My Chemical Freak: My Chemical Romance All The Time

Daisy, the girl who won the guitar, emailed MCF this photo.  Thanks Daisy for sharing and congrats on winning!

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By Brett

So I finally got my RED vinyl copy of Bullets from the nice folks at Eyeball Records. I’ll start out by saying that it comes with a complimentary Eyeball Records sticker, which now adorns my bumper, as well as 2 promo flyers for The Bronze Episode (myspace.com/thebronzeepisode). Now that I know The Bronze Episode is putting out an album, I can FINALLY sleep at night!

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The show and whole experience was amazing! We left my house in northern Jersey at like 3 and got to Vintage Vinyl at about 5. On the way sadly we got lost and had to stop for directions. So we got to Vintage Vinyl and my cousin and I walked around a little inside and then I saw a pretty good looking man. He was like his late 20’s and I could have sworn it was Frank. My mom and cousin were like no it’s not him Samantha. I was like so sure It was his him though! So I saw a scorpion on his neck and I told my mom and she’s like “He’s probably just some obsessed man”. So I watched this guy for about 10 minutes. Then when he was walking past I saw HALLOWEEN across this guys knuckles and I was like HEY FRANK!! He was like oh hi. I got a picture with him and was so happy when he put his arm around me to do the picture. He signed the shirt I made for the occasion. It said LeATHERMOUTH “XO” and a few lines from Body Snatchers 4 Ever and the back had all the song names. So he signed it and really seemed to like it.

Then I gave him this picture my seven year old sister drew for him (she may be seven but she loves Frank and MCR) and she drew one for him to give to Bob. Frank thought it was really cute. Frank said my mom could join LeATHERMOUTH and my mom laughed. I told him how I was going to bring him a tiara (we all know Frank and his tiaras) and he’s like “haha it’s okay.” He showed us the NJ inside his lip and said it really hurt. It looked so cool! So that was my second time meeting Frank and it was pretty cool. We walked over next door to a pizza place and I saw Frank outside smoking and I couldn’t help but smile really big and stare. Then he smiled and laughed at me, it was AMAZING!!

So we waited in line for about a half hour outside Vintage Vinyl before the show. We talked to the girls behind us in line about MCR, Frank, and LeATHERMOUTH, and even this website. At 5 to 7 they let us in and we were all so happy! There were only about 100 kids there and it was pretty small performance area. Frank thanked everyone for coming then went to set up and I yelled “WOW HE’S IEROSISTABLE”!! He giggled and they started off with Fifth Period Massacre. They went through some songs and when they were setting up Frank asked if anyone had any questions and I was the first to scream “I DO” but he laughed and said “No not you”. People asked questions and it was sort of hard to hear because I wasn’t too close. But the band played really great and Frank’s vocals were out of this world. They played all the songs off of “XO” except for Leviathan, which I really wanted to hear, but oh well. They closed with Body Snatchers 4 Ever. It was a great song to close with and it blew my mind! It was the song I was waiting for and was so happy to hear it done so great. After the show they signed everyone’s CD and it took a while because there were only two markers. The guitarist complimented my shirt. Frank said it was nice to see me again, then we took another picture. My cousin, three girls we just met, and I searched the whole place to try to find Mikey after that. I don’t think he’s ever missed a LeATHERMOUTH show and we didn’t think he would start with their release show. But Mikey shockingly wasn’t there. But, overall it was an amazing show and everyone was really nice. It was a really amazing performance and I can’t wait to see LeATHERMOUTH again!

Samantha

Thanks Samantha!

First of all, kudos to Warner Bros. for shipping my picture disc via Priority Mail as it arrived on Monday right on time. Seems that they may have actually learned how to ship things before my son, who’s 5, turns into a teenager.

The disc is pressed nicely and the colors are vibrant and true to what the description is online. I was a little hesitant to listen to it since my vinyl Revenge sounded like crap. Throw it on the turntable, and much to my glee, beautiful organic punkness eminated from the speakers. In other words, it sounds great. At this point, I wouldn’t even need the CD as it certainly won’t sound this good. Still getting it, though.

