Photos courtesy of Bryce Hall and Jesse DeFlorio. Cover photo by Bryce Hall.
August 2022. One of the final hangouts of the summer before starting my senior year of high school. My friends and I are sitting cramped in a 2008 Scion XD on the way back home from a day at the mall. Out of the brief silence between talking about what we bought and what we were dreading about the incoming school year, my friend, the driver, placed a CD into the car’s head unit. It would be dramatic for me to say that I felt like I saw my world go from black and white to color, but there is truly no other explanation that could encapsulate what I felt at 17 hearing the opening guitars to “Honey, This Mirror Isn’t Big Enough for the Two of Us” for the first time. Then came the first pre-chorus:
“And you can cry all you want to / I don’t care how much / You invest yourself in me / We’re not working out“
I came to figure out that this was My Chemical Romance’s debut album, I Brought You My Bullets, You Brought Me Your Love (2002). MCR had always been on my radar in my tween and teenage years, being an avid self-proclaimed “yeemo” in 2017 (if you know, you know). I casually listened to hit singles and was shocked to find out about the band’s reunion in 2019, after their infamous split six years earlier. That summer day sparked my now four-year admiration for the band. As an art kid back then and design major now, the world building and visual media embedded within their music resulted in MCR remaining at the top of my artist list ever since.
—
Now come one, come all to this tragic affair: last fall, New Jersey rock band My Chemical Romance announced a five-night residency at the iconic Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles set for this October – the final show fittingly landing on Halloween. The first three nights mark the closing run of performances for their acclaimed Long Live world tour that begun July of last year. Performing their Black Parade (2006) album in full, celebrating its 20th anniversary, MCR has taken the concept of an anniversary tour to an entirely new level. Since first claiming tickets in September of last year, it would be an understatement to say that fans have been waiting in anticipation for what’s in store for these soon-to-be historic nights.
It’s no surprise that MCR has had their share of theatrics – 3 of their 4 studio releases being concept albums with their own elaborate stories, marketing, and stage productions. The Black Parade transforms the band into a fictional group of the album’s same name, detailing the story of a dying cancer patient’s journey to the afterlife. Since last year, MCR has reprised their roles as the Black Parade band, but instead constructed an entirely new universe for fans and concertgoers to immerse themselves in. Now, the Black Parade have ‘come back from the dead,’ touring as an act from the fictional country of DRAAG, a pseudo-Soviet-era Eastern European nation with its set of recurring characters and storylines that slightly alter after each show.
Tonight, fans were brought even further into the fictional world. Attendees were handed red carnations and small American flags (with the DRAAG logo in replacement of the 50 stars, of course) at venue doors – with Wayne Jay, the stage actor who has played the character known as the ‘Grand Immortal Dictator’ for the past year now lying in a glass coffin after serving as a looming figure of authority during the tour so far.
After facing a 45-minute delay due to weather, the venue lights finally dimmed resulting in a roar of eager fans ready to watch the Black Parade take to the stage. A recap montage of the tour’s previous legs flashed across the Bowl’s screens. Then, a character/actor who previously only appeared in promotional videos for Long Live walked out toward a desk on stage right. As he spoke, he detailed the history of DRAAG, as more actors began to simulate battle scenes on stage. Following the demonstration, Marianne (played by Lucy Joy Atlus) – a familiar opera singer and character – recited the “Star-Spangled Banner,” instead of the fictional “Over Fields” DRAAG National Anthem. The original stage set began to rotate in a circle, revealing the Black Parade and supporting DRAAG National Auxiliary Band (composed of Kayleigh Goldsworthy, Clarice Jensen, Tucker Rule, Jarrod Alexander, and Jamie Muhoberac) on the other side. A dramatic firework show and large American/DRAAG flag lowering behind the group set the high-energy mood for the opening rock-opera track, “The End.” Transitioning into “Dead!,” the band featured a display of female backup dancers dressed in WWII-era uniforms during the song’s bridge. Fans matched the dominating energy on stage, shouting every lyric in perfect unison.
If it wasn’t clear enough, the entirety of the Long Live tour serves overall as an elaborate political satire. The dramatization of patriotism, for both DRAAG and now the United States, as well as the Black Parade’s admiration (and eventual reverence) for the Grand Immortal Dictator, is a commentary through entertainment perfectly timed for the current state of domestic and global politics. Even simulating mock public executions and elections in prior shows, the Black Parade utilizes audience interaction to point out the corruption of American politics – as well as the illusion of democracy with corrupt leaders in charge of it all.
Before thunderous performances of “This Is How I Disappear” and “The Sharpest Lives,” lead singer Gerard Way hosted a mock presentation of DRAAG’s invasion of the U.S., even performing a parody of Woody Guthrie’s “This Land Is Your Land” themed to American monuments the country has taken over.
