“What is that?!” Claudio Sanchez exclaims. The frontman ofCoheed和Cambria坐在他的布鲁克林家中，刚刚与他的乐队成员和吉他手Travis Stever一起参加了视频电话。特拉维斯（Travis）在他的个人工作室里，距离曼哈顿上路仅45分钟。在他的右肩上，有一张海报钢铁侠2: a masterclass in tedium that Empire once called “inessential, over-busy and mechanical”.
“A guy that worked with us – he did the radio at Sony about ten years ago – got me it,” Travis shrugs as he glances backwards. “It’s signed byAC/DC, so it’s not as much about Iron Man 2 for me. But, hey, it was a great movie.”
“是吗？”Claudio回头。“真的吗？”
An argument about Marvel movies and classic rock is the perfect way to kick off an interview when you’re dealing with Coheed. It’s hard to tell what the four-piece, rounded out by drummer Josh Eppard and bassist Zach Cooper, are first and foremost: comic book geeks or music nerds.
他们是从整个地方挖掘出来的。即使他们在二十年前首次亮相，他们仍然尚未被伪造，从prog，金属，emo和硬核后折叠了提示。同时，从概念上讲，Coheed的十张专辑中有9张遵循漫画风格的故事弧The Amory Wars。It’s a sprawling, almost incomprehensible narrative that’s only grown more intangible with every instalment. What started out as a sci-fi melodrama about young Claudio Kilgannon and his parents, Coheed and Cambria, is now a mythology laden with prequels, metacommentary and demonically possessed bicycles. It’s weird.
Both USPs return on new albumvaxis iI: A Window of the Waking Mind。如果您只是想看看什么折衷的摇滚声音会挠耳的耳朵，那么您就会度过了愉快的时光：可能是十年半来Coheed最好的时光。正确的第一个数字美丽的失败者– named after the band Travis and Claudio were in together pre-Coheed – opens with a shimmering guitar lick, which is quickly flanked by high-flying falsetto vocals.
Comatose在以前的怪异的技术朋克氛围中，它的奇怪的和弦和即兴演奏之前A Disappearing Act声明“他妈的！”舞蹈摇滚，合成器充满欢乐。
“It’s new territory for Coheed,” Claudio says of the track, “if not necessarily for myself. I had a project called Prizefighter Inferno, which was primarily electronic-based. It’s not odd for us to step outside of the comfortable framework that most would consider the Coheed way.”
The best, however, comes fromvaxis iI’s closing trilogy:Ladders of Supremacy, Rise Naianasha (Cut the Cord)和the behemoth of a title track. Up until this trio, the album’s been a cavalcade of genre-spanning yet concise rockers: a direct response to what Claudio considers the excessive length of 2018’s 80-minutevaxis i: The Unheavenly Creatures。“In hindsight, I think it’s because that was our first attempt at producing a record ourselves,” he rationalises. “We were so excited that we threw everything onto the album.”vaxis iI, on the other hand, reserves its extravagance for that three-song grand finale.
梯子…is a guitar-driven metal symphony, tucking and diving from skull-bashing chords to harmonic leads to tremolo picking before the first verse even dawns.Rise…跟随前卫/流行巨人，然后来窗户…和its nine minutes of acoustic-cum-electric-cum-synth-backed pageantry.
Off the map
vaxis iI以最好的方式遍布整个地图。对于克劳迪奥和特拉维斯使用的吉他，不能说同样的话。主唱主要使用GibsonSGs, paramount among which was a 1990s Special model that was stolen from him in 2003. He didn’t get it back until 2017, after a fan somehow acquired it and shared the discovery on social media. “That’s now the guitar that I have here in my work area,” Claudio smiles, gesturing to all the musical equipment that surrounds him in his house’s spare room.