Also got my notice from Eyeball Records that my red vinyl edition of Bullets has shipped. Here’s to hoping Eyeball did their homework and put out a quality product!

Brett

Thanks Brett for the review!

Thanks to Francesca for typing all this out for us!

My Chemical Romance After a much-needed holiday, the emo heroes are ready to work.
Title: TBC
Due: TBC
Album Number: FOUR Follow up to: 2006’s The Black Parade.

Do you have any plans for the new album at this stage and have you started writing yet? Frank Iero (guitar): “We got together recently in October to finish up a song for the soundtrack to the film Watchmen. That happened in New York, where we mixed and mastered the song. All we want to do now is get together and write again. Really, right now, it’s a waiting game to see if Bob [Bryar, drummer who has suffered ongoing wrist injuries] is 100 per cent.”

Has he fully recovered from his wrist problems yet? “The thing you have to know about Bob is that, even if he wasn’t 100 per cent, he’d say he was just so that he could get back to playing. It’s very important to us to start playing again and it get back into it, but it’s not any more important than one member’s health. So we want to make sure he doesn’t injure himself- or do something worse- again.”

A year ago, Gerard Way promised a more punk-sounding, live-feeling album. Are there any thoughts as to which direction you might be taking at this point? “I haven’t got a clue, man. It’s too early to tell. I do know this: at home, we all have cassette recorders and different computer programmes that we’re been recording on. Ray [Toro, guitar] has a ton of tapes and I have a ton of tapes too, so we’ve got lots of ideas.

Do you tend go plan in advance or does the music take its own direction once you start writing together? “It’s so weird. If I had told you what I thought The Black Parade would have sounded like when we first started working on it, then what I would have said would be something completely different from the way it turned out. Basically, anything that I say now means that the exact opposite will actually happen!”

Going into The Black Parade, Mikey Way had various problems and there were some bleak periods during recording. How’s the mood in My Chemical Romance at the moment? “Everyone’s very positive and relaxed from some time off. The traveling is the hard work to us but as far as playing shows and writing music is concerned, then that’s the icing on the cake. So getting back to that is very exciting to us. We’re thrilled about the possibilities of what might happened.”

How necessary was the break you took for much of 2008? “We definitely needed it. If nobody had told us to go on that break, then we probably wouldn’t have taken it. We’d have carried on driving right into the sun because we love playing so much. But it’s good to take a step back and evaluate both what you’ve done and to work out what you want to accomplish. Also, you can look at the problems of what happened on the last record cycle- which was especially important for us because we had such bad luck on it wit health problems,injuries and family members passing away. That record was just cursed!”

Did that experience help tighten the bonds in the band? “Getting thought all that together was a great thing. It bought us closer together as musicians and friends. You can only become stronger because of it. Your personal lives have changed a lot away from the band- you’re married now, as are Ray and Mikey, while Gerard is having a baby. Does that change things? “We’re still as close. The only thing now is that we’re spread out across the country. That kind of sucks. We can’t just drive to each other’s houses and go get coffee or something anymore. But we talk everyday. I see Mikey and Ray a lot, and I’ve flown out to see Gerard and Bob. We’re around each other a lot, we’re just not in each other’s face so much!”

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LeATHERMOUTH

Despite his superstar status as MCR’s guitarist, Frank Iero and is four leathermouth bandmates recorded their debut completely unassisted, in a variety of basement in New York and New Jersey “to capture the band the way it should be heard”.”We recorded over the past two years whenever I was off tour.” Iero explains. “When doing the vocals, it was just me alone, hitting record and running to the mic.” The hardcore 10-tracker includes the songs 5th Period Massacre, Sunsets Are For Muggings, and Your Friends Are Full Of Shit. “I expect all the cool kids will hate it before they even hear it,” the frontman laughs. We doubt it!”

TITLE: XO DUE: January 26

Thanks to reader Ben for sending me these!  THANKS!

And if you have no clue what song we are talking about when we say Desolation Row, then here is a video of MCR performing it at Bamboozle Left…

Thanks KayeKarma for the vid link.

