David Pearce – Popular Culture and Personal Passions

My Chemical Romance and Joan Jett and the Blackhearts Wembley Stadium July 10 2026

This was a concert I had been looking forward to since we booked our tickets and I had built up some very high expectations. When I found out that the support act was going to be rock royalty, those expectations went up a further notch. Were they going to be met or were they so high that I would inevitably be disappointed?

Joan Jett and The Blackhearts took to the stage with the stadium a little more than half full, and those who didn’t arrive in time missed one of the legendary figures of rock music, called with some justification the ‘Godmother of Punk’. She was just 17 when she co-founded The Runaways and she revisited those days with the songs ‘Cherry Bomb’ and ‘You Drive Me Wild’. Watching her on stage you just can’t believe she has been in the music business for 50 years. She was in fantastic form, attacking the guitar and singing the lyrics of teenage disaffection with an attitude that is undimmed by the years. ‘Cherry Bomb’ in particular was a highlight of the set with its power and poise never wavering as the ‘wild girl’ let the crowd know she was in control. In between the two Runaways song was a cover that I never thought I’d ever hear live, ‘Do You Wanna Touch Me (Oh Yeah)’ originally by the disgraced rocker Gary Glitter, but also a Top 20 hit for The Blackhearts in the US. It was a clear statement of Jett’s unwavering iconoclasm and she brought the song back to life with a bluesy approach and an urgency that reminded me of how good the song actually is. The lyrics were absolutely perfect for this gender swapped version and it’s great that the band have decided to keep it in her repertoire.

One of my favourite parts of the set was when Kenny Laguna, keyboardist, songwriter and record producer, as well as co-founder of Joan Jett and The Blackhearts, talked about their early days. After they set up as a band they went on the road to as many venues as they could find. They didn’t get a huge amount of support from the record companies so they loaded up their van with themselves, their instruments and the vinyl to sell afterwards. It’s an insight into days that are pretty much gone in these algorithm driven times, and to those of us of a certain age seems far more like the real business of breaking into music. The song ‘Fake Friends’ reflected this time very well with its occasionally bitter but always funny lyrics.

The song that gave Joan Jett and The Blackhearts their only US Number 1 and their only UK Top 5 hit was not the final song of the set as I expected, but that was very clever on the band’s part as they built on the excitement of a singalong that thundered through the stadium and introduced the most casual of fans to three absolute belters to finish with, top ten hits ‘Crimson and Clover’ and ‘I Hate Myself for Loving You’ and the gleeful ‘Bad Reputation’ that gave Jett a brilliant final number to tear into. Despite the amazing quality of every song on this fantastic 12 song track list, ‘I Love Rock n’ Roll’ stands head and shoulders above the rest. It’s a slice of raw, undimmed brilliance that each generation discovers anew and loves as much as the previous generation. The crunching guitars and the growling vocals are as urgent and as irresistible as they were 45 years ago and Joan Jett still sings it with the power and attitude of youth. It was a singalong that hit the heights, and made me feel as I often do when hearing a favourite song live for the first time, that I had never really heard it properly before. It definitely goes into the memory banks as a live moment to rank with the very best I’ve experienced. I came to the concert thinking I would see a legend of music, and of course I did, but I also saw a vibrant band with a huge present and future as well as an amazing past.

When I was sitting and waiting for the main attraction, I was fascinated and amused by the Big Brother style signs outlining the rules for the country of Draag. My favourite was Rule 47: Remain calm. Panic will be assigned 🤣 which, as either of my daughters who were with me would tell you, suited me perfectly! The sense of Draag as a Soviet Era or Soviet Style state was reinforced by the occasional appearance of a man or woman with a cross over their face and Cyrillic letters that I took to mean that they had been executed. It was part of the developing sense of unease that was essential to the staging of the show to come. The Black Parade album was a concept album that harked back to the 70s and 80s in terms of its nature, but which was up to date musically when released due to its mixture of rock, punk, pop and ballads. On top of the musical concept, a further concept of staging and storytelling was added to increase the impact of a seminal album for my children’s generation. The combination of the two made it absolutely timeless as the next hour or so was to prove.

