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"Panic" is a song by the English rock band the Smiths, released in 1986 and written by singer Morrissey and guitarist Johnny Marr. The first recording to feature new member Craig Gannon, "Panic" bemoans the state of contemporary pop music, which "says nothing to me about my life", and exhorts listeners to "burn down the disco" and "hang the DJ" in retaliation. The song was released by Rough Trade as a single and reached No. 7 on the Irish Singles Chart and No. 11 on the UK Chart. Morrissey considered the song's appearance on daytime British radio a "tiny revolution" in its own way, as it aired amongst the very music it criticized.
It was later included in the compilation albums The World Won't Listen and Louder Than Bombs.
This song was written in reaction to an incident where the BBC DJ, Steve Wright, played the trite and spunky Wham! track, "I'm Your Man," following a news report about the Chernobyl disaster – a devastating nuclear accident that occurred on April 26, 1986 at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine. Guitarist, Johnny Marr, recalled to NME in 1987: "'Panic' came about at the time of Chernobyl. Morrissey and myself were listening to a radio report about it. The stories of this shocking disaster comes to an end and then immediately we're off into Wham's 'I'm Your Man.' I remember actually saying, 'What the f*ck has this got to do with people's lives?' And so, 'Hang the blessed DJ.' I think it was a great lyric, important and applicable to anyone who lives in England."
Marr refuted these claims to NME in 1987: "To those who took offense at the 'burn down the disco' line I'd say, 'Please show me the black members of New Order!' For me, personally, New Order makes great disco music, but there's no black people in the group. The point I'm making is that you can't just interchange the words 'black' and 'disco', or the phrases 'black music' and 'disco music'. It makes no earthly sense."
This was the first song to feature Craig Gannon on guitar. Gannon was initially hired to replace bassist, Andy Rourke, who was fired due to his heroin addiction. Rourke was rehired a few weeks later, so Marr offered Gannon the position of second guitarist instead.
Musically, this song is based on T. Rex's glam rock anthem, "Metal Guru." Marr recalled to Les Inrockuptibles in 1999: "When we wrote 'Panic' Morrissey was obsessed with 'Metal Guru' and wanted to sing in the same style. He didn't stop singing it in an attempt to modify the words of 'Panic' to fit the exact rhythm of 'Metal Guru.' He also exhorted me to use the same guitar break so that the two songs are the same!" NME readers named this the Song of the Year in 1986. 21 years later, in 2007, "Panic" was ranked at #21 on the same magazine's The 50 Greatest Indie Anthems Ever list.
This was a single-only release and consequently did not feature on a traditional studio album. It was later included in the 1987 compilation album, Louder Than Bombs, which consists of a mixture of singles, remixes, and B-sides.
In 2007, NME placed "Panic" at number 21 in its list of the 50 Greatest Indie Anthems Ever. In 2017, Rob Sheffield of Rolling Stone placed the song number six in his ranking of 73 songs by the Smiths. At Glastonbury 2017, a Smiths tribute band led the audience in a protest against Theresa May by changing the lyrics "hang the DJ" to "hang Theresa".
The Australian indie rock band The Panics took their name from this song.
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