• This is the first single from the album The Black Parade. In an interview with MTV, lead singer Gerard Way explained that the concept of the album is "The Patient," who dies of cancer at an early age. According to Way, death comes in the form of your most powerful memory, and for "The Patient" that memory is a parade he went to with his father, which explains the album title.
• During the shooting of the video the band suffered two very unfortunate accidents. First, drummer Bob Bryar suffered a bad burn on the back of his leg, which became infected. Even worse was when lead singer Gerard Way tore several ligaments in his leg after being playfully tackled by another member of the band.
• Throughout the album, you can kind of see into the mind of someone in a lot of pain. The previous My Chemical Romance album, Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge, dealt with demons, and this seems to be a continuing trend, but in a more mature way.
• There could be some biblical imagery in this song, as a father tells his son at a parade to be the savior of "The broken, the beaten and the damned." The son does not think himself worthy enough to redeem these people. This could be seen as a reference to God (father) telling Moses (his son) he needs to be the savior of the Jewish people (the broken, beaten, and damned) and lead them out of Egypt. At first Moses does not think himself worthy of this task.
• The video doesn't cut corners, showing the black parade marching to meet The Patient, who is played by Lukas Haas from the movie Mars Attacks!. It was directed by Samuel Bayer, who did Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" video.
• In the video, you first see Gerard Way with short blonde hair. He dyed it so he could better channel "The Patient."
• At a 2006 concert in Pennsylvania, Gerard Way said, "The song is dedicated to all dads out there."
• My Chemical Romance played this live for the first time in a rooftop performance at the 2006 MTV Video Music Awards.
• The line, "Sometimes I get the feeling she's watching over me" are the only lyrics on the album that are about the Way brothers' late grandmother. MCR's song "Helena" was inspired by her.
• The band went through a lot of personal struggles while making the album, made worse by the pressure to outdo their previous release, Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge. Gerard suffered from terrifying nightmares and his brother, Mikey, dealt with severe depression and daily panic attacks, forcing him to take a leave of absence. On top of that, they were staying in a notoriously haunted mansion, The Paramour Estate in Los Angeles, which Mikey described as "a storm cloud in the shape of a house." Gerard admitted it wasn't easy, but he told biographer Tom Bryant (Not the Life It Seems: The True Lives of My Chemical Romance) the pain made the album relatable. "It wasn't the happiest times of our lives. We were questioning our mortality. I think it's a very human record underneath the bombast and the theatrics. The sound is very large and grand but it's a very mortal record. It's an interesting duality because there are a lot of lyrics that examine ourselves – not just as a band but as human beings. We were examining each other and hopefully it will encourage listeners to examine themselves. We were putting our lives under a microscope. We wanted listeners to put their own lives under the microscope too.'"

Thanks for reading!

CATW