Out of the silence, the iconic ‘G-note’ beginning their hit song, “Welcome to the Black Parade,” enabled waves of screams – the crowd’s voices overpowering the band for the famous opening lyrics: “When I was a young boy / My father took me into the city / To see a marching band,” bringing the multi-generational audience even closer together. Following “I Don’t Love You” and “House of Wolves,” the Black Parade brought drama to the stage after ‘assassinating’ a new Dictator character whilst the crowd was instructed by actors to sing “Happy Birthday” (as absurd as that sounds) – the Dictator, landing face-first into a cake as the intro piano and orchestral arrangement to “Cancer” began. Marking the second half of The Black Parade, an extended version of “Mama” set displays of pyrotechnics, new stage props, and additional operatic vocals from Marianne during the song’s bridge.
An extended introduction of “Sleep” set the tone for the impending doom the Black Parade and remaining characters were set to face. Performing in front of a sculpture of a nuke — heavy guitar distortion, string instruments, and strobing red and blue lights marked certain death (and revival during the next show) as the album reached its end. The band launched into another breakout album track, “Teenagers,” supported by dancers in cheerleader uniforms behind them – a subtle callback to the song’s original music video. “Disenchanted” soon followed, as a longer instrumental of the song’s end depicted the dancers and extra actors in soldier uniforms having a standoff battle, similar to the one simulated at the beginning of the show. The final song on The Black Parade, “Famous Last Words,” marked the end of a triumphant first-of-final performances of the Long Live saga. Lead guitarist Ray Toro’s instrument solo soundtracked a firework and pyrotechnic display while fans shouted:
“I see you lying next to me / With words I thought I’d never speak / Awake and unafraid, asleep or dead”
—
The band returned to the Hollywood Bowl stage not as the Black Parade, but now as My Chemical Romance – beginning a new segment of the show performing other songs off their discography. Still partially in costume, core members – vocalist Gerard Way, alongside bassist and brother Mikey Way, with lead guitarist Ray Toro, and rhythm guitarist Frank Iero – were greeted by excited fans eager to see what tracks the band, alongside drummer Jarrod Alexander and keyboardist Jamie Muhoberac, had in store for the night. Starting during their 2022 reunion tour, MCR began implementing rotating setlists into each of their shows, every concert having its own unique and randomized selection of songs. Tonight, the band hit it off with “I’m Not Okay (I Promise)” from 2004’s Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge.
Two more deep cuts off Three Cheers followed: “Bury Me In Black,” a scrapped demo off the album, as well as “To the End” sounded surprised screams from die-hard fans (myself included). Between songs, Gerard vocalized his thanks for members of the tour’s cast, supporting band, and crew, admitting how proud he was of the night’s entire production despite only having a small window of time to rehearse. Later in the night, MCR played a cover of Morrissey’s “Jack the Ripper,” an ultra-rare performance that the band had only played on this tour in Detroit and London…the first times since the band’s early years over twenty years ago.
After a fiery rendition of “Na Na Na (Na Na…)” from their 2010 album, Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys, Gerard uttered, “This is a song off Bullets” [I Brought You My Bullets, You Brought Me Your Love] – a statement to send any MCR fan into shock considering only a few songs off the album are played live. The beginning guitar chords to “Honey, This Mirror Isn’t Big Enough for the Two of Us” echoed through the Bowl’s speakers, drawing hundreds of Oh my God!’s around me as the song had rarely been played live in recent years. Hearing the song that turned me into a fan of this band felt like a complete full-circle moment, immediately becoming a highlight of the handful of times I’ve seen the band live this past year. In this moment, I felt 17 again. My mind flashed between the past and present, reflecting on how much my life has changed since that day at the mall. MCR ended the night with two more songs from Three Cheers, “It’s Not A Fashion Statement, It’s A Deathwish,” before closing the night with “Helena”:
“What’s the worst thing I could say? / Things are better if I stay / So long, and goodnight”
Concluding their first of the last three Long Live shows, My Chemical Romance further cement themselves as rock-royalty in real time. With two more shows on October 23rd and 24th, (the 24th marking 20 years since The Black Parade’s release) MCR have now ended the year long story line, finally laying the Black Parade to rest in the Hollywood Hills. Plans for what the final two shows on the 30th and 31st hold remain a mystery. With posters of MCR displayed outside of West Hollywood’s iconic Whisky a Go Go earlier this week – one reading “We have the world’s best fans. Thank you. See you soon,” fans, (and I) can only imagine what theatrics and setlists MCR has up their sleeve.
Revisit My Chemical Romance’s iconic rock-opera album in it’s new 20th anniversary edition here!
