The last 3 weeks I've been listening to Coheed & Cambria's 2005 release "Good Apollo I'm Burning Star Volume One: From Fear Through The Eyes Of Madness." and found myself falling more and more in love with this conceptual prog band from New York. So it was with a bit of childish anticipation I headed for Rockefeller this Tuesday evening.

Chatfriends unite

Earlier that day I was trying to round up who was going to the concert and at least knew that PJ (Kjella) was going. I also had a little chat with "Katten" (Dorte) on msn on the Sunday before and given her a quick intro to what kind of music C&C is - resulting in a vague concert date. She needed to check if there were any tickets left.

Well inside "Møller's" (the somewhat run down pub close to Rockefeller) I managed to get Truls (Mastyr) come join me as well. I was sitting there alone with my water and counting minutes. A quarter to eight Truls came and we joined the ever-growing line outside Rockefeller. There's snow all over Oslo these days, but it wasn't too cold. Besides we had our cigarettes to keep us warm (eh).

Dorte had sent me an sms earlier that day that she had her ticket and we should just meet at Rockefeller. Funny thing. We have only met once before at Roskilde 2001 when she came to party with us in FistCamp. This was the year of Tool and Deftones (one we hope to recreate this year) and Dorte is a big Tool fan. Now, almost 5 years later we're meeting again at a concert. I tried to locate PJ by sms as well, but he had probably turned off his cellphone. Truls and me bought beers and Dorte joined us shortly after opening hours. While waiting for the concert the two "cats" updated ourselves on some of the events that has occured during the past 4 years. Seems I am the only chatmember she still has some contact with, so I hope we can change that now when she lives in Oslo.

The show must go on...

Originally this concert was set to play January 16 with Thrice, but the concert was moved due to C&C singer Claudio Sanchez's hand injury, and the Norwegian hardcore band JR Ewing later replaced Thrice on the bill.

JR Ewing has recently released their album "Maelstrom" which has harvested some pretty good reviews both in Norway and internationally and especially for the same reason I bought the album - the earlier hardcore band has successfully turned more progressive. One step to the side and five fast forward if you ask me. This album deserves your attention!

Tonight was their first concert ever to be played at Rockefeller and as the band commented themselves: "After being a band for 10 years it was about time!". Most of their set was taken from their new album and it sounded even better live. Singer Andreas Tylden almost struts around the stage bursting with energy and you can see they're enjoying themselves up there. The band have earlier toured with Mars Volta, Turbonegro, High on Fire and The Locust and guitarist Erlend Mokkelbost is also part of the much appraised band KILLL

After the Norwegian maelstrom came the American hurricane...

Coheed & Cambria enters the stage and the crowd explodes in applause as the first tones from "Keeping The Blade" seeps into the air illustrated by animation excerpts on the backdrop. The short but sweet intro then errupts into the much heavier "Welcome Home" and the crowd starts jumping. You can feel the floor giving way to the weight of a sold out Rockefeller. I exchange a smiling glance with Truls who also grins at the experience. No need to talk - we recognize pure joy in crowd when we see it. The setlist should be something like this, but there might be something missing or misplaced:

Unfortunately I haven't had the time to listen to the other C&C album I've got, so I could only recognize the ones from "Good Apollo, I'm Burning...".

Both "Once Upon Your Dead Body" and "Wake Up" are favorite songs of mine along with "The Final Cut", and I was very pleased to hear them being played even more powerful live. His voice never falters and his presence is absolute as we all sing to the sky; "I hope you die right now...Will you drink my chemical?..Oh..and if you cry out loud..it will only make me feel too good"

The band had very little contact with the audience throughout the entire concert, but a few words were spoken in between songs. This comment from Sanchez probably got the Rockefeller crew scrambling to their feet: "You call this a drink? It's fucking DIET coke! Someone get me a new one.".
And of course he had to go and wish us all Happy Valentine's Day...to which the response was a mix of cheers and boooos. "Wake up" is a very beautiful and quite romantic song and all the Valentine's couples around us were smooching away while we simply enjoyed the music. The concert ended with a really long and Pink Floydish "The Final Cut". The original track plays around 6 minutes, but live they must have gone on for at least 10 minutes with those guitars. And to compare this with Mars Volta's long escapades with guitars - I wasn't bored outta my wits this time!!!

After the concert was through we had a nice little chat with Agnete Kjølsrud (vocalist of Animal Alpha) as she turned to Truls and expressed her joy over sharing concerts with other true music lovers. She must have seen us next to her - smiling and heavily nodding our heads through the show. She's very often at the same concerts as us and that's cool. Animal Alpha is one of my favorite Norwegian bands, and it's reassuring to see the singer at concerts like ISIS, KILLL and C&C. The girl is the closest I've seen to a female version of Mike Patton. She could also disclose that the special microphone she uses is not the same kind that Patton has, but a harmonica microphone. Kicks ass live!!!

Coheed & Cambria - The BIG Picture

I would like to include a short introduction from the official website for the comic albums that the Coheed & Cambria albums are created around...and I urge you to check out the website and read more about the band, the man, the comics...

"The concept behind the Coheed and Cambria albums is fully entitled: “The Bag.On.Line Adventures” and is made up of 5 stories: “the Second Stage Turbine Blade”, “In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth: 3”; “Good Apollo, I’m Burning Star IV, Vol 1 and 2”, and “The Bag.on.line Adventures of Coheed and Cambria” (the prequel). Each story represents one album of the same name.

The story centers around the Kilgannon Family: Mother and Father Coheed and Cambria Kilgannon, their four children - Matthew, Maria, Josephine and Claudio, and Coheed’s brother, Jesse (aka, Inferno).

The ruling party of Heaven’s Fence have convinced Coheed and Cambria that they were previously implanted with a deadly virus (the Monstar) that, if is released, the entire energy force (The Keywork) for civilization will be destroyed. Even worse, they are led to believe that they genetically passed the virus off to their children, where it mutated into an even more powerful viral stream (the Sinstar), that has no antidote and even graver consequences for the Fence."

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