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Review: My Chemical Romance at Stubb’s
Gerard Way, lead singer for My Chemical Romance, looked a little tired Monday night at Stubb’s.
You can’t really blame the man. He and his band of Gothy-looking rockers have been on and off tour (mostly on) since their 2006 breakout album “The Black Parade.” This most recent jaunt, the fifth and final leg of “The Black Parade World Tour” is three months long. Way as much said this was the last show they would be playing in Austin for a good long time. I think everyone got their money’s worth.
So it wasn’t all that surprising that in order to keep the energy high (which it was) and to make the 10:30 p.m. hard-deck curfew (which they did), songs felt shortened, limited to a verse or two and a chorus, the better to rip through a high octane set that reached back to the band’s 2002 debut, “I Brought Me My Bullets, You Brought Me Your Love.” Gone were the elaborate sets and theatrical cast of their tour’s early legs.
This was a rock band playing to a sold out crowd that absolutely adored them. Way — looking less like a rock strar and more like the comic book writer he established himself last year in the excellent series “The Umbrella Academy” — started cool and sweated himself into a frenzy as the band stripped back its material’s proggier, Queenier (as in Freddie Mercury) elements for articulate, dynamic rock that held the crowd in the palm of his hand.
From MTV hits such as “Welcome to the Black Parade” to mopers such as “Cancer” to the anthemic “Teenagers,” the crowd was easily the equal of Way’s slightly fried voice. When the black-clad masses are with you, they’re with you to the end.
Comments
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By Kelli Asherman
April 29, 2008 5:46 PM | Link to this
MCR is great! (And I am 37 years old!) I laugh at the moron who said in August 2006, that My Chem has “9 more months of commercial shelf life”. Uh, it’s April, 2008, the nine months has waaaayyy past!!!! Way to go My Chem!
By Hip_Kittie
April 29, 2008 10:25 PM | Link to this
I’m 39 and was there to take my daughter(13)to her first concert. I threaded her through the crowd to the pit to hook up with her friends then I ascended up the hill to enjoy a beautiful unobstructed view of the stage on an absolutely perfect weather evening. We both had an “awesome” time. MCR has a great lineup with not one bogus song. Definitely got my money’s worth. Excellent “first timer” concert.
By John
April 29, 2008 10:43 PM | Link to this
I wouldn’t overplay MCR’s longevity just yet, Kelli. Their Stubbs show (capacity 2,200) took a VERY long time to sell out, doing so mere days before the actual concert. If they were still so hot commercially, why wouldn’t they be selling out venues twice that size, such as the Music Hall or The Backyard (or even the theatre setup at the Erwin Center)? I’m just sayin’…
By gene
April 30, 2008 10:29 PM | Link to this
for this last leg of the tour, they are doing small venues to be in a closer, more intimate setting with the fans, they explain this in their site, they are playing theatres, amphitheatres, auditoriums, all with very small capacity. the first and third legs of the u.s. tour were played in much larger arenas with 8 thousand plus capacity, im sure they did quite well. great show, well worth my time traveling 5 hrs to get to austin. my wife and i took our 16 yr old son, we’ve been taking him to concerts since he was 3, we have seen many concerts and we were totally happy with the performance. cant wait for the next time, by the way, the pit was insane.