Turn away if you could get me a drink
Of water 'cause my lips are chapped and faded
Call my aunt Marie, help her gather all my things
And bury me in all my favorite colors
My sisters and my brothers, still, I will not kiss you
'Cause the hardest part of this is leaving you
[Chorus]
(My sisters and my brothers, still)
I will not kiss you (Kiss you) (Turn away)
Lips are chapped and faded, call my (Call my) (Turn away)
Lips are chapped and faded (Faded)
Kiss you (Kiss you) (Turn away)
Lips are chapped and faded, call my (Call my) (Turn away)
Lips are chapped and faded (Faded)
[Verse 2]
Turn away 'cause I'm awful just to see
And all my hairs abandoned all my body
All my agony know that I will never marry
Baby, I'm just soggy from the chemo
I'm counting down the days to go, this just ain't livin'
And I just hope you know
[Chorus]
I will not kiss you (Kiss you) (Turn away)
Lips are chapped and faded, call my (Call my) (Turn away)
Lips are chapped and faded (Faded)
Kiss you (Kiss you) (Turn away)
Lips are chapped and faded, call my (Call my) (Turn away)
Lips are chapped and faded (Faded)
If you say (If you say)
Goodbye today (Goodbye today)
I'll ask you to be true (I'll ask you to be true)
'Cause the hardest part of this is leaving you
Yes, the hardest part of this...
[Outro]
I will not kiss you (Kiss you, kiss you, kiss you)
Lips are chapped and faded
Call my (Call my, call my, call my, call my)
Lips are chapped and faded (Faded)
Kiss you (Kiss you, kiss you, kiss you)
Lips are chapped and faded
Call my (Call my, call my, call my, call my)
Lips are chapped and faded (Faded)
About
In January of 2016, twenty one pilots' frontman Tyler Joseph posted a 13 second long clip of a cover of “Cancer” by My Chemical Romance. Since then, Rock Sound magazine announced the release of a The Black Parade cover album featuring a variety of different artists.
On September 13th, 2016, the twenty one pilots account released the cover via a tweet linked to a Youtube Video.
The single artwork depicts Tyler Joseph falling in a red light. The letters and colors are similar to those used on Twenty One Pilots' Blurryface, hinting at continuity of some kind. During the video, many of the books shown on the bookcases have covers similar to the patterns of the nine dots on the Blurryface album cover.
In the original MCR version of the song, the protagonist of the Black Parade album, known as “The Patient,” dies as a result of cancer.
While this is a cover of MCR, twenty one pilots definitely made it their own. While the original version relies on a driving piano and heavy vocals, the cover is more of a down-tempo electronic track. These changes give the song more of a relaxed and resigned feeling to it. The instrumentation and vocals feel subdued as if it were created by someone who has very little energy left to give.
Q&A
Find answers to frequently asked questions about the song and explore its deeper meaning
When we were approached about covering My Chemical Romance’s ‘Cancer,’ I was really excited about it. But I was also kind of nervous about changing something that felt right and was so simple. The one thing that stood out to me was the lyric, ‘I will not kiss you’. It’s such a pure lyric, because that person’s talking about their family members, like their mom and their brothers. When I first heard the song, that was the line that hit me the hardest and stayed with me. So that’s why I was excited to approach the song in a new way. It made me feel that I could highlight one of my favorite lyrics and then it became kind of a chorus, in a sense. Hopefully we did the song justice…"
–Tyler Joseph in an interview with Rock Sound
The production on this cover greatly shifts the tone of the song from the more loudly remorseful and almost angry piano ballad MCR fans have become familiar with, to a more resigned, hollow, and haunting composition in twenty one pilots' rendition. The soft, echoing drums and single-key piano notes lead to a more airy, quiet, and delicate tone rather than an almost aggressive one, as seen in the tense, acoustically raw piano strikes seen in the original.
The context of the production itself, and where it fits in to twenty one pilots' discography, is an interesting thought in itself. Although reminiscent of tracks like “Goner” on “Blurryface,” the beat and melody sounds more at home on their self-titled debut, right at home, if not a little down-tempo, with songs in lieu of “Oh Ms. Believer” and “Fall Away.” In short, the sound isn’t something we’ve really heard from the band since their shift to a more electro/synthpop sound on 2011’s “Regional at Best,” and then to a more hip-hop vibe on “Blurryface.”