Panic! At the Disco
A Fever You Can't Sweat Out

Less than two years ago, Panic! At the Disco were four nameless Las Vegas teens covering blink-182 songs in a living room. Cut to 2006, and the photogenic emo-pop outfit have captured Video of the Year at MTV's VMAs and sold 1.4 million copies of their galvanic debut, A Fever You Can't Sweat Out.

The transformation began when Fall Out Boy bassist/Decaydance label head Pete Wentz discovered the band online and offered a contract — though neither fame nor fortune was instantaneous. ''We were living in a one-room apartment in College Park, Maryland, to make the record,'' remembers guitarist and lyricist Ryan Ross, 20. ''There were bugs all over. It was gross.'' Luckily, roaches are a thing of the past, thanks to hummable ditties and the charisma of singer Brendon Urie, 19, a pillow-lipped Brando in an Oliver Twist overcoat. What's ahead for '07? ''We'd love to work with Adam Duritz from Counting Crows,'' Urie says. ''And Tom Waits,'' adds Ross, though ''that's just kind of a dream.'' Then again, so were clean sheets. — Leah Greenblatt