I'll Leave You a Phantom
Before I get to the point of this entry, a warning: I am still the same advocate of brilliance in rock and roll. I have a never-dying appreciation for great rock and what makes great rock and what could someday be great rock. I also have an appreciation for pop music, though not on the same level as musically-great rock and roll.
That being said, I love the new My Chemical Romance album.
I heard "Welcome to the Black Parade" on the radio and it stuck. It would not leave my head. I looked all around for samples I could hear for free, for any version I could just sit and listen to. Do I like My Chemical Romance?? No. Absolutely not. I think that prior to this album, they were trite emo kids who liked to cry over some bitch named Helena.
What changed? They found glam rock.
Glam rock is what was good about 70's rock. Rock and roll, as a music genre, is somewhat of a virtuoso, finding its brilliance early on in its life. That would be the 1960s, so in the '70s, rock only had to evolve to keep that brilliance. Zeppelin morphed into its greatest and then became something unrecognizable. Same with the Stones. So who, in my mind, is the greatest rock band of the '70s? That'd be good ol' motherfucking Queen. Queen rocks, hands down. Yes, a lot of great music came from the '70s that was not Queen, but to these ears, they were the definition of rock music. Bowie too, though I find him more inaccessible than Queen.
It seems My Chemical Romance agrees. Watching the video for "Welcome to the Black Parade," the leade singer Gerard Way (the ugliest man in rock and roll, might I add) acts like Freddie Mercury in the version of "Live at Wembley Stadium" that Tim Burton directed. And the song is the band's "Bohemian Rhapsody," even following a similar structure. It is that showy, anthemic attitude that makes the album.
Before you scorn me for directly comparing Queen to My Chemical Romance, let me point out that I totally recognize all the pop punk and emo inspirations. But what's so awful about pop punk and emo? I will always say that Blink-182's "Enema of the State" is one of the best albums of the 90s. And as for emo, look at a lot of the great bands of the '80s, The Cure and Depeche Mode to name a couple. To follow that route, The Killers (Brandon Flowers is a tool, but I will always stick up for The Killers).
What My Chemical Romance gets that a lot of the other rock acts seem to miss is that rock and roll irony that punk had. Instead of being self-concious or comedic, My Chemical Romance takes it seriously, exactly the way Queen did on "A Night At the Opera" (one of the best albums of all time).
Normally, I do not feel the need to defend music I listen to. But this is My Chemical Romance, and they are remarkably lame. So imagine my surprise when I liked this album. I highly recommend it be looked into, not just because it's a good album, but because it has the potential to become something of significance in the future.
That being said, I love the new My Chemical Romance album.
I heard "Welcome to the Black Parade" on the radio and it stuck. It would not leave my head. I looked all around for samples I could hear for free, for any version I could just sit and listen to. Do I like My Chemical Romance?? No. Absolutely not. I think that prior to this album, they were trite emo kids who liked to cry over some bitch named Helena.
What changed? They found glam rock.
Glam rock is what was good about 70's rock. Rock and roll, as a music genre, is somewhat of a virtuoso, finding its brilliance early on in its life. That would be the 1960s, so in the '70s, rock only had to evolve to keep that brilliance. Zeppelin morphed into its greatest and then became something unrecognizable. Same with the Stones. So who, in my mind, is the greatest rock band of the '70s? That'd be good ol' motherfucking Queen. Queen rocks, hands down. Yes, a lot of great music came from the '70s that was not Queen, but to these ears, they were the definition of rock music. Bowie too, though I find him more inaccessible than Queen.
It seems My Chemical Romance agrees. Watching the video for "Welcome to the Black Parade," the leade singer Gerard Way (the ugliest man in rock and roll, might I add) acts like Freddie Mercury in the version of "Live at Wembley Stadium" that Tim Burton directed. And the song is the band's "Bohemian Rhapsody," even following a similar structure. It is that showy, anthemic attitude that makes the album.
Before you scorn me for directly comparing Queen to My Chemical Romance, let me point out that I totally recognize all the pop punk and emo inspirations. But what's so awful about pop punk and emo? I will always say that Blink-182's "Enema of the State" is one of the best albums of the 90s. And as for emo, look at a lot of the great bands of the '80s, The Cure and Depeche Mode to name a couple. To follow that route, The Killers (Brandon Flowers is a tool, but I will always stick up for The Killers).
What My Chemical Romance gets that a lot of the other rock acts seem to miss is that rock and roll irony that punk had. Instead of being self-concious or comedic, My Chemical Romance takes it seriously, exactly the way Queen did on "A Night At the Opera" (one of the best albums of all time).
Normally, I do not feel the need to defend music I listen to. But this is My Chemical Romance, and they are remarkably lame. So imagine my surprise when I liked this album. I highly recommend it be looked into, not just because it's a good album, but because it has the potential to become something of significance in the future.