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sendmyresignation · 5 years ago

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alright. writing this “little” piece to exorcise the demon inside of me that wants to expand my teenagers meta further than it needs to go (if you weren't aware I'm writing a post, well an essay, wellll a short paper, about why teenagers fits on the black parade- stay tuned) BUT i cannot stop thinking about the multiple little "rockstar to kill" moments within the song/music video/live performances so... I'm self-indulgently going to write about it :)

anyway, at its most simplified, teenagers is a song about the violence within adolescents and being an adult whose afraid of that capability. that is the basic, surface-level understanding of the song. inherently, with mcr specifically, that sets up a conflict between the narrator of the song and the song’s audience. that means conflict is generational- it duplicates itself over and and over which allows for several different understandings of the narrator’s perspective. the cyclical nature means they could be speaking to a representation of what they view as the fundamental corruption of the youth, both by outside focuses and their very human nature, as the narrator become more cynical in their old age. it could be representative of them talking to their past self, reminiscing on the revenge fantasies they had in high school or the ways they were made to feel like an outcast when they were young. and they also could be speaking directly to the very literal future about their concerns as a mentoring figure (teenagers, to me, functions in layers, its interpretation can shift and change depending on the context) right now we’re preoccupied with that last perspective both within the song and the video’s contextualization, and into this wider idea of what the band’s purpose was (or how they saw their purpose).

putting the rest under a read more out of respect <333

moving into the actual text with that in mind, what becomes significant is the tonal contrast between being the seemly scathing, sarcastic indictment of Dangerous Teenagers on the surface to the actual understanding (if we’re talking about the single on its own) which is moreso criticizing the Authority figures who create and mold this violence either purposely (cog in the murder machine) or with indifference (you’ll never fit in much/they’ll leave you alone/as well as the implication of having to take matters into your own hands because the adults are absent). As a result, the song, on its own, isn’t actually blaming teenagers for the violence they perpetuate, but the narrator attempts to extend their understanding and offer advice. here is a figure looking to bring catharsis without patronizing. like this is most clearly expressed in the use of “maybe they’ll leave you alone, but not me” at the end of the chorus, which in this reading means the other adults may leave you alone, the but I am stepping in to tell you that both self-directed and outward expressions of violence are bullshit and useless and that’s what everyone else is expecting of you so fucking stop it! (this can obviously be re-figured within the context of the album- because, interestingly, the pronouns are purposely confusing with the multiple uses of they in this section) the violence is never explicitly vilified by the speaker,- its exaggerated- what you have under your shirt won’t solve anything isn’t that obvious how ridiculous it sounds, how ridiculous I sound saying it out loud? but also, the violence is implicit. the conflict is still there. the teenagers still scare the shit out of the narrator. so what gives?

well. the song is still about the gulf between generations. the speaker is still afraid and out of touch, regardless of the leadership role they’ve assumed or the perspective of the past they can offer. there is ultimately a limit to how much they can give.

which leads us right into the music video.

So first things first, Black Parade as a whole is heavily inspired by Pink Floyd’s The Wall musically, but the actual aesthetics of the wall are kind of divorced from the ww1 cabaret weimar thing that parade is drenched in (bc britian circa the 1950s is boring and the wall is purposely very ugly and grey and removed from emotion which isn’t dramatic enough for what mcr had in mind). However, teenagers exists as a sort of connecting point between the two- the music video of Another Brick in the Wall Part 2 (which you can watch here if you’ve never seen it) is clearly an influence on the subject matter and the setting and the “plot” of teenagers video- it serves as a sort of a parallel to it. more specifically, there are the “running shots” of kids making their way through unlit hallways into the auditorium that evoke the children in the pink floyd video marching through the school. there’s also the line “cog in the murder machine”, which seem particularly inspired from the depiction of children as going through machines and coming out the other side stiff, wooden, and obedient. then the backdrop of the large bomb centered in my chem’s stage show mimics the shot of the headmaster standing behind the large, lit up clock- especially since that where the teenagers in the crowd of mcr’s video all begin acting in unison, similar to the children in the wall all falling into line (but, like, just the use of ww2 era bomb imagery and gas masks in general is very reminiscent of the early wartime parts of the wall anyway). so in a vague sense, there is a huge connection between teenagers and that emulation and replication of the wall.

however, the most striking similarity is that, in the same way the students destroy their school in a moment of violent inspiration after sequences of disconcerting compliance, the group of high schoolers in teenagers do the same against the band. the difference is that in the case of the teenagers, the explosion is directed at the source of their outburst (they switch from the on-beat fist-punching to wild moshing as the song devolves and ray’s solo starts) instead of in opposition to a more institutional suppressive force. they are not motivated to action because of something done to them, instead it is the actual music itself that serves as both the impetus of conformity and the fuse that destroys that same unison action and then the band. and what’s significant is the particularity of the actions the crowd takes: they steal the band’s instruments from them and they bodily remove gerard from the microphone. like contrast this violence against the band vs the desolation row video where the whole band is physically incapacitated- there, its about knocking them around and getting them to stop (ray is beat down by police, bobs drums are destroyed, etc etc). but here, its about taking their places- the act of destruction is calculated but not purposely cruel. so, in teenagers being a parallel to Another Brick, that moment of turning on the band is the moment of violence but is also the moment of freedom. the difference in the two becomes the ways in which the band is responsible for reawakening the fire within the audience and giving them a purpose. which here is “killing the rockstar” by taking over, taking their places. and that is the nature of music and the nature of the conflict implicit to becoming the “rockstars”

it brings us right back around to that generational conflict: except when your talking about mcr’s realationship with their audience, that becomes the fostering of a group of outcasts and weirdos and freaks and giving them the tools to save themselves, yes. but also giving them the opportunity to do exactly what they did. to pick instruments and take their places. its the cyclical nature of creation and destruction “because when we get old and lazy some of you guys are gonna have to eat us alive by starting your own fucking band (x), that idea of needing a “rockstar to kill” has been refigured to mean something newer, positive. we are the ones killing them, but not in the way of typical martyring where a crowd of detractors and nonbelievers burns you at the stake- but instead by continuing the natural cycle of art, true genuine art. just as mcr is built off of so many influences- creating an entirely new project out of that existing landscape of sound that reaches people and gives them an outlet, we are doing the same things. by besmirching metal and punk by mixing them together, by “selling out” so they could put together a rock opera, by adding theater into a hyper masculine culture of nu-metal and post-hardcore, by making deeply emotional music that was still violent or angry, by writing the way they did they killed the bands they loved and made something better. its the the way in which the creative cycle is a rebirth, of scavenging the good things from the people who came before you and moving forward and taking the world by storm. here, in the video, the audience redirects their violence at the band, yes. but that is the point. teenagers still scare the shit out of the narrator, but that’s not going to stop them from reaching out, from speaking to them directly, from performing until their very last moments

until they take over. until they kill the rockstar. until we eat them alive.

in the end, that is the mission of my chemical romance, isn’t it- to inspire that level of passion, to turn the music into a life-raft and then gasoline and fire in your gut and then a sense of purpose and then into freedom and endless joy? and isn’t it the greatest act of love, the truest expression of admiration to tear them apart, build ourselves creations out of the wreckage to fill the space they leave behind, and then lay them to rest when the time has come?

#my brain. is crazy :) enjoy :)#mcr assigned reading #my posts

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