How well do you know “The Ballad Of Mona Lisa” by Panic! At The Disco?
It’s hard to believe Panic! At The Disco are celebrating nine years of their third album Vices & Virtues. Released in 2011, the follow-up to Pretty. Odd marked the first for Brendon Urie and Spencer Smith without Ryan Ross and Jon Walker who both departed nearly two full years prior. The fan-favorite record produced some standout tracks in the band’s discography including “Let’s Kill Tonight,” “Ready To Go (Get Me Out Of My Mind)” “The Calendar,” “The Ballad Of Mona Lisa” and more.
While Urie has shown off his love of metal with genre reworks of certain tracks, “The Ballad Of Mona Lisa” has lived on in its own way. Over the years, its entered the Billboard Hot 100 and won over elderly people. Urie and co. even still play it on the road, packing it into the nearly 30-song setlist on their most recent Pray For The Wicked tour.
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With its iconic music video referencing “I Write Sins Not Tragedies” as it awakens a steampunk wonderland inside a desolate church, see if you can remember all of the lyrics to the Vices & Virtues track below.
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Back in December 2018, Urie made good on his promise to launch a metal version of a Panic! At The Disco track. The musician shared a souped-up variant of “The Calendar” by way of his own Twitch stream, aired it during a Fortnite session.
“We did this in 2010,” Urie announces mid-stream. Can you imagine a full album of this?
“I want to do a metal project in particular,” Urie earlier revealed to Rock Sound. “I actually just played something for my bandmates recently. We have an old song called ‘The Calendar’ and I made a metal version of it from years back.”
This isn’t the last time Urie would share a metal song either. In late July, the vocalist teased a brief portion of a full take. When questioned if he was breaking his time away from work rule, he explained he did it in a “stoned and drunk” relaxation period. The following day, he shared the breakdown-filled full song.
Months later, Urie dropped another track, and this time it was for charity. The Panic! At The Disco frontman hosted a Twitch stream to raise funds for the Highest Hopes Foundation in November. Later in the evening, he brought along Josh Dun and Pete Wentz, and the musicians streamed themselves playing video games. Once they raised over $75,000, they premiered a brand new metal track live. Check it out here.
