On October 14, 2006, My Chemical Romance scored their first (and, to date, only) UK number one single with Welcome To The Black Parade, the striking centre-piece of their soon-to-be-released third album third album, The Black Parade. This was a genuinely remarkable achievement for a band who, just five years earlier, were playing basement shows in their native New Jersey and giving away their songs for free on MySpace. But while their commercial break-through was celebrated loudly by MCRmy loyalists in the UK, not everyone was on board with emo’s new superstars.
In the same week that Gerard Way’s band stormed to the top of the British charts, another fast-rising rock band, homegrown indie darlings Kasabian, hit out at the band for their “weird and dark” music, labelling the quintet “sad” and claiming that they “don’t have anything positive to say.”
“It’s like ventriloquists’ music,” fumed frontman Tom Meighan. “It’s weird and dark…The only good news is that it won’t last. These clowns won’t be around for much longer.Their make-up will flake off and the scene will die out. And it can’t happen soon enough.”
“I just can’t relate to it,” added guitarist Serge Pizzorno. “We are about decadence, having a good time and getting off your head. We champion youthful rebellion. We’re into peace and love, spreading harmony and having respect for people. But these people are the absolute opposite. It’s sad. These emo kids should get out more and try and have a good time instead.”
While this small-minded and inaccurate critique of the band revealed much more about Kasabian’s vanilla outlook than My Chemical Romance’s music or worldview, the Oasis-worshipping Leicester band’s comments were reported all all over the world, and soon reached the MCR camp, who found the English band’s ignorance hugely amusing.
“This band has never had a bullshit war ever,” Gerard Way responded. “I haven’t found an opponent worthy enough yet. If you’re gonna take me on, you’d better have the balls for it! If you’re gonna talk shit about us, you’d better have the juice. And we haven’t found anybody with the juice yet.”
As it turned out, there was room on planet earth for both bands.
Kasabian have since racked up seven UK number one albums, the most recent two featuring Pizzorno on lead vocals following the band’s July 2020 dismissal of Tom Meighan, while, 20 years on from the ex-Kasabian man’s prediction that they “wouldn’t be around for much longer”, My Chemical Romance have just played three sold-out shows at London’s 90,000-capacity Wembey Stadium to celebrate the 20th anniversary of their defining album.
Not bad for a bunch of “clowns”.
In a heart-warming post-script, the ‘feud’ was settled amicably almost as soon as it started.
“Just after that came out I got on the plane and who was sitting next to us for about eight hours? My Chemical Romance!” Tom Meighan later told Q magazine. “I’m face to face with the singer. We’re looking at each other, so I said ‘Look man, let’s have peace here!’ And he just laughed. He bought me a bottle of champagne and we got pissed. What a sweet man. He’s fucking cool!”
(LouderSound)
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