"My Chemical Romance is this generation's Nirvana"

You busy yourself with fashion
I busy myself with fun
I’m busy painting these mini metal skeletons and
You say I’m dressed like a bum

Fiiinally checking out Black Parade after years of only hearing a song now and then in the wild. Pretty great album! But I also like Panic at the Disco so I suppose that makes sense

I think Three Cheers is my favourite now. Black Parade has some of their best songs (Teenagers, Mama, Sharpest Lives) as well as some of their worst (Cancer, WTTBP, Disenchanted). Danger Days with a few songs replaced by some of the Conventional Weapon tracks would have made a killer album.

sucks that their reunion plans had to be put on hold - was supposed to go see them in March but of course it didn’t happen.

"WTTBP" and "Disenchanted" are probably my two favorites haha! "Cancer" is not great, but I think it's a really solid album otherwise. I'll check out Three Cheers next

"Sleep" is my least fave just because the climax sounds hopelessly squashed to me. (good song tho)

I get what you mean about squashed but I blame the production for that - "Sleep" sounds great live. 

"WTTBP" kept me from actively checking them out for years lol. I like it when they lean more T. Rex/Bowie than Queen, though I've come to accept that the Queen influence is a huge part of their sound.

It's amusing how blatant they were with their hero worship too - Gerard's vocal runs at the end of "The Sharpest Lives" are a pitch perfect impression of Matt Bellamy/Muse, who I suspect he was listening to a lot while they were recording this. But not terrible! One of their best choruses. And then there's like "Kill All Your Friends" which is so clearly "Where is My Mind?" run through a Britpop filter lol.

anyway at their best, MCR takes a lot of things that on paper should sound terrible and somehow makes them good.

Hard to unhear the squashing on "Sleep" now that you point it out. It starts right out with it. Good song still

I gave Three Cheers a few listens, another solid album. The songs are more uniform in style compared to Black Parade, and I have a harder time remembering songs where the title is not in the song, so I probably need a few more listens before it all sinks in. I can understand now why you may not like "Disenchanted", Roz - it's like a half-speed rewrite of the even-better "I'm Not OK". That and "Helena" and "Ghost of You" are really strong. And speaking of hero worship, the interlude straight up sounds like Radiohead

The first time I "got" Three Cheers, what hooked me was the one-two punch of Ghost of You and Jetset Life is Gonna Kill You. Both of those choruses are just so ultra-processed and saturated that I just felt like I was in a hurricane. You just get done being completely wrung out by Ghost of You and Jetset comes on like "let's do that again, shall we?"

Eyes. pic.twitter.com/LUK9DmduYC

— My Chemical Romance (@MCRofficial) December 8, 2020

You know, I was wondering what the hell this was about and it turns out they’re putting out a Revenge-era makeup line: https://www.allure.com/story/hipdot-my-chemical-romance-makeup-collection

Only 16 years too late, lol.

Gerard provides guest vocala for the new song from Ibaraki - a black metal project of Trivium's Matt Heafy and Ihsahn from Emperor.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7rn2BhWHAg

This thread is now older than Nevermind was when this thread was started.

Annie Zaleski making a convincing case: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2022/may/10/my-chemical-romance-how-the-vilified-band-turned-antipathy-into-triumph?CMP=share_btn_tw

All of this may be a passing fad – but the alternative rock realm MCR left behind has expanded in their image: it’s a place where greater honesty, empathy and a willingness to understand mental health difficulties are flourishing, and in which boundaries of gender and genre are dissolving. The late rappers Lil Peep and Juice Wrld continue to have large followings thanks to their deeply vulnerable, personal lyrics. After two years plus of the pandemic, a crop of songwriters known for talking frankly about mental health – such as Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker, Lucy Dacus, Soccer Mommy and Japanese Breakfast – have elevated profiles.

Today, MCR’s legacy is arguably comparable to that of Nirvana, another group of scrappy underdogs who proudly identified with the outcasts. Both bands drew on underground punk influences for inspiration and spoke to the marginalised; both became cultural forces by accident. Like Kurt Cobain, Way is an outspoken feminist (and fan of riot grrrl). These parallels weren’t lost on him. “I found myself in a position where I was obviously not nearly at the level that Kurt was, but I was speaking to a young generation of people,” he told GQ last year. “It doesn’t mean you have to play the fame game or the red carpet game or anything like that … Nirvana inspired us to reject those things.”

They'll be starting their tour in less than a week! Hope all goes well for them.

well-timed revive bc....

NEW SONG

https://mcr.lnk.to/thefoundationsofdecay

IT'S FUCKING AMAZING

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V2kWUJkRvVs

HOLY SHIT THANK YOU BRAD!

Wow, wasn't expecting this. Cool song, goes back to the Three Cheers-era sound a bit. I loved pretty much everything I've heard from this band from Three Cheers on and I hope hope hope there is a new album coming

Surprisingly good

oh wow this is pretty fantastic! gerard’s vocals are weirdly buried in the mix though (not that I’m complaining, I kinda prefer it like this?)

it’s like a polished version of their Bullets era, right up to the 9/11 references

Very, very good indeed.

gerard’s vocals are weirdly buried in the mix though (not that I’m complaining, I kinda prefer it like this?)