Travis, meanwhile, used his 2010Les Paul金顶。他解释说：“在大流行期间，我只是在家中有那只吉他。”“这基本上就是我在那段时间里用来的一切。直到Coheed多久以来第一次出去巡回演出，我才能将自己在家里有哪些吉他换掉。”
乐队最终制作的即将到来的专辑可能是对vaxis i的自我放纵，但这个故事正好在2018年的科希德（Coheed）离开的位置。vaxis iI’s predecessor was, essentially, a soft reboot of the entire阿莫里战争弧。系列中的前四张专辑 -第二阶段涡轮刀片到2007年好的阿波罗，我正在燃烧星际IV，第二卷– told the tale of Claudio Kilgannon, Coheed and Cambria. In 2010, they made a prequel with the same trio of characters called黑色彩虹的一年。Then, the 2012 and ’13ArtermanDoology是衍生品，2015年之前The Color Before the Sun成为第一张（迄今为止，唯一）偏离该主题宇宙的Coheed专辑。
返回The Amory Warsfour years ago, the goal was to tell the story of a new generation.vaxis i介绍了尼亚（Nia）和诺斯特兰（NostrandVaxis。vaxis iI与年轻家庭“从暴虐部队逃跑”的情节。从克劳迪奥（Claudio）获得更多故事情节细节就像试图通过挤压瓜来获取橙汁。“我再也不能告诉你，因为这将是一个破坏者！”他笑了。
What Claudio does open up about, though, is the personal importance of switching to this brand new story arc. The frontman was only 17 when he co-founded the band. A longtime comic book fan, he decided to integrate the medium’s penchant for winding, neverending stories into his music.阿莫里战争毫不奇怪，克劳迪奥（Claudio）是现实生活中克劳迪奥（Claudio）的化身，角色所讲的故事是音乐家处理自己青春期的经历。
“That original arc is very much about the main character being confused about who he is and what his part in the world is,” the singer/guitarist elaborates. “He was a reflection of who I was at the time. I was trying to understand my place. I went from being raised by my parents to the figurehead of a rock and roll band; it was perplexing and confusing. Pre-Coheed, I didn’t have nearly as much attention drawn to me.”
克劳迪奥（Claudio）的生活在第一届阿莫里战争弧线的过程中彻底改变了。他在24岁那年的一场演出中遇到了他一生的热爱，她19岁。她成为了他的写作伙伴，然后是他的妻子。这听起来像是一个梦，但这是一个充满活力的动态。例如，Good Apollo… Volume One single Welcome Homeis an embittered tirade against a lover: “You’re a whore in sheep’s clothing, Fucking up all I do!” Claudio wails over a screeching heavy metal riff.
“ Chondra自从[Coheed的第二张专辑]以来一直是我最好的朋友In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth,” the singer says. “We’ve had our ups and downs, which come with being partners for as long as we have. Does it get awkward? I’m sure it does for her, because some of that is in that song.”
家庭舒适
The sting is thatWelcome Homeis now Coheed’s signature anthem, closing their every concert. Its main riff – inspired equally byLed Zeppelin和工具– is among the best and heaviest of the 2000s, and single-handedly raised the band’s stock tenfold when the track charted in the US.
克劳迪奥回忆说：“当我写那条即兴演奏时，我仍然住在父母的家中。我在厨房的原声吉他上写了它，我记得当我想到它时，我多么兴奋。我在地下室里烦恼。我的妈妈下来在洗衣店里扔衣服，我大喊：“我只是写了这部巨大的即兴演奏！”这很尴尬。”
In 2014, Claudio and Chondra had a baby boy called Atlas. Naturally, the arrival transformed his father’s life, and theVaxisera ofThe Amory Warsdirectly tackles Claudio’s responsibilities and feelings as a new parent. “I have to be this guiding light: half of a team for this new entity,” he says. “That’s basically whereVaxis在。”
Claudio clearly has a lot to say about his newfound fatherhood. Even though he’s not one to wear his emotions on his sleeve during interviews, he plans on distilling his experiences into a total of fiveVaxisalbums. So, we’ve barely scratched the surface of the new Coheed era.
“There are going to be three more records,” Claudio confirms, but the band have no intention to hang things up after that pentalogy. “We have talked about potentially working on a musical,” he continues. “I got paired with a playwright and producer on Broadway to do a musical rendition ofThe Picture of Dorian Grey, and we’ve been talking as a band about giving it the Coheed treatment.
“Coheed will continue writing music for as long as people want it,” Claudio promises. “In fact, even if no one wants it, we’ll just give it to our friends and family.”
vaxis iI: A Window of the Waking Mindis out now viaRoadrunner。