The band recently kicked off their 20th anniversary tour for The Black Parade
My Chemical Romance paid tribute to Smashing Pumpkins during their show at San Francisco’s Oracle Park over the weekend. The emo punk band performed a rousing cover of the Pumpkins’ 1995 hit “Bullet With Butterfly Wings” as a surprise addition on their Long Live the Black Parade tour, which kicked off earlier this month.
The band offered a relatively traditional cover of the song, off Smashing Pumpkins’ seminal album Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, with frontman Gerard Way putting his own spin on Billy Corgan‘s vocals.
My Chemical Romance continue their tour on July 26 in Los Angeles at Dodger Stadium. They are also set to perform several shows in August and September, with an array of special guests opening the shows, including Garbage, Death Cab for Cutie, and Evanescence.
The tour celebrates the 20th anniversary of the band’s 2006 album, The Black Parade. Last year, MCR revived the iconic album at the When We Were Young music festival in Las Vegas in October where they performed The Black Parade in full. Since its 2006 release, the concept album has been heralded in the emo music scene and beyond. Rolling Stone named it one of “The Greatest 500 Albums of All Time.”
Last month, My Chemical Romance unveiled a deluxe edition reissue of their LP Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge featuring several previously unreleased live recordings. The four bonus tracks on the collection all come from a session My Chemical Romance did for BBC Radio 1’s “The Lock Up” in 2005. Among the previously unreleased recordings are live versions of “I’m Not OK (I Promise),” “Helena,” and “The Ghost of You,” while also included is a performance “You Know What They Do to Guys Like Us in Prison,” which was originally released as a B-side on a limited edition UK CD single of “I’m Not Okay.”
