Late last year, Alison made me listen to MCR's latest album, The Black Parade. I put it on not expecting much but to my surprise I fell in love – with the soaring anthemic melodic rocks songs, the passionate lyrics, the underlying punk attitude, the absolute sing-a-long enjoyableness of an album that is ostensibly about death. And I could not wait to see them live and sing-a-long with my fist in the air, which is the default feeling I get when I listen to the albums over and over again.
Support act Another Day Down came across really LAME, trying to be this heavy rock band. One of them had a mullet and looked right out of the 80s, but without the irony. Totally forgettable songs that didn't even sound good the first time.
But My Chemical Romance were AWESOME. They played so much from The Black Parade, almost the entirety. Gerard sounded great and looked healthy and happy, and seemed like he was really enjoying himself in Australia. During 'Dead!' the front of the mosh got quite scary and he stopped the song completely to try and calm it down. He made sure the people getting crushed were pulled out, he instructed everyone to take some steps backwards slowly to create more room, and told the kids that no matter who much fun they were having they should stop and help people up if they’ve gone down in the mosh. He had the room’s attention all nigh. He made a great frontman, with gestures and voice and passion, throwing himself around the stage, singing his heart out. I *love* him.
The rest of the band were great, but subdued. Ray was so so so good – whenever I knew a great lick was coming up I would make sure I was watching him shred on his guitar. There wasn’t much band interaction during the set, mostly Gerard talked to the audience and had them eating out of the palm of his hand. The highlight of the night was last song 'Famous Last Word'. It was insanely good live, with Gerard taking out his earpiece to hear the audience yelling the refrain back to him, arms reaching out towards the stage, loving him and the band and their music and his words.
The End
Dead!
How I Disappear
I’m Not Okay
Mama
Welcome to the Black Parade
I Don’t Love You
Thank You for the Venom
Teenagers
House of Wolves
You Know What They Do to Guys Like Us in Prison
Helena
Sleep
Cancer
Famous Last Words
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