The Paper Kingdom

In response to the polarizing reception of their fourth album Danger Days, American rock band My Chemical Romance began working on a follow-up record with the hopes of re-capturing the success of their iconic third album, The Black Parade. Following the conclusion of the Danger Days tour, the band returned to Los Angeles to begin work on their fifth album—a concept record about a support group of parents coping with their loss of their children, titled The Paper Kingdom. However, the sessions for the album were described as bleak¹, with those present at the sessions describing it as the darkest music the band had ever written and drawing comparisons to experimental alt-rock band Radiohead.

It was bleak, man. It was fucking real bleak. I get the Radiohead vibe but I think that’s only because none of it was done. There was a weird sparseness to it. We had over an hour’s worth of music framed but very little of it was by any means finished.

— Frank Iero¹

The Paper Kingdom would ultimately never see the light of day, as the band broke up in March 2013—leading to the album being scrapped. In the years that followed the break-up, The Paper Kingdom gained the mystical status of being the “lost My Chemical Romance album” and was subject to heavy speculation within the community—which only intensified after the bands reunion in 2019. Throughout the early 2020s, small portions of the album would begin leaking online—eventually culminating in the full album leaking in 2026. After fourteen years, fans were finally able to listen to the darkest music My Chemical Romance has ever written.

The Paper Kingdom has never been officially released and is currently obtainable only through unofficial channels. Leaking and distributing copyrighted material is against the law; we do not condone it, nor will we be sharing any links to copyrighted material on this page.

Timeline

Who’s who?

My Chemical Romance

• Doug McKean: Audio engineer, record producer, and friend of the band who did engineering for The Black Parade and Danger Days, and was set to produce The Paper Kingdom.

Buyers and Sellers

• Excalibur: Leaker who uploaded three snippets from The Paper Kingdom onto a forum and put the full album on sale.

• Aang and ATTAM: Forum users who allegedly purchased the album together for ten thousand dollars.

• D0UG: Served as a middleman for the transaction between seller Excalibur and the buyers Aang and ATTAM.

• Coming of Jesus: Leaker who posted an unfinished workprint of the full album online, and attempted to sell more unreleased material. He would later be called out for scamming and obnoxious behaviour, leading to his reputation being ruined.

• Toasty: Leaker who released numerous tracks from The Paper Kingdom sessions, disappearing shortly after dropping a mega leak containing 20 gigabytes of material.

2010

November

• November 22, 2010: Danger Days is released.

2011

August

• August 12, 2011: During an interview with chorus.fm, Mikey Way reveals the band has been experimenting with new material.

  Yeah, we have actually. We kind of write every day and we don’t even realize we’re doing it. Sometimes we’ll be at soundcheck and someone will have a riff and everyone starts playing off the riff, or Gerard [Way] has a vocal melody and everyone starts playing off the vocal melody. We’ve had tons of stuff come from that. We’re not really sure where the songs are going to end up or what they’re going to be yet, but we’re just going to keep writing and writing. After this tour, we’re going to pretty quickly continue demoing and then get in there as soon as possible to make a new album.

  When asked what the new material sounded like, Mikey responded:

  The weird thing is, whenever we have a new batch of songs pop up during a record cycle or after a record cycle, it’s usually some kind of kind of thing that gets us to the next sound. Any time we try to guess where we’re going to be or where we’re going to go, we’re usually wrong but we’re always very pleasantly surprised at where we ended up. It’s hard for us to guess what it’s going to end up sounding like. Right now, it’s definitely a mix of Danger Days and some of the stuff we did back in the day.

  — Mikey Way²

2012

January

• January 18, 2012: During an interview with Destroya News, Frank Iero reveals the band is in the early stages of figuring out their fifth album. He doesn’t give any further information, but he does say:

  “I can tell you that I think about music in colour, and I see a lot of orange in the next record.”

  — Frank Iero³

• January 31, 2012: Two fans separately record videos of the band doing soundchecks before a show at Festival Hall, Melbourne, Australia. In the first video (which is very low-quality), the band can be heard playing an unknown song (speculated at the time to be new material).⁴

  In the second video, taken at a different point during the soundchecks, James can be heard jamming while Gerard performs vocal warm-ups. According to the uploader, the band began performing a new song, but he was unable to record it as his camera ran out of battery.

  I loathe my camera so much because it ran out of battery after this, just when they played a NEW SONG. It was so beautiful, oh my God. But I can’t remember it now. All I remember is one lyric that was like “when the rain pours down”. Waaahhhh :(

  — Becky Hill⁵

February

• February 4, 2012: During an interview with Noise11, the band reveals they are building a new studio in Los Angeles to record their fifth album.