Vocals were pretty low in Hesitant Alien, although that was a while ago now. Then he did that black metal thing a couple months ago.

i don't know why i resisted i brought you my bullets for so long. i've definitely listened to it more than a few times, but it's only now dawning on me what an emo classic it is

i think from three cheers-on they become more distinguished, more of their own thing that i can't get other versions of, but also: they started off with an awesome regular-ass emo album

more of their own thing

That's the thing about Bullets for me - it's really good, but it reminds me so much of bands that I was already a fan of, like Thrice and Thursday and Saves the Day.

New song doesn't do anything for me.

I never quite got the appeal of this band and it's crazy to me that they've become so huge, esp in 2022. I was much more of an AFI guy haha

I HATED Welcome To The Black Parade back in the day. Detested.

But then I met Gerard and he's a darling. He was interviewing Grant Morrison, who I was fortunate to have accompanied reading a prose poem on stage @ the Opera House (I improvised cello + laptop) and various MCR fans contacted me afterwards saying they loved it. Aww. [Sincere apologies for this humblebrag]
I also really liked Gerard's reboot of Doom Patrol, I must admit.

So I went into this with an open mind and yeah, it's a great song. Nice one.

That’s really cool, raven! WTTBP also kept me from checking them out for years though I always thought “Helena” and “I’m Not OK” were jams. Finally won me over just before the reunion.

anyway, even cranky mfs like Billy Corgan have nothing bad to say about Gerard - SP posted this on their tiktok yesterday lol

goin through the discog

this is the greatest band of all time

i reach that conclusion once i hit "the sharpest lives" on the black parade every time

looks like they performed Boy Division at their first gig on tour <3

I like that article, and I also like that it reiterates the claim that launched this thread 16 years ago.

(The Annie Zeleski article, I mean.)

love this new track - goddamn they still know how to do a big fuckoff chorus <3

I remember the buzz around their first album (I Brought You My Bullets) and just thinking kinda..."meh". The buildup for Three Cheers was kind of interesting as the major label signing was out of left field for me. Definitely some jams on that one. The Black Parade kinda took me by surprise (in a good way) with its almost classic rock theatrics. I was really interested in the proto-punk album they were supposed to put out, which I think came out later as Conventional Weapons. The Danger Days album did very little for me and they kinda just fizzled after that. Anyway that's been my journey with MCR and it's been wild to see how much nostalgia there is for them. Maybe I'll see them at When We Were Young or the Forum, but I ain't paying top dollar. lol

i started listening to some of frank iero's stuff recently and my impression was that the guy can't sing or write lyrics worth a damn, but he's a massive part of why MCR is so good - stylistically all over the place but really great at song structures, choruses, playing around with riffs and rhythms.

gerard gets a lot of credit obviously, but i think it's the combo of him and frank that really makes the band work

Brought You My Bullets didn't really hook me but I honestly feel the band hasn't placed a wrong foot since. like not just the albums, but the Conventional Weapons releases, Mad Gear and Missile Kid, Black Parade b-sides... I love it all. Hesitant Alien just as good, but some of Gerard's recent singles aren't quite at the same level

absolutely hilarious and great and very much in character: https://www.them.us/story/my-chemical-romance-merch-tramp-stamp-shirt

Awesome. That's very sweet.

Here's a fan video of the live debut of Foundations of Decay (the channel also has videos of many more songs from the concert). Some unfortunate audience singing basically drowning out Gerard.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkl8_vs6tl4

The thing about this song is that on my first listen, I was like, ok, this is good. Maybe not the best MCR song I've ever heard, but it's definitely a return to form. Only listened to it a handful of times on the day it came out because I haven't been on an MCR tangent lately. But then a few days later, the chorus popped back into my head out of nowhere, which I took as a good sign.

listening to conventional weapons today, still think they were right to shelve it, but there are so many incredible hooks on it ("boy division," "ambulance, "gun.") that i'm glad they put it out anyway. imo the bare bones garage rock approach gets ropier the further they get into ballad territory

even then i'm just getting picky, like i don't think "the world is ugly" has the impact it intends but i don't really hate any of this band's songs

ugh i cannot deny it, danger days is still my favorite

from "save yourself" on it is just a steady program of the best songs ever

“Ambulance” is soo good, it’s their Jimmy Eat World moment.

have you heard the earlier version of “the world is ugly” Brad? there are one or two performances on YouTube from 2008 or so. it doesn’t have the verses from CW, basically launches straight into the chorus and a different bridge and is all the better for it.

anyway it seems like they’re switching up the setlists on this tour and playing a ton of CW and other deep cuts - “Surrender the Night”, “Make Room!!!” and “Boy Division” on day 1, “Mastas of Ravenkroft” on day 2

i have mixed feelings about the tour version of "the world is ugly" as it is clearly an unfinished song but is also gorgeous and feels like it points toward a post-rockier path the band ultimately didn't take

'cause you only live forever in the lights you make
when we were young we used to say
that you only hear the music when your heart begins to break
now we are the kids from yesterday

;_;

<3

i've never listened to the danger days b-sides before!!! uhhhh these songs are all great!!!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zU_QjjjyCs

yo!!!! i love it when this band pretends to be the pixies