Swear to Shake It Up If You Swear to Listen

Panic! At the Disco is one of my guilty pleasures. They're a Las Vegas band that plays retro-80s-synth-infused dance-emo-punk-pop. Imagine Fall Out Boy doing the Killers doing Bloc Party doing My Chemical Romance. I shouldn't like them, but I do. They played SLC last night.
The openers were The Hush Sound and The Dresden Dolls, both of which I missed. I really would liked to have seen the Dresden Dolls, but I ended up walking in about five minutes before P!ATD took the stage. The venue was sold out and about 110 degrees inside. It was mostly a bunch of teenagers, and part of me was ready to go before the show even started, but I'm glad I stayed.

Panic! At the Disco
Originally uploaded by currtdawg.

They opened up with "The Only Difference Between Martyrdom and Suicide is Press Coverage." (Yes, all their song titles are like this.) The crowd went crazy, singing along with every word. I was kinda expecting them to be one of those bands that sounds good on the record, but sounds horrible live, but they weren't bad at all. It was a very theatrical show, blending twisted circus and goth cabaret. They even had a few dancers in garb reminiscent of a roaring 20s jazz club.
They worked their way through their album for about thirty minutes, then left the stage for a brief intermission, wherein the dancers came out to introduce the band members. The band then returned to finish the remaining songs. Whenever a band tours behind their debut album, they usually don't have a huge repitoire, so you can't really expect things to last too long. To elongate things, P!ATD included two covers: the first was a jazzed up version of Radiohead's "Karma Police," which kinda made me ill. The second was the Smashing Pumpkins' "Tonight, Tonight." I think they would have fared better sticking to their own material, but it's rare that I can appreciate anyone covering Radiohead. The song I wanted to hear most was "Camisado," which has to be the most upbeat yet heartbreaking song ever written about euthanasia. When they played it, I didn't want to stop dancing.
Overall, it was a pretty fun show, despite the heat and the couple grinding next to me. I'm really interested to see how this band's second album will sound. I hope it's as fun as their first.