  Yeah, back in L.A., we just got a studio, so we’re kind of building that out and basically trying to make a kind of compound where we can be creative and be there whenever we want to be. That’s one of the tough things, you know, when you’re doing records in a kind of a cycle, you have like maybe 3 or 4 months’ time window where you have to write and record a record. Sometimes that’s tough, and you can take longer, but you always feel like there’s something over your head like a time constraint. And, you know, now we’ll have our own place where we can go and make music 24 hours a day, and it’s going to be great.

  Ray also reveals they’ll be working with sound engineer Doug McKean, who did engineering for both The Black Parade and Danger Days

  Doug McKean, we’ve done our past two records with him, he’s an awesome engineer, so he’s going to be working with us. He knows everything. He’s a genius. He definitely, while we’re in the studio with us, helps shape the sound of songs. He does funny stuff like play back stuff in a different way or change arrangements and trick our ears and we’ll be like “That was awesome! Look at what we did!”

  — Ray Toro⁶

March

• March 21, 2012: The band is interviewed by Australian news outlet The Advertiser, during which Mikey talks about the fifth album. He says that while he doesn’t know yet what the album will sound like, he’s confident it will prove non-believers wrong.

  People had formulated ideas about our band just based on seeing a kid in one of our T-shirts – and they were wrong.

  — Mikey Way⁷

• March 23, 2012: My Chemical Romance posts pictures on their Facebook page, showing off their new studio. One of the pictures shows songwriting notes, and the structure of a song being worked on.

  

May

• May 15, 2012: During an interview with The Aquarian, Frank says the writing process is going well and that they’re about a month away from recording their fifth album.

  It’s going really well, actually. I’m really excited. I can’t wait to start tracking. I think we’re maybe a month away from the record button lighting up.

  He also reveals touring drummer Jarrod Alexander will be recording with them.

  Jarrod is a rad guy and a fantastic player. It’s been really fun making music with him these past few months. He loves coffee and hitting drums super-hard… and the fact that he’s not a thieving piece of garbage is a breath of fresh air.

  — Frank Iero⁸

June

• June 11, 2012: While the rest of the band is out watching the 2012 Stanley Cup Final, Gerard writes a new song called “Fake Your Death”. Reflecting on the song two years later, he wrote:

  What was not so obvious at the time was that the song was, and would serve as, a eulogy for the band, though I should have known it from the lyrics. I think internally I did, as I felt an odd sense of sadness and loss after hearing back the words on top of the music. I also felt a strange sense of pride in how honest it was, and could not remember a band recording a song of this nature, being so self-aware. Ending felt like something honest, and honest always feels like something new.

  — Gerard Way⁹

July

• July 18, 2012: During recording sessions for the fifth album, producer Doug McKean goes on Twitter and asks if anyone can provide him samples of the Narita Airport announcement chimes.

  Is anyone at Narita Airport right now. I need a sample of the announcement chimes¹⁰

• July 28, 2012: Doug posts a series of pictures on Twitter, showing the band in the studio.¹¹¹²¹³

  “Never leave the studio and you won’t miss any of the music.”¹¹

  “Six million ways to die, choose one.”¹²

  “Thank you Langevin”¹³

• July 31, 2012: Doug posts two more pictures from the studio. “Squirm” is the title of a 1976 horror film, and it’s possible the band was using it for inspiration.¹⁴

  “Getting ready for guitar overdubs”¹⁴

  “If you only knew what this sounded like! “¹⁵

August

• August 13, 2012: Gerard briefly talks about the fifth album during an interview with Kevin Smith.

  Gerard Way: [holds up 5 fingers] Five. I’m only calling it-… I like to call it MCR 5 right now, so I’m really excited.

  He says the album is going “rather quickly” and that he’ll be meeting with Colleen Atwood (costume designer for The Black Parade and Danger Days) to discuss costumes for the fifth album.

  Kevin Smith: When’s the album come out?

  Gerard Way: We don’t know yet, but this one is going rather quickly, and I’m very excited about that. And, it’s very dark so far, but I really like it.

  Kevin Smith: Are you going to dress up for this one, or are you going to be you?

  Gerard Way: This one. Yeah, this one has… Because, the last one, we didn’t dress up. This one I’ve got something worked out that’s really awesome, and I can’t wait-… I’m actually going to meet with Colleen [Atwood] soon about it.¹⁶

October

• October 13, 2012: While promoting his upcoming comic book The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys, Gerard is asked by interviewer Becky Cloonan if the next album will tie into the comic book.

  Gerard Way: No, the next album will be something completely different.

  When asked if he’s found a theme for the next album, Gerard says:

  Gerard Way: It’s a little too early to say, if I say it now, it probably changed five more times.

  Becky Cloonan: You’ll just jinx it.

  Gerard Way: Yeah, I’ll jinx it too.¹⁷

2013

March

• March 9, 2013: Kill Hannah frontman Mat Devine is interviewed by Kerrang. During the interview, he reveals Gerard Way played him four new songs from their upcoming fifth album.

