The Black Parade (Deluxe edition)

by

My Chemical Romance

Edit

2005 showed to be a year for a wide range of highly anticipated and greatly accepted alternative albums, one of which being The Black Parade. The third studio album release from My Chemical Romance, following up Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge, has been certified platinum, as well as reaching number 2 on the Billboard 200, and number 3 on the ARIA Charts. While criticized by some for being a sell-out and over-produced pop version of My Chemical Romance, it is considered to be their most musically and lyrically mature album to date.

The Black Parade is a concept album following the life of a patient through a reasonably grim and disturbed American society. The album deals with many issues on a personal scale as well as those on a larger one. The Black Parade opens on a slightly ironic note (The End.), and eventually leads to self-realization in the end, actually giving the album a more uplifting theme than not. Such issues dealt with in the album, such as cancer (from the song of the same title), give the listener a more realistic outlook on life; in part by providing an escape from one’s own troubles, yet, at the same time, bringing the listener closer to the problems around them.

The album’s sound is still very much of the “My Chemical Romance platform” for music, but it shows much more aptitude in creating an album that appeals to a larger audience than previous albums. The general sound of the album is still heavy, and with the usual punk rock elements comes a new, more mature, and quite theatrical, sound to the album as a whole. Think Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge meets A Night At The Opera. Through an ingenious mixture of being head-banging and foot tapping, (along with thought provoking) The Black Parade has made its mark as one of the greatest post-hardcore, if not of all genres, albums of the new millennium.