Fall Out Boy **1/2
June 24, The Pearl
Who’d have thunk the real stars of the Fall Out Boy-headlined Honda Civic Tour—aka a dizzying amount of ads in both display and commercial form promoting the car corp’s green machine—would be Panic! At the Disco’s Brendon Urie and Ryan Ross?
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After a short film by Pete Wentz interspersing old home videos with testimony about how deeply the film Invisible Children influenced the Fall Out Boy bassist, the four Chicago emo-punkers kicked off with “Thriller,” the first track off this year’s Infinity on High. “Grand Theft Autumn,” from 2003 debut Take This to Your Grave, followed, as did a brief, jokey rendition of Akon’s “Don’t Matter.” “This one goes out to my possible future cellmate,” Wentz prefaced before stopping the song with, “What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas!” and launching into From Under the Cork Tree’s “Sugar, We’re Going Down.”
As live feeds and out-there animation alternated on the dual screens flanking the stage, the band split the set between tracks from their two latter efforts. Unfortunately, even nifty video projection and showers of mylar streamers couldn’t supersede the muddy vocals and sullen clock-punching emanating from the stage. Wentz and guitarist Joe Trohman dutifully spun and leapt off the ramping drum riser, and though he’s apparently outgrown the whole running-his-tongue-down-his-bass-strings thing, Wentz did manage to keep his Clandestine Industries hoodie firmly in place over his angular, ironed bangs. “Hum Hallelujah” was dedicated to recent Vegas Decaydance signees The Cab; a faithful version of Michael Jackson’s “Beat It” was interrupted by a fist fight on the floor.
Following “This Ain’t a Scene, It’s an Arms Race,” Wentz introduced “my favorite band on the entire planet,” and as the screams hit supersonic levels, Urie and Ross perched on stools to deliver acoustic renditions of “The Only Difference Between Martyrdom and Suicide Is Press Coverage,” “But It’s Better If You Do” and “I Write Sins Not Tragedies.” “This is some coffeehouse shit going on,” Urie then remarked of former Blink-182 frontman Mark Hoppus’ entrance for Blink’s 1999 hit, “What’s My Age Again?” His +44 having cancelled tonight’s set due to another member’s family emergency, Hoppus led the two through Blink’s 1999 hit “What’s My Age Again?
”FOB returned for a quick “Thnks Fr Th Mmrs,” “The Take Over, The Break’s Over,” “Dance, Dance” and Grave’s “Saturday”; no encore. Though the band departed in a frighteningly thick blizzard of silver confetti, and Wentz ventured out to the barrier courtesy of a brawny security guard’s beefy arms, the lasting image was that of a grinning Urie, who earlier had appeared moved nearly to tears by the sold-out crowd’s reception: “I don’t know if this is the wrong thing to say or not, but ... this is probably the most fun I’ve ever had onstage.”
Photograph by Jacob Kepler