It remains a staggering piece of work, but it’s worth noting that the best My Chemical Romance song sounds better in the hands of another artist. No disrespect to Gerard Way and the band, whose seminal work, The Black Parade, is about as good as it gets for the group, but Sloppy Jane offers up an intense and yet delicate reading of Cancer. One of the many masterpieces to be found on the band’s third album, a concept piece which cuts deep into what the band still stands for. We can hope, at least, that they still stand for this, given they’re touring this album and seemingly have no plans for new material. Sometimes living in the past is easier than enduring the present but The Black Parade pulled no punches when detailing its difficulties twenty years ago, and it still sounds perfect now. A brutal piece of work that’s not just the pillar of emo genre releases but a real undertaking of how bands crack under the pressure of always evolving for the better.
Irrespective of the songs found on The Black Parade, beyond the fact that it does objectively improve on the band’s previous work, Way and the group head in with a hatred for such an expectation. Why should they have to continue building? All the greats have faltered and even early into their career they should be given a chance to regress in the pursuit of another sound. They do that a little here, pushing and pulling at what made Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge such an enjoyable listen. The Black Parade has no duds and while a song-to-song listen of Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge is that little bit better, it’s The Black Parade that works best as a whole concept. It really is magnificent. Rock opera is a bold choice for the basis of The Black Parade but it works tremendously. There’s not a heightened sense of importance at play, but you can feel the pressure from the studio taking its toll on early album songs like The End and This is How I Disappear.
What becomes such an overlooked part of The Black Parade is pressure. It’s a blueprint for success but is built around the band being infuriated by a lofty expectation set so soon into their careers. Forget the fact they surpass it from song to song with blistering instrumental thrills on Dead! or some of Way’s best lyrics on Cancer and Teenagers, there’s such an ongoing spite at play. Spite is the great redeemer though; it’s an excellent influence if used correctly or as well as it is here. Every song is a new vindication for the band and thus the listener too. Songs like The Sharpest Lives and Welcome to the Black Parade dig deep into that desire to overcome. It’s broad enough to make it applicable to any listener, specific enough that the latter track becomes one of the band’s most moving pieces.
One of the few albums where the grievances of a band are not just extremely valid, but paint a darker picture of the music industry which has since come true. It was true at the time, it is worse now. Headline acts pulling shows because of burnout and an increase in the speed at which listeners consume works rather than consider them is putting more artists out of work. Expectation lingers at all times and The Black Parade, as masterful as it is, works because of what it tried to defy. My Chemical Romance headed into this third album with valid hang-ups and addressed them in such a creatively charged manner that it lasts beyond that nostalgia factor that has no doubt brought on this anniversary tour. The Black Parade is an album worth touring over and over. No wonder the band stopped working on new albums after Danger Days. That pressure which would define them, as it does so many groups, is worth avoiding. My Chemical Romance hasn’t looked back since.
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