  It’s incredible! It’s slightly new territory; it’s an evolution. I’ve heard four new songs. It’s exactly in line with what My Chem fans will be thrilled to hear, but at the same time it really marks what I think is a new phase [for the band]. It’s super refreshing, but at the same time familiar in the way you want it to be.

  — Mat Devine¹⁸

• March 23, 2013: My Chemical Romance announces their break-up, and the fifth album is scrapped.

  Being in this band for the past 12 years has been a true blessing. We’ve gotten to go places we never knew we would. We’ve been able to see and experience things we never imagined possible. We’ve shared the stage with people we admire, people we look up to, and best of all, our friends. And now, like all great things, it has come time for it to end. Thanks for all of your support, and for being part of the adventure.

  — My Chemical Romance¹⁹

October

• October 5, 2013: During a panel discussion at the Sydney Graphic Festival, Gerard talks about the depressive state he was in during the recording of the scrapped fifth album.

  I fell back into a lot of old habits because it was easy, because I felt in control. I wasn’t in control at all, and then after climbing out of it - it got worse, it got worse because I became even more paralysed, even more depressed and I started to work on a record that was a concept record about a group of parents in a support group because they all lost their children in a horrible way, and that was supposed to be the last record - and that’s not a story I wanted to tell, and the songs reflected that. You could it hear it, and all the joy, it was gone.

  — Gerard Way²⁰

2014

January

• January 31, 2014: Gerard is interviewed by radio host Zach Dresch for KCFS, where he’s asked about My Chemical Romances scrapped final record.

  Zach Dresch: Before My Chem broke up, you were working on a- I was watching your interview with Grant Morrison in Australia. You’re talking about how your final album would be a concept record about a support group of parents. Was that true?

  Gerard Way: Yea, that is true. That was where it was heading, and the visuals were really beautiful, um, and it was again a lot different like all of the different eras of MCR were very different.²¹

• February 17, 2014: The band releases “Fake Your Death”, the final song it recorded together before it’s break-up. The song is accompanied by a trailer for their greatest hits compilation “May Death Never Stop You”.

April

• April 29, 2014: James Dewees is interviewed by news outlet Under The Gun Review about his new solo project Reggie & the Full Effect, and he’s asked how he felt about My Chemical Romance’s break-up.

  It was weird because, as I got asked to join the band, I had played with them for seven years [already] and was asked to become a member of the band, sign a contract, all that shit, and live in LA for a year working on the record. Seven days a week, ten hours a day, writing music. We have like twenty-six songs that will never be heard. But at the same time, I’ve been their friends for a really long time, and I could see it coming. I mean I went through the first Get Up Kids breakup. Where it was like, I knew Matt was ready to go. So I could kind of tell that Gerard had the signs, like he wasn’t happy, this wasn’t what he wanted to do, he wants to go do other stuff.

  For me it’s always like, your friends and family comes first. So, I mean, he told me this is what he was thinking, and I was like, “Hey, if this is what you want to do, it’s what you want to do. You shouldn’t force yourself to do something you don’t want to do.” When you hear bands do that, it’s like they’re doing “that.” “Like oh man, they’re not writing good music anymore, they’re doing it just to get paid.” If your heart’s not in it, you shouldn’t be doing it

  — James Dewees²²

July

• July 24, 2014: Gerard is featured on Andy Greenwald’s podcast, where he reveals the title of the scrapped fifth album and offers some insight into its production.

  Gerard Way: That My Chem record that didn’t get made, it was really- not only was it really dark, it was supposed to be like a whole stage production that we went into places like the theatre that’s here in Downtown.

  Andy Greenwald: The Disney Theatre, yeah.

  Gerard Way: Because that’s where I’d seen Black Rider. I was basically finding anything else to do besides write music. And that started on Danger Days, really, once that music was done there was no tweaking to it, it was just like “art, art, art, art, art”. And then, this was starting right away where it was like, yeah we cared what the songs were, it’s just gonna be a bunch of dark stuff. You know, we're gonna build costumes and stage set and it's going to be a storyline about a support group of parents who are dealing with the loss of their children, so they make up this story about the children all being missing in the woods and fighting this witch. And that, that's what it was about.

  Andy Greenwald: Did you have a name for it?

  Gerard Way: Yeah, it was called The Paper Kingdom.

  Andy Greenwald: Sounds kinda cool, sounds dark.

  Gerard Way: Yeah, it does, and you know, there may be a time in my life where I want to do The Paper Kingdom, and maybe it’s a book, maybe it’s something else. I don’t feel that dark, I don’t feel like I want to be in a support group for- mentally, on stage every night being in a support group.²³

September

• September 30, 2014: Biographer Tom Bryant releases Not the Life It Seems: The True Lives of My Chemical Romance, an unauthorized biography detailing the bands history from their formation in 2001 to their break-up in 2013. The book reveals new information about the production of The Paper Kingdom.

