If you live near Historic Crew Stadium, those weren’t gunshots you heard at around 10:30 p.m. May 14. It was the sound of a creepy clown blowing himself up moments after stabbing Gerard Way, the lead singer of My Chemical Romance, to death.
At least, that’s what happened in the fiction of the show.
That’s just a taste of the pandemonium My Chemical Romance brought to Sonic Temple on Thursday night as a part of the band’s “Long Live” The Black Parade tour.
For the uninitiated, the “Long Live” The Black Paradetour is a celebration of the band’s legendary 2006 album “The Black Parade.” The band plays the entirety of the album, filled with songs that defined a generation of emo and pop-punk music, and a few others at each concert.
The new tour comes complete with a new storyline, acted out live on stage, and some new takes on the band’s hits. In the fiction of the show, My Chemical Romance are performers in The Black Parade, a nationalistic band that performs for the Grand Immortal Dictator of the nation of Draag (represented by a mannequin in a military outfit on stage). That meant the band spent most of the show in black marching band-style outfits, and Gerard Way spoke with a sometimes Eastern European, sometimes British, accent.
After hearing “The National Anthem of Draag,” MCR kicked off the show with “The End,” the first song on “The Black Parade.” It’s a great fit for the start of a show, starting a bit subdued before hitting the crowd with a wall of screams and guitar riffs. Behind Way’s vocals were lead guitarist Ray Toro, rhythm guitarist Frank Iero, bassist Mikey Way and drummer Jarrod Alexander.
From there it was a tour down memory lane straight down the album’s song list. The crowd reached a new level of fervor for “Welcome to the Black Parade,” one of MCR’s biggest hits and the fifth song on the album. Fans sang along with Way for the somber, piano-heavy start of the song before breaking into vicious headbanging for the rest of it.
For every song off “The Black Parade,” Way played a creepy, haunted doll-like character with wild eyes. His performance was so engrossing that I started to wonder if he was even playing a character; maybe he was just like that all the time.
The first time I was dumbstruck by the quality of the show’s production came a few songs later with “Mama.” A man on fire ran across the stage while Way sang about hell, a stunt I’ve never seen in a live performance before.
The band wasn’t even close to being done playing with fire. Significant portions of the stage were engulfed in flame a few songs later during “Famous Last Words,” another of MCR’s mega-hits.
“The Black Parade” portion of the show concluded with a revision of “The End” from the start, and the aforementioned creepy clown dancing to the album’s hidden song, “Blood,” after he killed Way.
After a brief interlude the band came back out in street clothes, and it was clear the story of the album had concluded. All that was left were a few more hits that brought the crowd alive like “I’m Not Okay (I Promise)” and “Na Na Na (Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na).” “I’m Not Okay (I Promise)” evoked an almost religious reaction in the fans in the front row, whose emo faces flashed on screen throughout the song.
MCR ended the night with “Helena,” an apt final song, seeing how it prominently includes the lyrics “So long and goodnight.”
For anyone that had an emo phase (or never left it), it was a good night indeed.
Reporter Nathan Hart can be reached at NHart@dispatch.com, @NathanRHart on X and nathanhart.dispatch.com on Bluesky.
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: My Chemical Romance shakes Sonic Temple with headbang-worthy show
Reporting by Nathan Hart, Columbus Dispatch / The Columbus Dispatch
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
