It is 6:45 p.m. Thursday and the St. Pete Times Forum is rapidly being filled with the nervous and excited chatter and laughter of fans.
Most of them dressed in black clothing and some of them not yet old enough to drive wait in the dimly lit arena for the show to begin.
Tonight, every single person in the building has a common bond that bond is an undying and almost uncanny love and respect for the band “My Chemical Romance.”
As the lights cut completely off and the audience is drowned in a blackness so deep one can not be expected to see hand in front of one’s face, screams and cheers ride over the sea of people only to break on a dark and empty stage.
All of a sudden, almost unnoticed to the crowd, a gurney covered in nicotine yellow sheets slips out on to the stage.
Fans begin to scream and chant “MCR” over and over again because they realize who is on that cart, and they can not wait for him to appear. Finally, their savior has arrived.
Lead singer Gerard Way, 29, slowly emerges from under the sheets and begins singing the opening lines his fans have been dying for.
“Come one, come all to this tragic affair. Wipe off that make up. What’s in is despair. So throw on the black dress mix in with the lot, you might wake up and notice your someone you’re not.”
The crowd that has been shrouded in shadow now bursts with light as the curtains fly open and Way’s band of misfits from New Jersey pour their soul into the second song, “Dead!”
Way takes a quick break from cuing the guitarists and the drummer, Bob Bryar, who looks completely astonished that his drum set can revolve, to welcome the crowd to the show.
“Hello Tampa, how the hell are ya,” said Way, “I want you to do a little something for me. Repeat after me: Le Black Parade. Le Black Parade. It’s cool. It’s hip, It’s fashionable.”
Of course, the crowd does exactly what he commands of them.
Suddenly, rhythm guitarist Frank Iero plunges into the next song and again the audience is lost in the noise, the lyrics, and the passions that is a My Chemical Romance concert.
They continue to play through the first half of their recently double-platinum album entitled “The Black Parade” which chronicles a young man’s life experience as death comes for him while he lies in the hospital. Way’s entrance reflects to the audience that he may be the one who needed to be saved.
At the end of the song “Sleep”, Way pauses the show and develops a more serious tone, this time not laced in imagery and metaphor.
“This next song, which many of you know, is a heavy song. This band has always stood for something and we still do. We are telling you that there is always someone you can turn to and violence is never the answer,” he said.Even his band mates looked on almost in awe of him as the lights beamed down and the audience became hushed, every single person absorbing every word.
The band cues up and begins to play the catchy yet politically charged song “Teenagers” which came under scrutiny when the album was released in October and is being delayed as a U.S. single because of the massacre at Virginia Tech earlier this month.
The lyrics are the “patients” recount of being picked on by more popular kids in high school and the pinnacle of the song comes when Way shouts “And if you’re troubled and hurt what you got under your shirt will make them pay for the things that they did”.
With only one more song from the album left to play, Way continues his banter with the audience. “We are almost done; I know I know, we only have one more song to play for you tonight.
Then you are going to have to deal with “My Chemical Romance.” Sorry,” said Way.
Iero, looking very tired and almost out of breath leaned over the microphone and said, “Pssh My Chem, I hate those guys.”
The fans in the audience, who know that the band refers to them selves now as “The Black Parade” and to “My Chemical Romance” as their former alter ego, laugh and join in the banter.
Parents of those fans who look like they would rather be in bed look around at other parents with puzzled expressions hoping that someone would get the joke they missed.
But the parade must carry on.
The band belts out the song “Famous Last Words”, their second U.S. single with some much passion that Way looks emotionally distraught.
The whole time, the thousands of minions gathered by The Black Parade are chanting right back at him.”I am not afraid to keep on living, I am not afraid to walk this world alone