While writing new material, the band aimed to replicate the emotional rush that went into
Revenge,'
while also surpassing it in scale as much as possible.' They wanted to create an album that would be considered a "classic", something passed on from generation to generation.''
While Revenge'' was largely an album composed of whatever each band member could individually come up with, they aimed to try and make their third album more coherent, with shared general themes and a storyline. Gerard Way would create a storyline centered around life and death, which would later evolve into one centered around a man dying of cancer, whilst death presents itself to him in the form of his fondest childhood memory: his father taking him to see a marching band while he was a child. From there, he created a plethora of characters that would exist within the album's world: Mother War, Fear and Regret, The Soldiers, and The Escape Artist. The album would adopt this story, becoming a
concept album.'''' The album's working title was
The Rise and Fall of My Chemical Romance, although its name was later changed into
The Black Parade. Shortly after the band entered S.I.R. Studios, they created early versions of songs that would become "The End.", which was originally known as "Intro", "
Mama", and "
Teenagers".'''' To work on
The Black Parade, My Chemical Romance traveled to Los Angeles in April 2006. They chose to record the majority of the album in the
Paramour Mansion. They also got in contact with
Rob Cavallo, a producer known for his work on albums from other artists like
Green Day, to help produce the album. By the time that the band arrived at the Paramour, only about a third of the record had been written.'''' The mansion itself at the time of the album's production was noted by the musicians as being scary and uneasy to be in, with all of the band members believing that the nature of the mansion "bled" into the sound of the music itself and left a significant impact on them all. Gerard Way, in particular, felt a necessity to "cut himself open" in order to write good music and completely engulfed himself within the atmosphere of living in the Paramour. He also found that he would often struggle to sleep while living in the mansion due to "night terrors".'
Bassist Mikey Way would also develop depression and alcoholism from the toll that living in the mansion left on him, particularly due to a lack of communication to the outside world.' After straining themselves for a long period of time, the band took a short break to play at
Emo's in
Austin, Texas.'''' While this significantly helped out with the band's mental health, it strangely led to them hitting a creative roadblock and the album's writing process would be halted.'
While Frank Iero managed to write one song during this brief period, "House of Wolves", it was apparent to all of the band members that they were struggling to get back on track.' Motivated by their own frustrations towards their lack of creativity at the time,
Ray Toro would toy around with a song titled "The Saddest Music in the World". Gerard Way would help out Toro with the song, motivated by his fears about Mikey's mental health, and it would eventually become "
Famous Last Words". After that song was created as a method of letting out his emotions, Gerard Way along with the rest of the band managed to start coming up with new music again.'
Around the same time that "Famous Last Words" was created, Gerard would write "Sleep", which was based on the troubles he faced falling asleep at the time.' Shortly afterwards, the band would revisit a song concept they had originally sketched out in their earliest recording sessions, "The Five of Us Are Dying". It was the hardest song that the band tried to make for the record, having to rewrite it several times and never being satisfied with the result. In the middle of the song's creation, Gerard would break up with his then-girlfriend of six years, causing further distress during its production.'''' It wasn't until Cavallo showed the band a short piano piece that he had written, which was then attached to the beginning of the song, that the band would realize what they wanted to do with the song. It would later evolve into the album's centerpiece, "
Welcome to the Black Parade".''
A lot of music was written for the album would end up being cut by its final release, including a scrapped unknown cover song that was never recorded. In 2016, Gerard Way stated that The Black Parade
"could have been, and almost was, a double album". One such example of a cut song was "Kill All Your Friends", which Gerard Way would go on to regret not putting on the album. Recording for The Black Parade'' would end by August 2006. The band would assist Cavallo with the final production of the album, while
Chris Lord-Alge would mix the album'
and Doug McKean would serve as its engineer.' == Composition and lyrics ==