  Frank reveals that touring keyboardist James Dewees was going to be involved in the writing process for The Paper Kingdom, becoming a full-time member of the band.

  That was a big change for us, with that, came the ability to be super dark and have these ominous things going on that really filled us out. Having James around was really cool because he’s an absolute genius. I’ve never met anybody as musically skilled and creative as him.

  Gerard’s close friend and comic book writer Grant Morrison also discusses the dark time that the band was going while recording The Paper Kingdom, and how it influenced their music.

  The material I heard was super-dark, it was very strange and wasn’t like anything else they had ever done. They were almost going in a Radiohead direction at that point. It probably wouldn’t have worked for them and I think Gerard knew that all along. The last year was a dark time and the music coming out of it was very gothic, I would say.

  — Grant Morrison

  Despite the song Fake Your Death being included in their Greatest Hits album, Frank suggests the rest of the material they recorded for The Paper Kingdom will never see the light of day.

  It’s so far from being done that I don’t know how [much of] it could come out, there were a couple of things here and there that might have been finished but I don’t think it would feel right to go in and finish the other stuff later. Whether there are versions of things that could be agreed upon that could be considered finished, I don’t know. Time will tell.

  — Frank Iero¹

2019

October

• October 31, 2019: My Chemical Romance announces they will reunite for a show in Los Angeles, scheduled for the 20th of December.²⁴

  

2020

January

• January 10, 2020: A short, cryptic promotional video is posted to the Warner Music Artist Services twitter account, using an unknown sound. It’s taken down shortly after, and re-uploaded on the bands socials with the sound removed.

  Source unavailable due to legal reasons.

• January 20, 2020: My Chemical Romance releases a promotional video titled “An Offering” featuring original music and chanting vocals by Gerard Way.²⁵

• January 29, 2020: Another promotional video titled “A Summoning” is released, announcing a North American tour. The video features an original composition by Ray Toro and Jamie Muhohberac, with the chanting vocals from “An Offering”.²⁶

2022

May

• May 12, 2022: My Chemical Romance surprise-releases “The Foundations of Decay”, their first release since “Fake Your Death” in 2014.²⁷

  

June

• June 29, 2022: Doug McKean, audio engineer, record producer, and friend of the band, unexpectedly passes away from a brain haemorrhage at the age of 54. The band issues an official statement paying tribute:

  My Chemical Romance lost Doug McKean, a dear friend, a collaborator, a partner, a brother, a problem-solver, a genius, an integral part of our music. Doug was someone who made us laugh, made us better, understood, and always came to the rescue. He is deeply missed. He always will be.²⁸

September

• September 26, 2022: On the music trading website LEAKED, a user called Excalibur leaks snippets of three songs from The Paper Kingdom:

  • Dark Cloud
  • Witch
  • Wake Up!

  Excalibur initially lists the album for sale for $10,000, though it’s later changed to “Best Offer” instead.²⁹

  

• September 27, 2022: Excalibur is surprised by the strong reaction to the leaks from the My Chemical Romance community, and writes:

  Okay okay, I’ve seen countless remarks on both Reddit and Twitter (some strange threats even) I’m here to respond. Personally, I didn’t know this would blow up to this extent and for now I’m gonna keep this as a private buy regarding the ones who are mad that I had any intentions to leak this knowing it’s music the band made when they were all in a dark place. A group buy isn’t out the window just yet but if there’s enough interest for one I MAY consider it. None of this is “fake” and I don’t think AI can generate rock / the instrumentals that easily.

  Although, if anyone’s interested in the Foundations of Decay session, message me. I also have countless versions of the track.

  — Excalibur

  A group of dedicated fans attempt to organize a group buy, but it falls through due to logistical issues with fund collection. A user on the forum who goes by Aang later claims to have purchased the album from Excalibur, sharing that he’s going to “keep it all private” but is open to releasing a single song.²⁹

October

• October 17, 2022: My Chemical Romance debuts Fake Your Death live during the final night of their five-day residency at the Kia Forum, making it the first song from The Paper Kingdom to be performed live.³⁰

2023

June

• June 10, 2023: Alternative rock community NO COOL KIDS ALLOWED makes a post on Facebook, revealing a livestream they held several months prior where they played all of the leaked snippets from The Paper Kingdom had been copyrighted striked. YouTube’s Content ID system automatically identified one of the snippets as “Paper Swords” by My Chemical Romance.

  Fans theorized at the time that “Paper Swords” could’ve been another song from The Paper Kingdom, though this was purely speculation as nothing could be confirmed at this time.

  GUYS.. several months ago on our stream we played leaked snippets of what we thought were new MCR songs… Well, just recently (as in TODAY) one of those snippets has been identified by the automatic content ID system as “Paper Swords” by My Chemical Romance. Could this be the title of new song?? Is The Paper Kingdom happening??? IS IT HAPPENING SOON???? WE ARE NOT OKAY.³¹

  

• June 23, 2023: Frank launches a Reverb shop, listing his old gear for solo. The gear includes a Harmony Baritone Ukulele, and the description contains a short message from Frank revealing the ukulele was used during sessions for The Paper Kingdom.

