MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE “Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge”
MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE released a near-perfect debut full-length in “I Brought You My Bullets, You Brought Me Your Love.” That release displayed a merciless spirit in dishing out intense, melodic, but spooky, hardcore, in the vein of STRUNG OUT, but with a frilly, dramatic overbite. As much as I enjoyed the music on “I Brought You My Bullets…” the band’s entrenched silliness left an awkward aftertaste. “Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge” is the band’s debut release for Warner/Reprise, and it largely follows the same paradigm as the band’s earlier work, but in an expectedly more refined delivery. In simple terms, “Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge” is less hardcore and decidedly more power-punk. While that shouldn’t surprise anyone who tracks major label releases, MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE have taken well to the luxuries of working with a major label recording budget, and with a marquee producer like Howard Benson. “Three Cheers…” is beautifully produced, and rich in texture, leaving the band’s aggressive spirit mostly intact. Songs like “Hang ‘Em High,” and the corny, but infectious “I’m Not Okay (I Promise)” explode with the extinguishing of pent-up tension, and sit well while pressed against the bands’ more mid-tempo, but swift fare. MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE have worked hard in focusing their sound/lyrics/image around themes that can be best describe as “all things dark and spooky involving death, girls, more death, and life” (stick with me here poeple!), and their approach, both musically, and lyrically is very similar to which TSOL adhered to, 20+ years ago on their timeless classic, “Code Blue.” While MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE mitigate some of the vileness that TSOL bathed in, a lot of the imagery on here is still over the top and cheeky. Honestly, who can take a line like the following seriously? “If living was the hardest part / we’ll then one day be together / and in the end we’ll fall apart” (from “It’s not a fashion statement, it’s a fucking deathwish.”) I’m not exactly asking for a dissertation on the pros and cons of how our brain internalizes human relationships, but I know these guys can do better than that. Nonetheless, it’s hard to argue against the completeness in which MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE go to stick to their guns. From a cynical standpoint, “Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge” could have ended up a lot worse, and an even bigger mockery of the artistic architecture that MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE is trying to build. The band has surely benefitted from becoming better musicians and scoring engaging, hook-laden songwriting, but I still believe they’ve got a long way to go before their music retains a degree of character that isn’t so superficial for the image it supports. As young chaps, I’m betting that MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE aren’t even close to the peak of their talents.
Warner/Reprise
