Since My Chemical Romance’s breakup back in 2012, the now defunct band’s former frontman, Gerard Way, has kept himself busy. Very busy, in fact. He’s forged a second career in comics, writing an Eisner award winning series, The Umbrella Chronicles, and working with Marvel on the Edge Of Spiderverse series. Late last year, he released his debut solo album to rave reviews, and is currently touring the world promoting the record. Following his recent talk at the Oxford Union, he is now speaking with me about these projects, his creative process, and what’s finally allowed him to feel content.
It might surprise many who are familiar with Way through his highly conceptual work with his former band, or through his fantastical work in comics, to see his approach to promoting his solo LP, Hesitant Alien. He’s stripped back the costuming and allowed music and showmanship to take centre stage. Talking about this change in direction, Way tells me, “That in itself was the concept actually, not to have a concept. To focus just on the 70s and focus on glam, and just have fun with that element, and to really make it about the songs.”
He shares how much he’s enjoyed spreading his talents across disciplines, and how they’re all equally part of a creative vision. “I think it’s all just coming from expression and creation. I feel like an artist. It’s cool to wake up and be like, ‘What do I have to do today?’ Sometimes it’s the cover to a comic, sometime it’s a script to a comic, sometimes it’s writing a song, sometimes it’s recording a song, sometimes it’s writing lyrics, sometimes it’s coming up with video treatments. And I’m using every skill I have to make those things come to life.”
To those paying attention, his comic book successes likely came as little surprise. Way’s musical output has frequently comprised narrative elements. He even released a comic book follow up to My Chemical Romance’s last album, Danger Days, following the continued adventures of the album’s ‘Fabulous Killjoys’. I ask if he uses characters in his lyrics as a way to externalise aspects of himself with which he feels uncomfortable. He replies, “To me, playing a character or using a character, it doesn’t feel like you’re hiding behind them. It almost feels like you’re saying, ‘I am the character.’”
Yet for all the excitement surrounding his latest release, Way is in no hurry to distance himself from his successes with his former band. He tells me he “didn’t become a solo artist to make the kind of art I wanted specifically, because I felt like I could always do that. So at that moment it came time and I started making Hesitant Alien, it’s just what came out. All this Britpop and fuzz rock and all that.” During his talk with the Union, though, Way did seem pretty certain the band was done for good, telling the anxious crowd, “It feels like it achieved what it set out to achieve.”
However, he hasn’t necessarily retired the theatricality of his previous work, suggesting, “I’m thinking of writing for the next album, and I’m feeling like it’s a concept album. It’s definitely too early only in that the new stuff feels like it’s gone further down the rabbit hole of glam, like a more traditional 70s kind of thing. So it feels like it’s gone that way, but I don’t know what will happen when we hit record. It could take on a whole new life.”
Now happily married to artist and Mindless Self Indulgence bassist Lyn-Z, and with a five year old daughter, Bandit, Way seems as if he’s settled into a new phase of life. Reacting to my suggestion that his solo effort was his most self-satisfying release to date, he confirms, “It gave me an understanding of what it meant to be an artist. I really started to understand that, and I think that made me content.
“I started to pare things down, and to realise what was important to me. On Hesitant Alien, I didn’t feel like I was fighting with anybody. With My Chemical Romance records it felt like it was some kind of boxing match, with society or the world. Paring things down made me feel like I could open them up a lot more.”
