PANIC!



Origin: Nashville, Tennessee, USA
Genres: Alternative rock, pop punk
Years active: 2004–present
Labels: Chaos Records

Biography

PANIC! is an American rock band from Nashville, Tennessee, formed in 2004. The band currently consists of lead vocalist and songwriter Ashley Perry, and composer, and multi-instrumentalist Gabriel Hunter. The was originally founded by Ashley Perry, Nick Asher as bassist, and Josh and Joey Fallon at lead guitar and drums, respectively. Gabriel Hunter and Ryan Ross Hernandez joined the band in 2005 just before hey were scheduled to enter the studio to record their debut album. Hunter joined as rhythm guitarist and Hernandez took lead guitarist duties from Josh Fallon, moving the latter to third guitar.

Perry and the Fallon brothers met at a private school in Franklin, Tennessee, agreeing to create the band just in matter of weeks from meeting each other. Before they had coined a name for the group, Nick Asher joined as the bassist. Asher was Ashley Perry's neighbor at the time. The band was very young at the time of forming the band, Perry was sixteen while Joey Fallon, the youngest member, was just fourteen. When Asher showed up, he was stunned to find out the drummer was only fourteen. He admitted "I had very, very, very, little faith in everyone in the band because of their age. I remember thinking, 'This is not going to work because this kid is way too young,' but that first day of practice was amazing. I knew we were on to something."

Ryan Ross Hernandez was originally signed to a record label as a solo artist in 2003. Hernandez was introduced to Ashley Perry by the label's A&R department in 2004. The original plan of the label was to create a duet project between Perry and Hernandez, with the rest of the band serving just as a backing band. When Hernandez joined the band, the rest of PANIC! saw it as both a move forced onto them by the label as well as a bad move due to Hernandez's trained skills as a blues and acoustic guitarist, but not rock disciplined. Hernandez reportedly wowed the members with the guitar tunes he could hit. In April 2005, after a small private performance for label executives at a concert hall, the band was signed.

During the first album, Ashley Perry served as the band's lead vocalist and primary lyricist, while Ryan Ross Hernandez was the primary composer and lead guitarist. PANIC! broke out of the music scene and reached mainstream success with their second studio album, Nobody Puts Baby in the Corner. Released in 2007 as the follow-up to their 2005 effort We Are the Directors of This Dramatic Love Story, the album won several awards and achieved quadruple platinum status after selling more than 4.1 million albums in the United States. It was a critical success as well, many acclaiming the vocals and joint writing of Perry and Hernandez. The album spawned two top ten hits: the double platinum certified lead single "I Liked You a Lot Better Before You Became a Fucking MySpace Whore" which reached number two on the Billboard Hot 100 and the platinum "Force Our Smiles, Baby, Half Dead". The group headlined tours around the world in 2007 and 2008 to support their record.

In November 2007, Hernandez announced his departure from the band to focus on his solo career. This brought Gabriel Hunter up to lead guitarist and Josh Fallon to rhythm.

In 2009, PANIC! released their follow-up album, Broken Down on Memory Lane, to major chart success, debuting at number one in seven countries and selling 560,000 copies in its first week in the US, with top five chartings worldwide. Broken Down on Memory Lane contained the hits "Disloyal Order of the Ignorant" and "There's Only One Exception When It Comes to Love".

After a two year hiatus and another three members departures, PANIC! returned this past July and released "Happiness Is Something You Need," serving as their one-off, comeback single. In an interview with MTV, Ashley Perry said that despite the band losing three of its founding members, they will be releasing new music in 2011, hinting likely to an EP release and a full-length coming in 2012. The singer also admitted that PANIC! style was likely to change with now her and Hunter at the forefront, but clarified that the band would still retain their signature sound.

THE MAN AND WOMAN BEHIND THE !


Ashley Nichole Perry
Born: December 18, 1988 (23)
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Hometown: Nashville, Tennessee
Instruments: Lead vocals, keyboard, drums, guitar
Influences: Death Cab for Cutie, Jimmy Eat World, MewithoutYou, Sunny Day Real Estate, Thrice, The Cure, Etta James, No Doubt, Coldplay, U2, Radiohead, Blink-182


Gabriel Martin Hunter
Born: April 30, 1984 (27)
Evanston, Illinois
Hometown: Chicago, Illinois
Instruments: Lead guitar, vocals, bass guitar, piano, drums, percussion, keyboard, trombone, saxophone, trumpet, synthesizer, mandolin, guitalele
Influences: Prince, Michael Jackson, David Bowie, Elvis Costello, Tom Waits, Nat King Cole, Buddy Holly, The Get Up Kids, The Who, Roberta Flack, Donny Hathaway

DISCOGRAPHY

WE ARE THE DIRECTORS OF THIS DRAMATIC LOVE STORY
(Release Date: May, 2005)

Track Listing

1. "When You Catch Fire"
2. "The Sounds of This Small Town"
3. "A Song for the Kids to Sing On a Long Weekend"
4. "The Cure to Growing Older"
5. "We'll Burn This City Down So They Can Remember Our Names"
6. "Rock N' Roll Just Ain't Our Style"
7. "Tell Everyone We Were Founded in Tennessee"
8. "I Could Crush You With My Voice and Witty Verses"
9. "Take Two of You and I"
10. "The Era of Innocence Ended in 2005"
11. "A Book of Conspiracies"
12. "Nashville, TN"
13. "Let My Heart Breathe"

NOBODY PUTS BABY IN THE CORNER
(Release Date: July, 2007)

Track Listing

1. "Force Our Smiles, Baby, Half Dead"
2. "We Are the Dealers of Hope, and Lies, and Friends"
3. "I Liked You a Lot Better Before You Became a Fucking MySpace Whore"
4. "The New Faces of Failure" (The Unconventional Love Song)
5. "Sometimes We Take Chances, Sometimes We Take Pills"
6. "Songs That Only Catch the Ear of the Desperate"
7. "The Has Beens of Husbands and Cunning Wives"
8. "Casting a Spell Over the Northern Hemisphere"
9. "God's Gift to Music and the Devil's Curse to Love"
10. "Our Debut Album Was Our Sophomore Slump"
11. "This Town Is Made of White Picket Fences"
12. "The Writer Who Never Made It As a Poet"
13. "Silent Lovers are the Best Kind of Lovers"
14. "The Music on the Airwaves"

BROKEN DOWN ON MEMORY LANE
(Release Date: September, 2009)

1. "Too Careful"
2. "Disloyal Order of the Ignorant"
3. "Who Framed God?"
4. "A World of Magic Can't Fix Your Tragic Life"
5. "Turn It Off (When Praying Doesn't Always Help)"
6. "There's Only One Exception When It Comes to Love"
7. "A Feeling We Don't Appeal to"
8. "Things Are Looking Up"
9. "Writing in Stone Across a Personal Map"
10. "Misguided Hearts"
11. "All I Wanted Was (Me & You)"

THANKS FOR THE MEMORIES - GREATEST HITS
(Release Date: December, 2009)

TOUR DATES

APPEARANCES