My Chemical Romance guitarist ‘hurt and wildly confused’ by LEGO cease and desist

My Chemical Romance guitarist Frank Iero says he’s ‘hurt and wildly confused’ after the LEGO Group reportedly issued a cease and desist to his post-hardcore supergroup L.S. Dunes.

The LEGO Group’s lawyers have apparently demanded L.S. Dunes’ label Fantasy Records take down the band’s ‘Grey Veins’ music video, which features a faceless LEGO minifigure (and what appears to be several Playmobil-like figures). And it’s sparked a passionate response from Iero, who in 2021 helped a My Chemical Romance LEGO Ideas project rocket to the review stage in a matter of days.

“As a card-carrying LEGO VIP and lifelong creator and builder, I am hurt and wildly confused,” Iero tweeted. “I have spent more hours than I can calculate, not to mention thousands upon thousands of dollars over the years, buying and building your sets as a child, a teenager, a semi-adult, and now as a dad who builds with his son – an 11-year-old who loves LEGO more than anyone I have ever met.

“My family and I have vacationed at LEGOLAND and my other band has been voted into your LEGO Ideas program by 10,000 supporters as a potential future set. I love your company because you gave us bricks and taught us we didn’t have to accept the world as it was – we could see what was possible and build it ourselves.

“I have taken that inspiration and created a universe of my own, and now you want to squash it. Why? Let creators create. Have your people stop calling my people. Spread kindness, spread the creativity, spread the word. Leggo my LEGO.”

Responses to Iero’s tweet have called out the LEGO Group for being too hasty in contacting Fantasy Records. “As a LEGO lover and avid builder, this is a bummer,” one fan tweeted. “Their whole thing is letting people create what they want to create. I hope their legal team does the right thing [because] this is crummy.” Another pointed out that the company is ‘completely opposing the message of The LEGO Movie’.

Others have suggested that Iero ‘should know how licence and copyright works’, however – while another criticised Iero for refusing to ‘push back on WMG’s bloodthirsty protection of [the My Chemical Romance] IP’, calling the guitarist’s tweet ‘super disingenuous’.

For the moment, the music video for Grey Veins is still up on YouTube, where it’s racked up more than 160,000 views since premiering in early June. The single comes from L.S. Dunes’ debut album Past Lives, which released last year. The band – which also includes members of Coheed and Cambria, Thursday and Circa Survive – is currently touring the US.

Featured image: L.S. Dunes

Support the work that Brick Fanatics does by purchasing your LEGO using our affiliate links.