The Black Parade section started off with ‘We’ll Meet Again’ by Vera Lynn! I had to laugh at the audacity of that choice, but it was completely right, because it wrongfooted the crowd right from the beginning. We knew we were going to get The Black Parade as a theatrical display but this told us that even within the confines of the album that My Chemical Romance were going to stop us from feeling sure of what was coming next. What I really liked was the way that the crowd, mainly in their 20s and 30s, started singing along with a song that their grandparents and great grandparents would have known and loved. The instrumental afterwards was ‘The Laying of the Wheat’ which reflected the largely target driven agricultural sector of those states. The marching band style of that instrumental led straight into a brilliant pastiche of Soviet anthems of the time with the Draag National Anthem, ‘Over Fields’. As a child of the 70s and 80s I can confirm that the doom laden words and militaristic tune were perfectly observed. There was only one decent anthem from the Soviet block and that was the USSR itself, now repurposed as the Russian anthem and musically peerless. During this preamble a bearded man was dragged across the stage and then appeared in a video on one video screen for the rest of the first half.

On to the album itself, and the band were in incredible form from the first note. The opening three tracks ‘The End’, ‘Dead!’ and ‘This is How I Disappear’ were so good that it sent the hairs on the back of my neck rising. The guitars and drums were at full pelt from the opening notes and never let up, but Gerard Way was absolutely peerless and he rose to the challenge of the incredible musicianship with swagger and style. He frequently smiled and occasionally shook his head as if he couldn’t believe the reception he was getting from over 80000 fans, nearly all of whom seemed to know the words as well as he did. As an opening trio of tracks I would suggest that they stand comparison with the opening of any album ever.

‘The Sharpest Lives’ is a masterpiece of attitude that explodes with an undercurrent of nastiness and defiance. In any other album it would be a standout but it is the track which precedes, for my money, one of the finest pieces of music in the 21st Century, ‘Welcome to the Black Parade’. I can’t tell you how much I was looking forward to hearing it live, and when it finally arrived it surpassed everything I could have imagined. It was epic and from the opening piano notes made me emotional as I remembered how much we all loved the track when my children introduced me to it. The singing from the crowd was as loud as you could imagine, but Gerard Way’s voice rose above us all, clear, full of emotion and in total command of the stadium. As a live moment, it goes straight into the Top 5 of nearly five decades of concert going.

Having mentioned the crowd, I have to say how much they contributed to the evening. They were made up in white and red as Gerard Way in his Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge era, in military uniform for the Black Parade era and, right opposite me, there were two young women in florescent skirts and tops carrying light up wands who knew every single word throughout the concert. They were the stars in the area around me, and their enthusiasm was not only utterly infectious but encouraged me to really let loose when I did know the lyrics! In the almost impossible event that they are reading this, I would like to say thank you for making my night even more enjoyable.

The staging was telling a story that unfolded through the night from the dictator with the huge peaked cap and toy corgi (!) to the would be assassin who charged onto the stage in flames. Along with the man who had been locked up at the start, and who was seemingly succumbing to madness in his cell, and the two female vocalists who were clearly part of the apparatus of the state, we even had voting cards to give our decision on an execution. On one side was Yay, which meant he was to be spared, and, on the other, Nay which demanded the firing squad. The overwhelming vote was Nay and the shots rang out!

