Rating: NNN
It would seem that My Chemical Romance were serious when they claimed they aren’t an emo band. The Black Parade sounds like a love letter to the stadium-sized glam of Queen and liberally borrows from the Ziggy-era Bowie and T-Rex palettes. It’s so over-the-top that the Liza Minnelli guest appearance isn’t even noticeable unless you’re looking for it. The good news is that they wear the bombast bravado well and the album sounds huge in a good way. The bad news is that while the music has grown up (though remaining delightfully juvenile), the lyrics and death-themed concept are still mired in adolescent melodrama and embarrassingly bad poetry. They’ve succeeded at making a good big-dumb-rock record, but you get the sense they didn’t mean for it to be quite this dumb.
