first single (likely released to be popular), then the rest of the songs would be better! I was optimistic!  

And…well…Viva Las Vengeance the album was released and oh boy. It was. It was….bad. Plainly, it was bad. I listened to the album once and went “Oh. Okay, my interest in this band is cured! No longer will Brendon Urie occupy a space in my mind!” But I was wrong. Oh baby boy, was I wrong.

Leading up to the concert, I was a little…intrigued. Past concerts were near empty, extremely dead, and it became clear that maybe this wasn’t going to be the most successful stadium tour to ever exist. And we started to think…we’re going to get upgraded tickets, aren’t we? Well…sure enough we did.

We (Julia, Koedi, Fletcher, & I) showed up about an hour before the doors opened so we had time to hit the Viva Las Airstream. We got our photos at the photo ops, then we got in line. Compared to the last concert (where we showed up 2 hours early and were like 15th in line) we got in line 30 minutes before and were just a few people from the door. This concert was a little bit dead. And most of the line was millennial couples or groups of middle-schoolers.

In line for the concert we filmed a TikTok of our dance to the song "Middle of a Breakup." Oh, by the way! We made a dance to once of the songs for the album specifically to make our concert experience more fun. Update: it did make it more fun. 

We make our way in the door and then make our way up to the 300-level of the Moda Center only to find that our section is physically blocked up with a massive curtain. We ask for some help and, sure enough, we're getting reseated. 

We go all the way back to the front doors on the main level and some nice old ladies give us four new tickets. We find our new seats (200-level now! Woo!).

Back at the floor level, Julia and I spy out of the corner of our eye the person running the Panic! At The Disco Instagram, and he has been known to give out free floor/pit tickets to people. We linger around for a minute then, because we look so hot, HE APPROACHES US. He asks if there's only two of us, but we reveal there are indeed four of us. He puts two tickets back in his pocket and instead films himself giving us a t-shirt. 

Julia and I started beating ourselves up. This is terrible news! We almost got to be close enough to stare into Brendon Urie's eyes!

The sheer amount we walked around the Moda Center on the fateful night

The first opening act, Jake Wesley Rogers, performs and he's great! He plays piano, he slays, and we have a good time. But at the same time, I am beating myself up over the fact that we could be standing in the pit, staring into Brendon Urie's pained eyes.

So then Marina comes on and, oh boy, is she great. She is the most attractive woman I have ever seen. Julia screams at the top of her lungs. We get to bop to "Bubblegum Bitch." Marina does sing with a vocal backing track which I think is a bit weird, but literally I would forgive that woman for anything. She was gorgeous and is such a great performer. 

Then. It's time for the big guns. It's time for Brendon! At The Disco to come on stage. After a 10 minute countdown on the big screen that concludes with "Running Up That Hill" by Kate Bush playing throughout the arena, the lights go off, and Brendon Urie pops out of the stage singing "Say Amen (Saturday Night)." It's very unceremonious, and he doesn't say a word between songs or anything. He plays a few, then runs off stage, and comes back in the Viva Las Vengeance jacket. Oh yeah, it's time. 

Now I can't stress this enough. Nothing can kill the vibe of a concert as much as playing an entire album front to back. The only exception that can kill the vibe more is if that album is bad and the majority of your crowd doesn't know it. 

Brendon Urie plays Viva Las Vengeance in its entirety track by track. As each song wears on, more people start sitting down. By "Say it Louder" no one in our section is standing and dancing...well...except for us.

Because despite not liking the album in the slightest, we had listened to it enough to at least know the chorus of every song, and at least know every time he was going to say something out of pocket like "I got a 2.1 GPA."

During the set of Viva Las Vengeance I had the time of my life. We sang and danced. We screamed. When he performed "Local God" Julia screamed with her whole chest about Ryan Ross. Koedi kept making funny little jokes about the lines that made me cackle. We all did the dance to "Middle of a Breakup." I only cringed at the strain on Brendon Urie's voice for the entirety of "Sad Clown," but it was okay because at the end he goes "haha I just blew my voice out" before continuing on to the next song with a raspy voice. Despite the fact that the album is bad, despite the fact that it seems Brendon Urie doesn't want to be performing anymore, we made sure that we had a fun time at the concert. 

us with the sad clown in question
 

Even though I'm smiling
I'm crying
Sick and tired of trying
I'm dying
Is this all there is?

- "Sad Clown"

 

He finished the entire album, then went back to doing some of his popular songs again. He completely skipped Vices & Virtues (my favorite album) and didn't play a single song from that era but I'm not mad! Not very mad! I'm fine! 

When he started "Nine in the Afternoon" and everyone started getting overly excited he showed a bit of surprise, and I felt an intense pang of sadness, watching Brendon Urie sing Ryan Ross's words. If you don't understand, please do just a couple minutes of research into the band's history.

And it was a pretty normal end of concert. He did this little canned speel before his encore songs, and when I say canned I mean painfully, as if he were reading a script. Ended with "High Hopes" and I of course did the Pete Buttigeg campaign dance the entire time.

We left the concert, got picked up, and it was over. It was like it never even happened.

Now there's one thing I haven't mentioned, which is the fact that Brendon Urie appeared to be intoxicated for most of the concert. I hate to say it, but I've seen him perform enough to know that he just didn't look normal. I don't want to speculate too much, but when you see a man sway while holding a beer and belting "Death of a Bachelor" it just becomes a little bit concerning. I hope Brendon Urie had fun, but based on the numerous interviews he has given describing the debilitating anxiety he feels around performing, I'm not sure he did. 

"I’m just a nervous wreck most of the time, and when I’m not expending energy to get rid of that, you know I can become really anxious and have like severe like anxiety attacks, but that’s why it’s so important for me to keep performing, it’s like I have to be on. Like, turn it on! Be this guy now, because you can’t have a breakdown of your anxiety on stage, that would be bad, so play a character, do something else, act like you have the answers or something.” 

– Brendon Urie on Song Exploder, Episode 240: Panic! At the Disco, "Viva Las Vengeance." 


Why the fuck is this man still touring?

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