I'll Be Late for My Funeral: Panic! At the Disco's "Death of a Bachelor"

May 15, 2022

My Chemical Romance released their first music in almost a decade last Thursday. Fall Out Boy is touring the world (and I still haven’t caught a show). The Twitterverse is finally turning on Brendon Urie for actions of his that came to light in 2020. So, of course, the emo trinity is on my mind. What better album to review than one of the least emo albums any of the three released? (Fear not: two of my favorite albums are trinity classics and inevitably will be reviewed here.)

“Death of a Bachelor” is the album I typically blame for my love of singing. How could I not? Brendon Urie writes fantastic tunes. Unfortunately for me, he has a vocal range of four octaves. To paraphrase the album’s eponymous song: “Lifetime of singing at the expense of the death of my vocal cords.” Furthermore, I’ve been blessed with long-suffering roommates; otherwise I could have switched out “vocal cords” with “social life.” I’m an unashamed shower singer.

The song I enjoy singing the most off the album depends on the day. That’s the joy of “Death of a Bachelor:” It has the silky slow ballads (“Impossible Year”), the party jams (“Don’t Threaten Me with a Good Time”), and the champagne-toast standards (“House of Memories”). I have more success with the low note in “Impossible Year” than the high note in “Death of a Bachelor,” but I still give both my all every time they come up on shuffle. That’s the power of Brendon Urie’s showmanship: His effortless singing invites you to join him on stage and become a singer yourself if just for a moment. With eleven different tunes to pick from, you’ll always find a song to belt from “Death of a Bachelor.”

Highlights:

• “Don’t Threaten Me with a Good Time:” Lyrics for your amusement: “I lost a bet to a guy in a Chiffon skirt / But I make these high heels work / I've told you time and time again / I'm not as think as you drunk I am.”

• “Death of a Bachelor:” The song that taught me how to sing in falsetto - or rather, it taught me which vocal cords to use for falsetto. “Sing” is a strong word for my warblings.

• “Golden Days:” You can almost smell the wine and feel the heat coming off of Bianca Jagger’s new yacht.

• “House of Memories:” If you didn’t get enough reminiscing from “Golden Days” (like me), lucky you - here’s “House of Memories.”

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to blow out my vocal cords to “Golden Days” for the millionth time.