RePlay: “The Black Parade” is “Dead!” Serious

One of the best plays in recent memory isn’t a play at all. It’s an album — My Chemical Romance’s 2006 opus “The Black Parade.” The actor — as well as writer and director – is Gerard Way.

Way wrote the album as a narrative conversation between two characters — The Patient, a boy dying from cancer, and Death, a war victim guiding souls to the afterlife, as pieced together by fans and described by NME.

But like most plays, the plot just covers the surface of the story. “The Black Parade” is a sardonic response to accusations leveled at Way and the broader emo movement of the early 2000s — that they were too dramatic or too depressing, as Way said in an interview with Kerrang.

Hence the play about dying from cancer.

After opening track “The End.” introduces The Patient’s character, “Dead!” wastes no time barging in the character of Death. 

“If life ain’t just a joke / then why am I dead?” Way sings with an almost audible manic smile. 

Title track “Welcome to the Black Parade” narratively represents The Patient accepting his death and joining the Black Parade of souls. The song is a forthcoming glimpse into Way’s psyche as he handles the weight of an entire movement placed on his epaulet-adorned shoulders. 

“When I was a young boy / My father took me into the city / To see a marching band,” Way sings wistfully. “He said ‘son, when you grow up / Would you be the savior of the broken / The beaten and the damned?’”

Way accepts this burdensome title as the track swells from a  simple piano melody to an anthemic power ballad.

“I Don’t Love You” follows, bursting open with bright guitar that fades to let Way’s emotive voice shine.

Way’s delivery defines the album. His angry yet sarcastic delivery paradoxically enthralls, as Way embodies his characters in a voice acting masterclass — whispering, screaming and crying to drive his lyrics home.

Amidst an album of over-the-top theatrics, “Cancer” quietly stands apart. While typically more of a vocalist than lyricist, Way delivers a heart-wrenching, brutally candid depiction of the ravaging disease.

“All my hair’s abandoned all my body / Oh, my agony / Know that I will never marry / Baby I’m just soggy from the chemo,” Way sings, his voice devoid of the humor heard in the rest of the album — just despairing anger.

The song features some of the only strings on the album, adding emotional weight to the lyrics and Way’s delivery.

“The hardest part of this is leaving you,” Way sings bitterly as the strings and guitar swell together.

“Mama” builds on the momentum and horror. After The Patient has recounted how he died in “Cancer,” now Death tells his story.

The song begins with the faint sound of explosions under a plucky guitar as the narrator writes a letter to his mother. Way’s voice gradually becomes less and less controlled, devolving into tortured screams repeating “Mama,” as explosions boom and sirens distort around him.

“Disenchanted” serves as a thesis statement for Way’s career. In an album full of theatrics, the song is heartbreakingly honest, serving as his ultimate response to the overwhelming feedback, positive and negative, he’d received. 

“If I’m so wrong / how could you listen all night long?” Way sings accusingly. “Now will it matter after I’m gone? / Because you never learned a goddamn thing.”

Although “Disenchanted” ends on an unsure note, closing track “Famous Last Words” picks up the driving message of “Welcome to the Black Parade” — Way won’t back down.

“I am not afraid to keep on living / I am not afraid to walk this world alone,” Way sings definitively.

With this message, the band takes their bows, facing the audience of critics and fanatics alike. They don’t know how their art will be received — but that won’t stop them.

“The Black Parade” is available to stream on all major music platforms.