Thanks to reader Brett Cooper for sending this to us.

Three Cheers Vinyl Review

The much-anticipated release of Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge on vinyl was topped-off when I surprisingly received it in the mail a brief 4 days after Warners/Nonesuch had sent me my confirmation email that it had been shipped. Usually the transit time in the past has been in excess of 3 weeks due to it being shipped as a parcel. Looks like they’re shipping these out via Priority Mail for US customers, more than likely so that they will be received in time for Christmas.

So there was a good indication that this was going to be fun. Opened up the box, broke out my mini knife to cut open a slit down the right side of the LP slipcase (this allows the shrink wrap to stay on the slipcase and preserves any stickers that have been placed on the shrink wrap and also preserved the slipcase itself from wear and tear), and popped-out the contents. As promised, it comes with an MCR sticker, Three Cheers logo stencil (complete with guns). a type-written lyric sheet that is much more easily readible than that of the CD jacket, and the flip side has “production” lyrics and notes, some handwritten, some typed. Whether or not these are actually from the production of the album is open to speculation. They do look like the real deal, however, as I do possess actual production notes and handwritten lyrics in my Alice Cooper collection, so I’ve seen these types of things before. If not, they did a good job of fudging it. The vinyl itself is a beautiful, deep, blood red. Very cool. That being said, the overall packaging is not as extravagant as the packaging was for The Black Parade deluxe vinyl edition (I literally get a rush every time that I open up my copy of the album because the packaging and heavy-duty vinyl is so frigging cool), but it’s a passable job.

But this is where my pleasure kind of ends. As all vinyl buffs know, the real test is what the album sounds like. Backing up a bit, I have a really nice turntable. It plays just about anything in any condition and makes it sound good. When I put Three Cheers on last night, I literally wondered if there was something wrong with my needle. Did I need to get a new one? The album sounded so scratchy and distorted that it made me wonder if I had gotten a defective copy or something. After about 4 songs, and the scratchiness and distortions getting worse, I decided to see if it’s my turntable or the record by putting on The Black Parade. Sure enough, crisp, clear, organic, goodness comes from my speakers when I put TBP on. So it’s not my needle. Put the Three Cheers back on. Same scratchiness, same distorition. This is a bummer. I already realized that the album is not pressed on 180-gram heavy-duty vinyl (a serious oversight, in my opinion), but the production values in
its analog transfer are seriously lacking. I don’t know what else to say. Sidenote: the jacket that the record, itself, sits in inside the slipcase, is already tearing on all three unopened sides. Either the jacket was a little too small and tore when the records were put into them, or the records were put in too forcefully.

My overall grade is a C-. B+ for packaging, D- for the quality of the vinyl record. The record comes off as more like a bootleg quality of some pirated copy of a record you might pick up at a flea market in Tijuana. I would like to hear what other people have to say. Maybe I did simply get a defective copy. Somehow I doubt it.

I wear this on my sleeve…

Brett Cooper

Here are reader Tiffany’s photos of Bob she took at the Chicago Drum Off.

Thank Tiffany!

Reader Liz went to the Chicago Drum Off at the Guitar Center and met Bob!  This is what went down

I just thought I should give you an update on Mr. Bob Bryar. I saw him Tuesday at the Drum Off in Chicago. He looks very well and happy. I asked about his hand, and he showed me his zig-zag scar on his wrist. It felt weird and bumpy. He said that it was doing just ok. He will soon start weight training for his hands, so hopefully that will make it better.

I also managed to get his autograph. When I went up to him I apologized for making him work his hand even more. He smilled and said it was fine. I had on me a couple of power point note slides from my psychopathology class. I told him he could choose which disorder he wanted to sign. His first reaction was “this is weird.” I also told him not to write all over it because I still needed to study them. So he decided to be a little sh*t and draw a line across one of the words on the power point. I called him a jerk and he just laughed.

There were a bunch of people waiting in line so I decided to leave quickly after. He was increadibly nice and was kind to very one who talked with him.

 Thank you LIz for that!

If anyone has photos from the Drum Off and would like to share contact me at brandi@mychemicalfreak.com