- Release date:
- March 25, 2008
- Artist/Band name:
- Panic at the Disco
- Record label:
- Fueled by Ramen/Atlantic
- Official Web Site:
- http://www.panicatthedisco.com/
Why you should care: Love them or hate them, PATD sold over two million copies of their debut album, “A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out,” and you have to give any band with that much early success props for having the stones to try something different.
Verdict: The Panic lads are clearly not ones to do anything half-assed—just as their debut took many of emo’s conventions to ridiculous extremes, “Odd” finds them pushing the fey orchestrations and cartoon imagery of “Strawberry Fields”–era Beatles to the breaking point, and sometimes beyond. “When the Day Met the Night” finds the moon and the sun falling in love over tea in the garden, complete with surging strings and a peppy horn section; “I Have Friends in Holy Spaces” funnels Urie’s voice, plus ukulele, trombone and clarinet, through the crackle of an old phonograph. It’s all a bit much, but still, there are a handful of undeniably great songs on “Odd,” particularly the celebratory “That Green Gentleman (Things Have Changed)” and the organ-led closer “Mad as Rabbits.” And if the band didn’t lay it on so thick, “Odd” wouldn’t be such over-the-top fun.
X-Factor: “Pretty. Odd.” is the first PATD album featuring new bassist Jon Walker. The band infamously fired their first bassist, Brent Wilson, after claiming that he didn’t actually play any of the bass parts on “A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out.”
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