The Heartbreaking End Of Panic! At The Discos 2006 Summer Tour (Masterpost)

The Heartbreaking End of Panic! at the Disco‘s 2006 Summer Tour (Masterpost)

In summer of 2006, Panic! at the Disco was on top of the world. Their debut album was an unexpected hit, despite initially being hated by music critics, and their avant-garde tour circuit across America established them as both an artistic and financial success. Even better, they had racked up an impressive four nominations for the MTV Video Music Awards.

The last performance of their tour was scheduled to be on the first day of the Lollapalooza festival in Chicago, IL, on Friday, August 4, 2006: the perfect, triumphant end to the perfect tour.

Unfortunately, fate had another plan.

Ryan Ross’s father, George Hammond Ross Jr., was an alcoholic who had been in and out of the hospital for some time. He and his son had a notoriously difficult and strained relationship, mostly due to problems associated with alcoholism, and Ryan had written two songs about it: “Camisado” and “Nails for Breakfast, Tacks for Snacks”.

An article from Kerrang in 2006 interviewed Ryan about his family troubles:

Ross, meanwhile, found growing up a more tricky prospect. As fragile as a porcelain doll - as if a strong gust of wind or the wrong words would crush him to dust - he writes the clever lyrics that frontman Brendon Urie sings. He was outgoing as a small child, but somewhere along the line he became cripplingly shy. Keen to give his son a good start in life, his father, an ex-marine, worked to send him to a private Catholic school - although Ross is an atheist - hoping to provide the education he never got. Ross found he had little in common with his wealthy classmates.

Meanwhile, his home life was falling apart. His parents split up when he was young; he hardly ever speaks to his mother and rarely sees his two half-brothers. Which meant he was left alone to deal with his father’s growing problem with alcohol - as beautifully portrayed in the song ‘Nails for Breakfast, Tacks for Snacks.’ Ross’ fights with his father were exacerbated by Ross’ decision to concentrate on the band rather than going to college.

“He was pretty much dead set on me going to college and I got a scholarship,” he says quietly. “He thought I was stupid for throwing that away. His problems with alcohol magnified and skewed things even further. I was not staying at home for weeks at a time. I was staying with my girlfriend, staying with the other guys in the band. There were times when I almost had to sleep at our rehearsal space, ‘cause I didn’t have anywhere to go. Obviously I loved him and I cared about him, but when you’re getting kind of abused by that person, at the same time it’s really hard to try to help them.”

At the end of July 2006, during a televised interview in Vancouver, Ryan received news that his father was in the hospital again and that it wasn’t looking good. Understandably, this made him check his phone repeatedly and have a barely-repressed anxiety attack, which resulted in the interviewer actually taking away his cell phone and teasing him about it on-air.

This is horrifyingly immortalized in the fandom (albeit out-of-context) because Brendon showed support for his grieving friend with a comforting hand squeeze. (Jon also flips off the interviewer behind his back.)

George Ross Jr. passed away on July 28, 2006, with memorial services scheduled for August 3.

Ryan heard about his father’s passing while on the band’s tour bus, which he discussed a few months later in an interview with Rolling Stone magazine:

Last July, [Ryan’s] father died in his sleep at the age of sixty. Panic were en route from Vancouver to Seattle on their bus when Ross heard the news. “I could almost feel that it was going to happen, because of the way he would treat himself,” he says. “I got a phone call, and I knew right away what the police officer was going to tell me. I just knew.”

Ryan also talked about his father’s funeral in the same Rolling Stone interview:

“The day of his funeral, it was raining and… it was strange to be raining that time of year. After the service, I went back and put my hand on the casket and kind of said goodbye. Right then, it stopped raining. The clouds blew away, and the sun came out, and it got warm. I spoke at the funeral and said that I think the one thing my dad cared about since I was born was that he wanted to raise me. I think he felt like he was done with that and had nothing else to do, so he just let go and stopped living. It’s almost like it’s better this way because it’s what he wanted. I miss him, but I feel like everything’s all right now. It was sad, but I got back out on tour and only missed three shows.”

The next day was the Lollapalooza show, and Ryan was determined to play it despite the circumstances.

The results are, as you could imagine, horribly sad in context. Ryan and Brendon’s vocals are both strained for the duration of the show, and the entire band looks on the brink of tears for most of their time onstage. “Camisado” and “Nails for Breakfast, Tacks for Snacks” are particularly gut-wrenching.