  This is the first Ukulele I ever owned. I have always loved the sound of the Ukulele and wanted to use it on a My Chem record. Gerard and I demoed a song together using this ukulele for a record that was never completed before My Chem broke up in 2012.

  — Frank Iero³²

2024

July

• July 4, 2024: D0UG, a reputable middleman on LEAKED, leaks a six-minute long track from The Paper Kingdom titled “Witch”, a snippet of which was leaked by Excalibur two years prior.

  Users on the r/MyChemicalRomance subreddit notice that the first note of Witch was used in a 2020 promotional video for A Summoning, which was deleted for unknown reasons and later re-uploaded without sound.³³³⁴

  Reliable sources for this particular leak are extremely difficult to find, and no evidence of the original threads existence is currently known to exist.

  An article from the Jewel City Times says a song leaked on July 4, 2026 and while it doesn’t name the song, it does cite the My Chemical Romance tracker (which names the track) as it’s primary source.

• July 5, 2024: Reddit user Live_Space_2840 reveals on Reddit that they spoke to Excalibur back in October 2022. During this conversation, Excalibur provides two extra snippets, one of them being from “Wake Up!” (different from the first snippet) and the other being from a demo for their most recent single, “The Foundations of Decay”.

  Excalibur estimates the album to be around 14 to 17 songs long, though he clarifies that some of them are just instrumentals. He also provides the Reddit user a partial track-list, consisting of ten unreleased songs.³⁵

  • Into Your Arms
  • Dive
  • High Hopes
  • Falling Down
  • Birthday Girl
  • Operation Day
  • Louder
  • Dogs
  • Bike Thief (Demo)
  • War Beneath The Rain

  

• July 29, 2024: MarfeeWarfree on the r/MyChemicalRomance subreddit brings attention to an unknown track that played during the intro medley for the band’s 2019 reunion show³⁶. The unidentified track consisted of a young girl singing “Happy Birthday”, and was noted to be out-of-place compared to the rest of the medley - the rest of which was composed of officially released songs.

  They speculate that it could’ve been the track “Birthday Girl”, which was listed in the partial track-list previously provided by Excalibur.

  I was sitting in class when it suddenly dawned on me; one of the supposed tracks that was on the leaked Paper Kingdom track list was called “Birthday Girl”. Between this and the opening of Witch being used for RETURN tour promotions, it makes you think.

  — MarfeeWarfee³⁷

2025

July

• July 6, 2025: Reddit user MyspacePuppy speaks to D0UG, a reputable middleman on the music trading forum LEAKED where The Paper Kingdom was originally put up for sale. D0UG claims he served as a middleman for the sale of The Paper Kingdom by Excalibur to buyers Aang and ATTAM, and that he was the one to leak Witch after ATTAM was exposed for reselling.³⁸

  

• July 26, 2025: During a show in Los Angeles, the band debuts an unreleased song that was originally recorded for The Paper Kingdom. The song is dedicated to Doug McKean’s family, who were in attendance at the show.

  We were making a record that never came out, and this was one of the songs we really loved from it. It was just us in the studio with our friend Doug McKean—he was there recording it. His family’s here tonight. I want this to go out to them.

  This song is called War Beneath The Rain.³⁹

2026

After this point in the timeline, I’ll be unable to provide links to various sources as they may contain copyrighted material - redacted screenshot evidence will used in place instead. Apologies for the inconvenience.

Not every single leak will be documented here, as that would go beyond the scope of this article—and my abilities as a writer. This section will only document leaks of major importance.

At a later point, I’ll create a new section to record the smaller leaks—but for now, I’d highly recommend the My Chemical Romance tracker if you a full, in-depth look at the history of My Chemical Romance leaks.

February

• February 1, 2026: A user on LEAKED named Coming of Jesus leaks an unfinished, one-hour long work-print of The Paper Kingdom online.

  

  Within minutes, the leak begins circulating online. Fans quickly notice that portions of the track “Paper Swords” were used in the 2020 promotional videos “An Offering” and “A Summoning”. The audio of a child singing “Happy Birthday” in the intro medley for the band’s 2019 reunion show, as noted by Reddit user MarfeeWarfree two years prior³⁷, was revealed to have come from “Dive”.

• February 6, 2026: A user named Thunder of Zeus leaks a song called “Don’t You Get Behind That Bus!”. It’s theorized by the community that it’s a solo song by Gerard, though Content ID lists it under My Chemical Romance’s copyright.

  

  In a later conversation with a forum user, Thunder of Zeus says he obtained the track from a anonymous seller—and that he leaked it for fun.

  

• February 7, 2026: A user named InpuT leaks a track titled “Into Your Arms”, after it was left out of the initial leak. InpuT accuses Coming of Jesus of double-selling and scamming, and tells him to “leak them all.”

