The Black Parade (2006–2008)
Main article: The Black Parade
My Chemical Romance started recording their third studio album on April 10, 2006 with Rob Cavallo, producer of many of Green Day's albums.[11][12] It was originally thought to be titled The Rise and Fall of My Chemical Romance (in reference to "The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars" by David Bowie), but in an interview with Kerrang! magazine, Gerard Way suggested this was just the album's working title, stating "It was never the title of the album, more a spoof, or joke."[13]
On August 3, 2006, the band completed shooting the videos for their first two singles from the album, "Welcome to the Black Parade" and although not released until January 2007, "Famous Last Words".[14] The "Famous Last Words" video was directed by Sam Bayer, director of Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" and Green Day's American Idiot videos.[15] During filming for the second video, band members Gerard Way and Bob Bryar were injured. Way suffered torn ligaments in his ankle, and Bryar a burn to the leg which caused a severe staph infection that needed constant monitoring in hospital.[citation needed] Consequently, the band was forced to cancel a few tour dates. While these injuries were reported by several news agencies to have been the result of a car accident, a statement released by the band on their website and MySpace page confirmed that these injuries occurred on the set of the video.[16]
On August 22, 2006, the band played a special one-off show at the 1800-capacity London Hammersmith Palais. The show sold out in 15 minutes, prompting tickets to be re-sold on eBay well over the tickets' face value. The name of the album was announced and 20 people dressed in black capes with their faces obscured paraded around the Hammersmith, followed by a large group of fans and street team members with signs saying "The Black Parade". Later during the show, the album title and the UK release date were confirmed. Before the band took the stage, it was announced that My Chemical Romance were unable to play, but they would be replaced by The Black Parade. After initial crowd hostility it became clear the band were simply performing under a pseudonym in keeping with the theme of the album.
"Welcome to the Black Parade" was released as a single on September 11, 2006. On September 26, 2006, the music video for "Welcome to the Black Parade" was released in the UK, and on September 27 in the US.[13] The single became the band's first number one on the UK Singles Chart in October 2006. The Black Parade was released on October 23, 2006 in the United Kingdom and on October 24, 2006 in the United States.
The Black Parade World Tour commenced on February 22, 2007, with the eventuating 133 shows featuring Rise Against, Thursday and Muse as support acts.[17] Reggie and the Full Effect frontman James Dewees played keyboards and synthesizer on the tour. In April 2007, it was announced that Mikey Way would temporarily leave the tour to spend time with his new wife, Alicia Simmons-Way. Way's temporary replacement was Matt Cortez, a friend of the band.[18] During the third leg of the tour, as a support act for Muse, members of My Chemical Romance and their crew, along with members of Muse's crew, suffered food poisoning, and consequently had to cancel six shows.[19] The band later featured on Linkin Park's Projekt Revolution tour in 2007,[20] along with Placebo, Mindless Self Indulgence, Saosin, Taking Back Sunday and HIM.
My Chemical Romance received mixed accolades for The Black Parade. Kerrang! rated The Black Parade as the fourth-greatest album of 2006.[21] In Rolling Stone magazine's ranking of the top 50 albums of 2006, The Black Parade was voted the 20th best album of the year. My Chemical Romance went on to win the award for Best International Band at the 2007 NME Awards, and Gerard Way also won the Hero of the Year award.[22] My Chemical Romance was also nominated for Best Alternative Group at the 2007 American Music Awards.
The band announced in a blog on their website that they would be going on a final tour in the United States before taking a break. At the same time, they announced they will be releasing a live DVD/CD collection titled The Black Parade Is Dead!, which includes two concerts from October 2007, the final Black Parade concert in Mexico, and a small show at Maxwell's in New Jersey. The DVD/CD was meant to be released on June 24 in the United States and June 30 in the UK, but was postponed to July 1 because of a technical fault with the Mexico concert.[23]
In 2009, My Chemical Romance released a new single entitled "Desolation Row" (a cover of the Bob Dylan song) on February 1, 2009. It was recorded to feature as the end credit track for the 2009 film Watchmen, an adaptation of the graphic novel of the same name.[24] The band then announced that they would be releasing "a collection of nine never-before-seen live videos, straight from the encore set of the Mexico City show from October 2007", entitled ¡Venganza!. The release came on a bullet-shaped flash drive and also contained exclusive photos of the band from the show. It was released on April 29, 2009.[25]
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