Panic! at the Disco, Shepherds Bush Empire, May 4th 2011.

A deafening screech is the only thing you could hear as Brendon Urie and Co ran out from the backstage of the Shepherds Bush Empire to a crowd off 2,000 fans, to present their “Vice and Virtues(the name of their recently released album) tour”, 80% of them screeching girls, as Panic! At the Disco hit the stage for their only date in London for this tour. The show started with the slightly more powerful version, as it was live, of the new single “Ready to go” which caused the whole standing area to erupt in a jumping movement, a very good song to start the show.

Shepherds Bush is one of my favorite venues so it was nice returning there to see Panic! At the Disco, it is a very intimate arena and makes you feel very close to the bands performing, yet still somehow has the feel of an arena, especially when you hear the whole crowd sing back “I write sins not tragedies” so loud that you cannot hear Brendon Urie at all. Panic! At the Disco stuck to their traditional 1950’s style of clothing dressed in tuxedo’s and braces with quite a traditional basic lighting on them, but with a spotlight on Brendon, on the tearjerker “Always” which had a beautiful effect and caused the cliché swaying effect on the crowd and causing the more emotional people to cry, Myself not being one of them people, however it was still nice. “Who’s feeling horny?” shouted Brendon before jumping into crowd favorite “Lying Is The Most Fun a Girl Can Have Without Taking Her Clothes Off”. This causing a quite amusing “moshpit” which was the first of many in this gig; it was quite an intimate sweaty gig which had a lot of movement which is a good thing for a band like Panic! At the disco to achieve as their music is generally quite fast. For me the highlight of the evening was the moment when Panic! At the disco covered The Smiths famous hit “How soon is now?” it was an interesting cover but however it worked and was a very good performance.

I was very excited to see Panic! At the disco as I had liked them for years before seeing them here, so I was happy to hear a few oldies like; “Camisado and But it’s better if you do”  but I am very fond of their new album having heard them at this gig, so I think they have been successful for me in that aspect. They built a very good atmosphere and I felt like I wanted to dance throughout the gig especially with songs like, “The Only Difference between Martyrdom and Suicide Is Press Coverage”. When I left however I felt very disappointed as they announced “We haven’t got enough time to do the songs we hoped to do because of time restriction, so we have to do a one song encore” and they then rubbed salt into the wound by playing a new song about only 10% of the crowd had heard. It would have made the gig better if Panic! At the disco had ended on a better known song and would have had a better support artist. The support artist was announced on the day as if it was someone big, leading people into a false sense of excitement, then this band named “Love Letters” walked on, certainly not to my taste.

Rating: 3.5/5