  

• February 11, 2026: Coming of Jesus returns on a new account and post snippets of demos for the songs “Dive” and “High Hopes”, originally provided to organizers of a failed group buy, whom he accused of wasting his time.

  He claims to have offered lossless files, demos, alternate versions and new unreleased material to the group buy organizers, but ended the deal when they refused to provide proof of pledges, and that he will now be taking private offers for the material.

  

• February 12, 2026: Coming of Jesus leaks a demo for the song “Dogs”, claiming it was purchased by DJDonut, whom he believed was an alternate account being used by forum user Galileeo11, who denies being DJDonut and accuses Coming of Jesus of being a scammer.

  

  Coming of Jesus accuses Galileeo11 of purchasing a demo from him for one-hundred dollars, and promising to buy more demos, only to never follow follow through. He alleges that Galileeo11 instead leaked the demo he had purchased to the community, only for Galileeo11 to deny that a purchase ever happened and that the files had circulating prior.

  

• February 13, 2026: Forum member Disoveries22 leaks a lossless version of the initial The Paper Kingdom leak, though it’s validity is disputed by forum members.

  They accuse Coming of Jesus of being a a doxxer and a scammer, who extorted Excalibur out of thousands of dollars alongside the album itself. They also allege that Coming of Jesus wanted to sell “insanely private” information about the band to private buyers, and he’s well known in the community for this toxic behaviour.

  

  Galileeo11 later admitted to being Disoveries22, revealing the lossless test sequence he posted was faked and that he obtained it from a leaker that we will not identify. He also once again denied buying any tracks from Coming of Jesus, saying he was confused for someone else.

  For safety reasons, the name of the unidentified individual has been redacted.

  

• February 14, 2026: Coming of Jesus calls out one of his buyers for not vaulting the sold material they had allegedly agreed upon, and leaks two more unreleased files as retaliation—a track titled “BATMAN MAP DEMO” and another file called “Sketchs in Batman Map”, a twenty-minute audio recording of Gerard and Ray working on a song together in the studio.

  

  

• February 16, 2026: Coming of Jesus releases another audio recording titled “Batman Map (Idea Session)”, saying that a snippet of it had been circulating previously. In the replies, he addresses rumours about files from 2019, claiming that they’re false, and any files dated 2019 came from Doug re-exporting old files from 2012 while revisiting old material with the band.

  

• February 17, 2026: LEAKED member Bebsy leaks a demo of the band’s 2022 single “The Foundations of Decay” titled “Foundations (8) DRM Editing_2” and says it’s from March 2022. An instrumental version is also included.

  

• February 18, 2026 - 7:05pm: Bebsy leaks another demo of “The Foundations of Decay” titled “Foundations DRY VOCA”. He dates it as being from March 2022, and notes that it has softer drums. The thread’s title refers to the demo as “demo 10”.

  

• February 18, 2026 - 8:25pm A user named Toasty leaks a demo of “Don’t You Get Behind That Bus!”, and promises to leak more music every day until he runs out of material.

  

• February 19, 2026 - 5:41pm: Toasty makes another post, with a link to a lossless version of “Test sequence 3” which had already been leaked by Zedabex a day prior.

  

  Coming of Jesus accuses Toasty of faking the files, and claims he will leak the real files soon. He would later take this back after being mocked by a forum member, and announces he’ll be privately selling the files for 400 dollars

  

  After being mocked by Toasty, Coming of Jesus would dare him to leak all of his files.

  

• February 19, 2026 - 7:48pm: Toasty leaks ProTools project files for “The Foundations of Decay” sessions 8 and 10, which had been leaked by Bebsy a day prior.

  

• February 19, 2026 - 8:19pm: Toasty leaks an early demo of “Dive” and accuses Coming of Jesus wanting to sell it for a high price.

  

• February 21, 2026 - 7:35pm: On behalf of Toasty, forum user Fedew04 posts a link to an eight gigabyte archive titled “TPK.zip” with 63 files which contains individual demos of The Paper Kingdom tracks (excluding Paper Swords and Witch), along with “Batman Map” audio files. The post includes a message from Toasty, saying material not included in the first drop will be leaked through a second drop.

  

• February 21, 2026 - 12:07pm: The second drop, a twelve gigabyte file titled “TPK2.7z” is released. The contents of the drop include two test sequences, ProTools session files for The Foundations of Decay and non-TPK material.

  As of the 18th of October 2026, this is the last major The Paper Kingdom leak.

  

• March 3, 2026: Reddit user Bl0k1d finds the old tweets of Doug McKean asking for Narita Airport samples, and posts about them on the r/MyChemicalRomance subreddit.⁴⁰

• May 24, 2026: A member of the My Chemical Romance tracker team, Paperjammer, posts a document titled “tpkallfilesinfo.txt`” on the LEAKED forum. The documents contains all metadata for the Toasty mega drop trials, which were initially scrubbed due to privacy and safety concerns.

