My Chemical Romance - "Desolation Row"

[Physical]

Goes for adds on January 27 according to All Access.

I'm excited for this! Does anyone know if it's from a new album?

[musicaddict]

I heard it was a cover.

[pen]

It is a cover. From the Watchmen soundtrack. Bob Dylan.

[Young Money]

Still should be interesting.

[Cody]

Wow, hopefully this is a sign that the new album comes out soon!

[pen]

It probably won't. If anything it's probably a sign that the album won't come out till later in the year. Soundtrack cuts are usually done to fill in gaps. Anyway, this had been in the works for a long time, so it's not like this is just something thrown on there.

[American Idiot]

Now that I think about it, I can't believe it's been 2 1/2 years since MCR released a full-length studio album. I'm glad at least they'll be releasing one new song to the airwaves even if it is on a soundtrack, but we'll probably have to wait possibly another year for another album? Meh.

[Nicholas2.0]

Jan 20, 2009 19:05:29 GMT -5 American Idiot said:

But we'll probably have to wait possibly another year for another album? Meh.

I got time.

[fran182]

Today, it reached Top 50 on Mediabase Alternative:

- 48 MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE Desolation Row 208 - 208 0.938

47 stations playing.

[@DiegoMarcondes_]

VIDEO PREMIERE

www.portalrockline.com.br/tube/musicvideo.php?vid=b02e1a213

[halo19]

It's decent. Not really my favorite MCR song, in fact I probably have all of their other singles ranked ahead of this. I didn't remember the Dylan version well which is why I'm also not trying to get into it just yet (I've only listened to the album right when I bought it last year).

[fran182]

Today, it reached Top 40 on Mediabase Alternative:

- 39 MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE Desolation Row 266 - 266 1.171

49 stations playing.

It's #70 on iTunes Top 100 Songs.

Wasn't expecting this to be successful...x

[American Idiot]

I only heard the second half of this while driving home from work the other day and thought it was decent. I have to hear the whole thing to make a real decision I guess.

[fran182]

I think this is just decent!

I love "My Chemical Romance", though.

I'm excited about the new album, I just hope it comes ou this year!
I'm sure it will be in my top 20 of 2009.

Imo, "The Black Parade" is one of the best rock albums of the decade. It's so epic!
And then, there's "Welcome To The Black Parade". For me that song is a masterpiece, even if it is a "Queen" rip-off.

[Cody]

This is actually REALLY good now, great tune. I hope the album follows this up nicely

[Shadows in the Dark]

Debuts at #32 on Modern Rock.

Damn....

[No Brake$]

This song is already starting to fade, no shocker, I guess I don't understand this release, because well, it's forgettable and bad.

[pen]

Feb 9, 2009 22:14:03 GMT -5 No Brake$ said:

This song is already starting to fade, no shocker, I guess I don't understand this release, because well, it's forgettable and bad.

I'm not sure if you really don't understand it or not, but here is a crash course.

This is off of the Watchmen soundtrack. It is the only new song on the soundtrack. It's a cover of Bob Dylan. It's not from a new album and it's not for a new album. It's just meant to promote the soundtrack, and the movie by extension. It's also a handy stopgap release between The Black Parade and MCR's next album, which probably won't be ready until the fall at the earliest, I'm sure. So it doubles as a way to keep MCR's name on the radio, for a brief amount of time.

And it still has a bullet, so it's not fading yet. It's just not going to have as much drive as a full-fledged single.

[pen]

Oh, and I like it, so you can go to heck.

[Walking Contradiction]

I will say that I'm glad that I just happened to hear this on an internet station before reading about it. This is a lot better than it sounds on paper.

[Nicholas2.0]

This ended up sounding pretty much like I expected it to.

From Dylan's original 11½ minute version, here's how they edited it:
They included verses 1 &2.
They skip verses 3-7
They add in a guitar solo, the second half of which recreates the beginning of Jimi Hendrix's Woodstock version of "The Star-Spangled Banner."
They include verse 8.
They skip verse 9.
They include the last four lines of verse 10.

(Or if you like, the last four lines of any of the verses could be considered "choruses," since they all end in "desolation row.")

Anyway that makes My Chemical Romance's version a concise, radio-ready 2:59.

[pen]

I've never heard the original. Ten verses? Jeebus.

[Nicholas2.0]

Feb 10, 2009 15:47:53 GMT -5 pen said:

I've never heard the original. Ten verses? Jeebus.

Well to be honest, though I've been familiar with all of Bob's bigger songs for at least 5 years now, it's only been a year and a half since I've had Highway 61 Revisited (as well as Blood on the Tracks and Blonde on Blonde) on my hard drive. And since I view him as a pretentious, humorless curmudgeon, I don't go out of my way to play his music from my hard drive. And "Desolation Row" was not a song that ever shuffled through.

Anyway, I passed up a couple opportunities to hear MCR's version because I wanted to at least hear (if not familiarize myself with all 11 minutes of) Bob's original first. So yeah, I finally did that and have now enjoyed MCR's version a couple of times. I recorded it off the radio and compared it with Dylan's lyrics from his website.

I'm clearly no Dylan aficionado (even though most of his earlier stuff is pretty remarkable) and don't pretend to be.

[fran182]

Top 20 on Mediabase Alternative:

24 20 MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE Desolation Row 673 617 56 1.822

51 stations playing.