The performance was also besieged with logistical errors, including microphone trouble, poor stage management, and a sound delay that gets progressively worse over the course of the show. The boys tried their hardest anyway, but the performance is not one of their best. Making matters even stranger, portions of the concert are lost forever.

Noticeably, Ryan also chose to do his hair and makeup in a way that covers most of his face. He has admitted to using his elaborate makeup designs as a mask and confidence-booster, so it is unsurprising that he did one of his most intricate looks on such an emotionally difficult day.

You may recognize this look, in fact, from a popular gif taken from the tail end of their performance of “Lying is the Most Fun a Girl Can Have Without Taking Her Clothes Off.”

The next time you see this floating around the fandom, remember the context.

~Mods C, M, and B

Morty: “You can’t do it!!”

Rick:

the two best songs by american rock band my ch*mical r*mance are about, according to gerard, getting fucked in the ass (you know what they do to guys like us in prison) and, according to anyone with cognitive thought processes, eating pussy (f.t.w.w.w.). the range.

concept playlists

feel better;  it’s been a long week, not moving from your permanently dark bedroom, your phone forgotten under the bed with a hundred missed messages, but you’re finally opening your eyes and seeing a sliver of early morning sunlight filter in behind the curtains that a mysterious breeze blew open.

daisy chains;  it’s late spring or early summer and you’re dozing with your best friends in the grass, the slow and peaceful brush of the warm breeze keeping you in that state of just waking from a pleasant dream.

songs to run away to;  you’re packing an overnight bag and taking the first bus out of the city. you’re not exactly running away, but you don’t plan on coming back. all you know is that your only goal is to keep on running.

classical jams;  it’s your fancy neighbour’s annual ball held in their gothic castle and you’re getting turnt to tchaikovsky while very deliberately disappointing your parents who wanted you to use the occasion to find an upstanding suitor.

dark academia but it slaps;  vague fuck the school system vibes, doing stupid shit with your close friends, caffeinated all-nighters, a chaotic gleam in your eye as you throw paper planes made from your essays out of the highest window in campus, not knowing if your friend really did commit murder. in this household we don’t take ourselves too seriously.

You know what? Fuck it. Full homo.

I would die for nicky. I love her so much. Seriously. What a hottie 💞

The future is bulletproof

The aftermath is secondary

It’s time to do it now and do it loud

Killjoys

Make some noise

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

Na, na, na, na, na

Drugs💊, gimme drugs💊, gimme drugs💊, I don’t need it

But I’ll sell💵 what you got, take the cash 💰and I’ll keep it

Eight legs to the wall, hit the gas, kill them all

And we crawl, and we crawl, and we crawl you be my detonator

Love ❤️ , gimme love ❤️ , gimme love ❤️ , I don’t need it

But I’ll take what I want from your heart ♥️ and I’ll keep it

In a bag 💼 , in a box 📦 , put an X on the floor

Gimme more, gimme more, gimme more, shut up and sing it with me

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(From mall security)

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(To every enemy)

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(We’re on your property)

Standing in V formation

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(Let’s blow an artery)

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(Get plastic surgery)

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(Keep your apology)

Give us more detonation

More, gimme more, gimme more

Oh, let me tell you about the sad 😢 man

Shut up 🤐 and let me see

your jazz hands 👐🏼

Remember when you were a madman

Thought you was Batman and hit the party with a gas can

Kiss 💋 me, you animal 🦒

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(You run the company)

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(Fuck like a Kennedy)

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(I think we’d rather be)

Burning 🔥 your information✉️

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(Let’s blow an artery)

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(Get plastic surgery)

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(Keep your apology)

Give us more detonation

And right here, right now

All the way in Battery 🔋 City 🌃

The little children 👶🏼 raise their open, filthy palms

Like tiny daggers 🗡 up to heaven

And all the Juvie halls and the Ritalin rats 🐀

Ask angels 👼🏼 made from neon

And fucking garbage 🗑 scream out what will save us

And the sky opened up

Everybody wants to change the world 🌎

Everybody wants to change the world 🌍

But no one, no one

Wants to die⚰️

Wanna try, wanna try, wanna try

Wanna try, wanna try, now, I’ll be your detonator

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(Make no apology)

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(It’s death 💀 or victory)

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(On my authority)

Crash and burn 🔥, young👧🏽 and loaded🤑

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(Drop like a bullet shell)

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(Just like a sleeper cell)

Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na

(I’d rather go to hell)

Than be in a purgatory

Cut my hair 💇🏽‍♀️, gag and bore me

Pull this pin, let this world 🌍 explode💥🔥