Favorite summer song of the century, so far

I'd never heard a single song by Panic at the Disco before last month, but when I read reviews of their new album "Pretty. Odd." which all used the Beatles and Sgt Pepper as jumping-off reference points, I thought, I will like this album, and I bought it completely unheard (whatever the aural equivalent of "sight unseen" is). And I do like it, though overall the album sounds less like the Beatles and more like an '00 band influenced by the Fab Four as filtered through ELO, Cheap Trick, Oasis, The Posies, and on through The Killers, Franz Ferdinand, etc.

The problem: the lyrics, which are more ridiculous than average for the 21st century. Musically, the choruses are catchy but the words you have to sing along with are a little embarrassing, like, "I know it's sad that I never gave a damn about the weather / but it never gave a damn about me" from "Do You Know What I'm Seeing?" Even worse, "You remind me of a few of my famous friends / Well, that all depends on what you qualify as friends" from "I Have Friends in Holy Spaces." And the titles of many of the songs have little or nothing to do with the lyrics. But I'm carping about things that no one cares much about these days. There's also a throwaway folk song parody appropriately called "Folkin' Around" that I could have done without.

The good things: most everything else. There are a number of direct Beatles references, such as the Sgt. Pepperish opening, horn riffs used as coloring, and a "Day in the Life" cacophony. But really the band sounds more like a less drugged-out, more high-energy Oasis (though some of the songs, like the wonderful "Nine in the Afternoon," are in fact about being high). And as far as the title of this post, there's a great summer song called "When the Day Met the Night" which I haven't been able to get out of my head for days: "In the middle of summer / All was golden when the day met the night." Unlike a lot of recent pop, this one will probably stay in heavy rotation in my car for the rest of the year.