To hell (literally) with understated, acoustic melodies and elegiac lyrics: My Chemical Romance is prepped to devastate with The Black Parade, a modern concerto with a flair for the dramatic. Telling the tale of a young cancer patient in the throes of death, this concept album draws on larger-than-life guitar solos and lyrics and even the guest vocals of Liza Minnelli. It's grandiose-maybe even overdramatic-but its blaring theatricality stirs in the unapologetic manner of a pure rock opera.
The band names Pink Floyd's The Wall and Queen's A Night at the Opera as inspirations for the album, and there's a resounding hint of Green Day's American Idiot, which Rob Cavallo produced before he took on this record. Nonetheless, The Black Parade sets itself apart from predecessors with raging tracks that sound like they should culminate in a triumphant freeze frame followed by a curtain call.
MCR has always straddled the line between whiny, disillusioned punk rock and raging screamo-land, with singles such as "Helena" and "The Ghost of You" taking on death with soaring choruses and gasping tempos. But this album puts previous hits to shame with the sheer magnitude of its proffered spectacle. At times, the record borders on Broadway with its symphonic inserts and folksy sound bites. Indeed, the recurring obsession with death and hell, with lines like, "Would you be the savior of the broken, the beaten and the damned?" lends itself to melodrama. But this album is a refreshing rebellion against subtlety, a record that isn't afraid to overwhelm with lofty themes in an age when break-up ballads have overrun the music industry.
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