‘I Don’t Love You’ is a gorgeous rock ballad which gave the audience one of the best vocal performances of the night in an incredibly competitive field. It goes from a whisper to a scream at the end and it was one of the most jaw dropping moments of the entire night. ‘House of Wolves’ is a Stray Cuts style rockabilly strut at the start that morphs into a heavy metal stormer and never lets up as the intensity just gets higher and higher with each bar. The original concept of the album was a man dying of cancer who is looking back on his life and ‘Cancer’, ‘Mama’ and ‘Sleep’ brings the reality of his illness to the fore. The first of the trio is so uncompromising that it is almost impossible to listen to without wincing. He refers to the state of his body and it is utterly heart breaking in places. ‘Mama’ featured Liza Minelli on the original album, guest vocalist for just a couple of lines but instantly recognisable for all that. Lucy Joy Altus and Charlotte Kelso take over her part in the live show and do it brilliantly. ‘Sleep’ is another song that sounds incredible live but which, on the album, fades into the background, sandwiched as it is between two iconic tracks. The power of the song is given full rein in this show and it establishes it as a fantastic piece of stadium rock. The next track was my biggest singalong of the evening, and quite possibly the biggest singalong for the crowd. If it wasn’t, it was level with ‘Welcome to the Black Parade’. ‘Teenagers’ is pure punk, funny, raucous and aggressive with a chorus that has rarely been bettered by anyone. If you’ve ever seen the video of the track with the audience fist pumping, well that’s what I was doing along with everyone else. I may be over four decades past my teens but this song still hits the spot! Funnily enough, it only occurred to me later that Gerard Way had left his own teens behind a fair while ago, but he still sounded absolutely authentic!

One of the best albums ever ends on the beautiful ‘Disenchanted’ and the magnificent ‘Famous Last Words’. In the former, a lifetime of fight and the regret that that life has been cut short is encapsulated in just less than five minutes. All human life is here in a masterpiece of song writing. ‘Famous Last Words’ is a positive finishing song which shows that life goes on and that even if you have lost someone you still have your strength of purpose. ‘I am not afraid to keep on living’ is the refrain that sticks in the listeners mind and it reflects the overall message of The Black Parade. The final song of the first half is the hidden track that used to be a favourite of artists during the height of the CD era. ‘Blood’ turned out to be the perfect ending but I won’t tell you why just in case you haven’t seen the show. It brought to an end an hour of the most innovative, immersive, bonkers and brilliant stagecraft I have ever seen at a rock concert. I really hope there’s going to be a video!

The second half of the show switched the action from the massive stage at the front to a small circular stage in the middle of the crowd. The theatrics were dispensed with as the band went through their other three albums, I Brought You My Bullets, You Brought Me Your Love, Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge and Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys. As my oldest daughter’s boyfriend said, it’s amazing to think that such an influential, era-defining act only had four albums to draw from. I was fully expecting my favourite song of theirs outside the Black Parade to be an encore. Nope! They played I’m Not Okay (I Promise) second in the second half. The theme tune of anyone who was bullied at school, it hits so hard on record and twice as hard live. It’s a cry of anger at the way people treat anyone who is different and, as a result, a cathartic song to belt out with 80000 plus like minded fans. The lines ‘You said you read me like a book/ but the pages all are torn and frayed’ perfectly describe how I felt after seven years of secondary school. When Gerard Way first wrote and performed this he was far closer to the age of those he was primarily singing to, but he still sings those lines like the high school student he was. Other highlights of the second half included ‘Helena’ and ‘To The End’ from the same album and ‘Na Na Na’ from 2010’s Danger Days. The final song of the night was ‘Demolition Lovers’ from 2002’s I Brought You My Bullets, a first outing for this reworked song featuring strings and piano. It was a fantastic finish to one of the best nights I’ve had at a concert.

Thank you to Mikey Way, the brilliant bassist, Frank Iero and Ray Toro, the guitarists who seem to have endless supplies of energy as they pound their instruments into submission and the drummer Jarrod Alexander who holds the whole night together with displays of barely controlled violence to his drumkit! Gerard Way is quite simply the most charismatic front man I have ever seen. He controlled the crowd, delivered the songs brilliantly and went to the well of emotion time and time again and never came up empty. It was a privilege to see a genius at work, and make no mistake, he deserves that title in every aspect of his performance. If you ever get a chance to see My Chemical Romance, take it, because you’ll never see another show like it.