Tracklist

This is currently the most complete track-list of The Paper Kingdom that we have, taken from the leaked test sequence from February 2026.

1. Fake Your Death (3:31)
2. Witch (5:30)
3. Bike Thief (5:02)
4. Operation Day (4:30)
5. Falling Down (3:00)
6. Birthday Girl (3:16)
7. Dark Cloud (6:10)
8. Wake Up! (3:12)
9. Louder (3:47)
10. Narita Airport (2:32)
11. War Beneath The Rain (4:09)
12. Paper Swords (5:32)
13. Dive (5:29)
14. High Hopes (4:59)
15. Dogs (4:30)
16. Perfectly Well (2:15)

Speculation

This section is dedicated to speculation and theories by the community surrounding The Paper Kingdom, ranging from the origin of the leaks to how the albums could’ve looked visually.

Most information in the following sections is sourced from community speculation or unidentified sources whose identies and reliablity cannot be verified. Be open-minded about what you read online, and never treat or present unverified information as fact.

Source of Leaks

Since the initial leaks, there has been considerable community speculation over the source of the leaks—though nothing has been definitely proven, it’s generally agreed upon that the leaked material was stolen directly from Doug McKean in early 2022. There are two things that make this theory plausible: first, all of the leaked tracks come exclusively from the 2012 sessions for the album—there is currently no known cases of leaked material from their previous four albums circulating; secondly, data found in the ProTools session files show the demos for “The Foundations of Decay” were stored in Doug McKean’s Dropbox, giving us a good idea about what the hacker (generally believed to be Excalibur) may have targeted.

Macintosh HD/Users/mckeanwest/Dropbox/MCR/2022/Foundations Of Decay (8) STEM Session.ptx

Unless the leaks for The Paper Kingdom and “The Foundations of Decay” came from two separate sources—which is highly unlikely at this point, this data tells us that the hack happened sometime between January and September 2022, when Excalibur made his first post on LEAKED.

A theory that was popular in the early days of the leak was the leaked material coming from a 2016 data breach of Warner Music’s servers, though there’s no strong evidence that points to this; the presence of files from 2019 and 2022 also eliminate this claim.

2019 Revival

Since the 2026 leaks, it has been heavily believed by fans that the band was planning to revisit The Paper Kingdom in late 2019—but it was scrapped before the 2022 tour, most likely due to the pandemic and a change of direction. Multiple evidence point to this theory: snippets of songs from The Paper Kingdom were featured prominently in 2019 marketing materials during the bands “Return” era which had themes of witchcraft and occultism; metadata for leaked files also indicate the band had been re-exporting old material from 2012 to revisit during late 2019 sessions.

We do know the band had recorded some new material before the pandemic, since keyboardist Kamie Muhoberac (who wasn’t with the band in 2012) is credited alongside Ray Toro for an original piece featured in the “A Summoning” promotional video. Even with all of this taken into account, it’s unlikely any serious work was done on a revival of The Paper Kingdom before the pandemic; all files from 2019 are just re-exports of files from 2012, proven by various discrepancies (such as a 2019 file featuring James Dewees, despite him no longer being associated with the band by that point).

2012 Soundchecks

Gerard’s Solo Material

Visual Style

Contact

If you have any questions or information that I might find useful, please send an email to buckshot_collie263@simplelogin.com, and I’ll get back to you as soon as possible. Alternatively, you can conact me through Discord at zweegle. Friend requests without a personalized message will be denied.

Special Thanks

• Sammyliterally, for creating the original blog post that inspired me to make this one.

• Kekktye, for their amazing timeline that covered the leaks as they were ongoing.

• The team at My Chemical Leakage, for creating the My Chemical Romance tracker.

• Ham1ltron, for creating the amazing absolutely cover art and letting me use it for this page!

Credits

Editor

• Zweegle

Feedback

• Adrian
• Dive
• Fedew
• Galileeo
• Goose
• Landon
• Morningstar
• Paperjammer

Tracker Team

• Stupidity at it’s Finest
• Bloodedge
• Paperjammer

Sources

1. Tom Bryant (September 30, 2014): “Not the Life It Seems: The True Lives of My Chemical Romance” ↩︎ ↩︎² ↩︎³

2. chorus.fm (August 12, 2011): “Interview: Mikey Way of My Chemical Romance”. ↩︎

3. Destroya News (January 18, 2012): “Interview with Frank Iero, Big Day Out 2012: My Chemical Romance” ↩︎

4. ToxicBoomKilljoy (January 31, 2012): “My Chemical Romance New Material @ Soundcheck Melbourne 2012” [@ToxicBoomKilljoy] YouTube. ↩︎

