My Chemical Romance were an absolutely huge Emo Band from the early 2000’s.
They made four studio albums, toured the world and introduced thousands of sad teenagers to Emo music!
However, sadly in 2013, MCR split up, and people were not okay!
For a few years, emo kids had to just be sad or move on and enjoy other work to come from the band members.
Like Gerard Way’s amazing comic: Umbrella Academy!
But then, on Halloween 2019 they suddenly announced a reunion tour!
They played the first gig in Los Angeles at Shrine Expo Hall.
Suddenly the Twittersphere was rife with wild speculation about where else the band would play.
Download Festival?
The most prominent rumour is that MCR will play Download Festival 2020.
It’s obviously wanted. For the fans this would be the best day ever and we do have some clues here and there to make a judgement on.
So, let me answer this: will MCR play download festival?
I am not usually one to make such concrete declarations but: No.
Not a chance in hell, kid.
Now before you click off this post and just repeat the rumour: let’s discuss both sides of the argument and see why people think MCR will play.
Why They Might Play Download
Let’s be totally honest here: MCR are the perfect band for Download Festival.
My Chemical Romance absolutely have the nostalgia factor for a huge proportion of the festivals audience.
They also have, and this is only slightly less important: a fantastic huge back catalogue. With four sublime albums and dozens of grade-A songs, they could absolutely fill a headliner slot with their music.
Obviously with a new tour announced, people are expecting the band to play some of the biggest and best venues and festivals around.
They are also confirmed as playing both Download Festival Australia and Japan.
If anything is a good indicator for the band to play at Donington, thats it.
The Video
On January 9th 2020, the band released a cryptic video on their Twitter account.
A series of strange and foreign characters showed up, plus a Union Jack.
This strange puzzle really got people going, and as the internet has the collective mind power of Sherlock Holmes, the message was pretty quickly translated.
Apparently the characters were from the Theban alphabet, commonly used by Wiccans.
Translated, the message reads:
June 10 2020
From this, people were pretty quick to link the date with a popular music festival that takes place in early June…
Case closed, amirite?
Why They’re Not
No, the case is not closed. Not by a long shot.
MCR fans were very quick to deduce the message on Twitter, but then they made some pretty huge leaps in logic to arrive at Download Festival.
First off: the headliners for Download have already been chosen.
- Kiss
- Slipknot
- System of a Down
If you want to read my opinion of the Download Festival headliners, you can totally do that.
Now, maybe this is just me (and you are welcome to disagree), I think that MCR are far too huge a band to take the second spot to any of those bands.
I think it would be all or nothing. If they can’t headliner, then they’ll just take their music elsewhere.
Secondly, the last time the band played Download Festival, way back in 2007, they were bottled mercilessly by a less than favourable audience.
Thirdly, and probably the most damming piece of evidence here:
The message read June 10 2020.
Download Festival takes place between June 12th and June 14th.
That’s pretty concrete evidence right there.
Upside and Possibility
Now, the message may not have been about Download festival.
BUT I think we can assume the band is announcing something big on that date though, likely a big gig at a massive venue.
There is also the possibility that the band COULD still play a secret set at Download Festival, but I think that’s pretty unlikely.
The plus side though is that the band is clearly announcing something in the UK!
And thats got to be of some comfort to all the Killjoys out there.
Conclusion
I am sorry to disappoint all the emo fans out there, but MCR will not be at Download Festival, there is just no chance.
But hey, you know how it goes: these will be my famous last words!
