Revenge Of The Nerds had it all wrong. The uprising of the tragically geeky is upon us and the dudes carrying the banner on the front lines aren’t starchy poindexters but a quintet of pierced, afroed rock stormtroopers and their loyal fictional mascots, Coheed And Cambria.
The New York nu-prog eggheads have officially conquered the emo and punk realms, most recently with their circuituous, tongue-twisting opus In Keeping Secrets Of Silent Earth: 3. Stay focused for the next bit: IKSOSE:3 is the band’s second release, but it relates the third chapter in the larger, four-part saga of Coheed And Cambria, of which the first record, Second Stage Turbine Blade, was the second chapter. The first and last chapters will come next, possibly on one record, or perhaps on some number of records that can only be arrived at with an incredibly complex system of equations.
Here's the interview given to
ChartAttack by
Coheed And Cambria frontman
Claudio Sanchez and drummer
Joshua Eppard in late July:
ChartAttack: So really, you’re just trying to confuse people with this multi-parted, non-linear narrative business, right?
Claudio Sanchez: Kind of. The thing is, Coheed And Cambria don’t really live past second stage, so it’ll be nice to kind of return to them later, to close the story off by going to the beginning of the story, but basically the end as well.
Mmm Hmm. I guess I’ll just count on the forthcoming comic books to clear things up.
Claudio Sanchez: Actually, the first book is out, for Second Stage. It’s been done for about a week or two. We’ve been selling them on the website.
Cool. So when the story’s done and Coheed And Cambria are dead, does the band disappear in a whiff of smoke, or spontaneously combust or what?
Claudio Sanchez: We get that question a lot. It’s hard to say. That’s three records from now. After three records, we might want to take a break. Or maybe we’ll just keep going — we’ll create another story or just create records as a band.
OK, really — you’re just messing with us, right? Why else would you be so obtuse?
Josh Eppard: I think to a certain degree, it’s important to us. Most people, if you’re an artist, you’re always kind of doing things to interest yourself. If the time changes and everything interests other people, that’s cool. So in a way, it just kind of naturally happens, ‘cause it’s what we like to do. It makes it more interesting to challenge yourself. The kind of stuff we like to play just happens to be a little off-kilter and not so streamlined.
Where does all this come from? Are you influenced by anything in particular, or is this all just your own lunacy?
Claudio Sanchez: There’s little things in the book, in the dialogue — like when Coheed comes home to Cambria, she says, "Somehow I’ve always known," which is a line that Luke Skywalker says to Princess Leia. If you look in the book, you’ll see a lot of similarities between Coheed And Cambria’s story and other stories.
I feel a lot of the characters have things about them that I can identify with. It’s just me hiding… instead of writing a song that basically has my heart on my sleeve, I write these stories. You get that in the next issue, where the story is that we step outside the story and see it from the writer’s perspective.
Whoa — slow down. You’ve written the next part of the story?
Claudio Sanchez: The next record is pretty much written from my end of things. I just basically write the main guitar line and the vocal melody and then I bring it to the attention of the other guys. They write their parts and we arrange the songs. I mean, I have the whole record on the bus, the acoustic version. But it’s a whole new ballgame once you bring them to the band.
Damn. Hey, you look pretty comfy in those beds. This whole success thing must be a riot, huh?
Claudio Sanchez: It’s a lot of fun. Two years ago we were just a bunch of dudes, working nine to five, getting old, getting afraid that this might never happen.
Josh Eppard: We’re getting up into our mid-20s. Compared to a lot of bands, [our success] seems sudden, but we worked really hard. And whatever things are happening now, it’s definitely really exciting. We’re just trying to enjoy the ride.
In related Coheed & Cambria news, the band has set "Good Apollo: I'm Burning Star IV: Vol. One From Fear Through The Eyes Of Men" as the title to their upcoming debut effort for Columbia. The effort will be the first of a two-part series, and is tentatively expected out in stores in Summer 2005. Further details on the group's upcoming plans can be found here.
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