5. Becki Hill (January 31, 2012): “MCR soundcheck at Melbourne Festival Hall” [@xJustAnObsessionx] YouTube. ↩︎

6. Noise11 (February 4, 2012): “My Chemical Romance, the Noise11.com interview” ↩︎

7. news.com.au (March 21, 2012): “How to follow The Black Parade” ↩︎

8. Aquarian (May 15, 2012): “Interview with My Chemical Romance: “It’s Not Someone Else’s Fest. It’s Ours.” ↩︎

9. Alternative Press (January 21, 2014): “My Chemical Romance reveal ‘May Death Never Stop You’ tracklisting, comment on their final song” ↩︎

10. Doug McKean (July 18, 2012): “Is anyone at Narita Airport right now. I need a sample of the announcement chimes” [@mckeanwest] X. ↩︎

11. Doug McKean (July 28, 2012): “Never leave the studio and you won’t miss any of the music.” [@mckeanwest] X. ↩︎ ↩︎²

12. Doug McKean (July 28, 2012): “Six million ways to die, choose one.” [@mckeanwest] X. ↩︎ ↩︎²

13. Doug McKean (July 28, 2012): “Thank you Langevin” [@mckeanwest] X. ↩︎ ↩︎²

14. Doug McKean (July 31, 2012): “Getting ready for guitar overdubs” [@mckeanwest] X. ↩︎ ↩︎²

15. Doug McKean (July 31, 2012): “If you only knew what this sounded like!” [@mckeanwest] X. ↩︎

16. Spoilers With Kevin Smith (August 13, 2012): “The Bourne Legacy and Gerard Way” ↩︎

17. Artisan News (October 13, 2012): “My Chemical Romance Talk Next Album” ↩︎

18. Kerrang! (March 9, 2013): “Gerard Way and Mat Devine join forces on the Kill Hannah man’s solo record!” ↩︎

19. Rolling Stone (March 23, 2013): “My Chemical Romance Break Up” ↩︎

20. Louder (July 29, 2025): “Watch My Chemical Romance perform unreleased anthem War Beneath The Rain for the very first time” ↩︎

21. Zach Dresch for KCFS (January 31, 2014): “Gerard Way Interview” [@LandonAdam] YouTube.” ↩︎

22. Under The Gun Review (April 29, 2014): “UTG INTERVIEW: Reggie & the Full Effect @ Middle of the Map Fest” ↩︎

23. Grantland Podcasts (July 24, 2014): “Gerard Way on My Chemical Romance & His Solo Album” ↩︎

24. Pitchfork (October 31, 2019): “My Chemical Romance Announce Reunion Show” ↩︎

25. My Chemical Romance (January 20, 2020): “An Offering…” [@mychemicalromance] Youtube. ↩︎

26. My Chemical Romance (January 29, 2020): “A Summoning…” [@mychemicalromance] Youtube. ↩︎

27. Rolling Stone (May 12, 2022): “My Chemical Romance Mark Musical Return With Six-Minute Epic ‘The Foundations of Decay’” ↩︎

28. Loudwire (July 31, 2022): “Doug McKean, My Chemical Romance Producer, Dead at 54” ↩︎

29. Blunt Magazine (December 12, 2022): “Welcome to the black market: Profiting off stolen music in plain sight” ↩︎ ↩︎²

30. NME Magazine (October 19, 2022): “My Chemical Romance perform ultra-rare ‘Sister To Sleep’ for the second time ever in California” ↩︎

31. NO COOL KIDS ALLOWED (June 10, 2023): “GUYS.. several months ago on our stream we played leaked snippets of what we thought were new MCR songs… “ [NO COOL KIDS ALLOWED] Facebook ↩︎

32. Reverb (June 21, 2023): “Harmony Baritone Ukulele Owned by Frank Iero” ↩︎

33. NME Magazine (June 1, 2026): “The Paper Kingdom leak: how MCR’s scrapped album ended up online” ↩︎

34. My Chemical Leakage (Feb 9, 2026): “My Chemical Romance tracker” ↩︎

35. Live_Space_2840 (July 5, 2024): “The Paper Kingdom Tracklist + Foundations demo snippet + Wake Up snippet 2” ↩︎

36. Erynn Halvorson (December 21, 2019): “My Chemical Romance RETURN: I’m Not Okay (I Promise) (Los Angeles, CA - December 20, 2019)” [@ErynnHalvorson] Youtube. ↩︎

37. MarfeeWarfee(August 29, 2024): “The Paper Kingdom - ‘Birthday Girl’ referenced at reunion show in 2019?” ↩︎ ↩︎²

38. Kekktye (October 17, 2025): “A Sourced History of My Chemical Romance’s Lost Songs” ↩︎

39. Pitchfork (July 28, 2025): “Watch My Chemical Romance Debut New Song “War Beneath the Rain” ↩︎

40. Bl0k1d (March 3, 2026): “ Doug asking for Narita airport samples during tpk recording “ ↩︎