Yesterday my favourite band My Chemical Romance absolutely destroyed the internet, by posting a short video all over their social media platforms. The video consisted of a new logo, the tune to Welcome To The Black Parade and a date: 9/23/16. The internet exploded and rightly so! We were all minding our own business and then out of the blue MCR hit us like a tonne of bricks with no explanation.
With all of that excitement it made me reminisce My Chemical Romance and all that came with, so I compiled 20 things only the MCRmy will appreciate. If you're completely out of the loop - that's the hardcore fans of My Chemical Romance.
I hope you enjoy!
1) Mikey Fuckin' Way
Your username online HAD to be MCR related; to let people know that you were of course a fan. If your username didn't relate, were you even a fan?
As you can see, at one point my username was __xofrnk, similar to Frank Iero's sign off (and I'm showing off the fact Gerard tweeted me). Another popular choice was adding 'Fuckin' Way' to the end of your name, just like Mikey.
2) Gerard Way was God
Oh my Gerard Way!!!
Unfortunately this was a very popular phrase. Why? Because people worshipped Gerard Way like he was a God.
What's even more unfortunate is that occasionally my Timehop likes to show me posts that are filled with this phrase. Oh my Gerard Way, how cringe.
3) Gerard's Eyeliner
We all aspired to do our eyeliner just like Gerard's, because he was the King of Eyeliner. Now we probably look at it an despair - that's so not on point.
4) Battle of the Bands
Your best friends were those who like MCR also.
No matter how tolerable a person was, if someone didn't like MCR, they were not your friend.
No matter how tolerable a person was, if someone didn't like MCR, they were not your friend.
On non-uniform days at school we'd all come in representing our favourite band with as much My Chemical Romance merch as possible. Our rivals would also come in wearing their merch and it would quite literally turn into the battle of the bands, arguing over which band was better.
MCRmy VS Parawhores.
MCRmy VS Parawhores.
5) Shrine
You would quite literally create a shrine dedicated to MCR in your room, with as many posters and merch as possible. The amount of posters you had, often correlated to how big a fan you were.
I spent hours creating collages on my wall dedicated to MCR. I also spent way too much pocket money on Kerrang! magazines but that's another matter. This is a snippet of my room just before we moved, so most of the posters had been taken down at this point. A lot also had to be thrown away as I wasn't allowed posters in my new house *cue the heartbreak*.
6) My Chemical Romance Bible
This has to be one of my favourite memories.
Going back to worshipping Gerard Way: on your social media platforms you would have either the 10 Commandments of My Chemical Romance / Gerard Way / Mikey Way / Ray Toro / Frank Iero / Bob Bryar. Or if you were me - all of them. You aimed to live your life by these 10 Commandments. My favourite being those of Gerard Way:
Thou shalt never let them take you alive;
Thou shalt drink Starbucks coffee;
Thou shalt play World of Warcraft as an Undead Warrior;
Thou shalt admit thy is not okay freely;
Thou shalt release the fucking bats;
Thou shalt strike violent poses;
Thou shalt stay out of the light;
Thou shalt drink the blood of they enemies;
Thou shalt overcome thy weaknesses;
Thou shalt not be afraid to keep on living.
No, these are not what got me into World of Warcraft - thankfully! Funnily enough I was creating an Undead character a couple of weeks ago and it made me remember these commandments, so I named my character 'Xerard' and his pet 'Way'. Not quite a warrior, but close enough. I was actually pretty awful at following these commandments, I hate coffee for a start.
7) Iero
When your first read the name Iero and tried to figure out how it was pronounced. Eye-ro? Eye-er-o? Who-fucking-knows-er-o?
I think we all settled for eye-er-o.
8) Frerard
There's not much to say about this one. Apart from that we all shipped this so hard.
I'm just going to leave this here...
9) Frerard?
We all shipped Frerard so hard, but then we'd put them up against each other. Who was more attractive, Gerard or Frank? Friendships were quite literally ruined as no one could agree on who would marry Gerard and who would settle for Frank.
Poor Ray and Mikey often got left out at this point.
Guilty, my favourite was Gerard.
10) Emo
The MCRmy WERE. NOT. EMO.
As Gerard famously said; 'emo's a pile of shit'. Because of this, whenever someone called us or the band emo, we would not be okay (I promise).
11) Tattoos
Tattoos were talked about a lot in the MCRmy:
Everyone was either planning on having the cover of Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge tattooed, or they were admiring Frank's tattoos whilst the others were thankful that Gerard is scared of needles. At least then they didn't feel so bad for not having their favourite band tattooed on them.
12) Mama
If your favourite song was I'm Not Okay or Welcome To The Black Parade then were you even a real fan? Nope, because everyone knew those songs! Despite the fact that they are epic songs.
Way back when, my favourite song was Mama. When Conventional Weapons released this changed to The Light Behind Your Eyes, but really I love them all.
13) FUCK THE DAILY MAIL
The ENTIRE MCRmy hated the Daily Mail, why? Because they accused My Chemical Romance's concept of the Black Parade of being a self-harming, self-loathing suicide cult following the death of a MCR fan (may she rest in peace x). The entire MCRmy came together to protest against the Daily Mail and to this day they still hate the Daily Mail. Especially when they had the cheek to post about their break up in 2013.
14) Hair
The MCRmy changed their hair according to how Gerard did his hair. During the Revenge era we all had black hair. When he had blue streaks, so did the fans. When Gerard bleached his hair platinum blonde for the Black Parade, so did the fans. When Gerard went red so did everyone else. He is basically the reason that everyone had bad hair. Then there were people like me who had strict parents who wouldn't let us dye our hair. Thank you for saving my hair mum.
15) Uniform
The MCRmy all looked the same; all black outfits, red ties, parade jackets, pale faces and bad eyeliner. Not to mention all of the merch!
I suppose not much has changed for me, considering my entire wardrobe is black and my eyeliner is questionable.
16) Killjoys
In 2010 we ditched the black, uniforms and make up and embraced more colour (more than just red too!).
17) Twilight
We all know what happened with the Vampire Money situation, and from that moment on we all hated Twilight.
18) My Chemical Romance had MEANING
The band formed following the 9/11 attacks, and they produced the song Skylines and Turnstiles based on their experiences with the events. MCR taught us that it is okay, not to be okay. They based an entire album on The Patient, and his experience with death.
According to the MCRmy, My Chemical Romance had more meaning than any other band, and that's what made them the best band ever.
19) MCR5
We were all pumped for MCR5! My Chemical Romance were building their own studio, posting pictures of them recording and then destroyed us when they broke their news on the 22nd of March 2013, that they were breaking up.
20) 9/23/16
The MCRmy came up with hundreds of theories: they were hacked, it was a terrible April Fools trick, they were going to get back together. When MCR released Fake Your Death this confirmed everyone's beliefs - they are getting back together! Even the video showed clips of the band having fun together, which made everyone question why they had broken up in the first place.
As of yesterday, 20th of July 2016, the band posted a short video captioned 'Watch Me' with no explanation but a date. The entire MCRmy exploded and got their hopes up.
MCRX
In October it will be 10 years since the release of MCR's biggest album, the Black Parade. Fans have guessed that the band will unite and tour again, or come back with another single. My guess was the same as everyone else's. Then today, they posted again.
So it looks like there's nothing to get excited about. My Chemical Romance are releasing something special for the anniversary of the Black Parade.
Heather ☾
