For being the lead guitarist in a band that’s so wrapped up in sci-fi lore and comic book world building, Coheed & Cambria guitarist Travis Stever is pretty nonchalantly normal when he joins our Zoom call. “Can you hear me okay? I’m in my car; I just dropped my son off at tutoring.” Of course, it’s the mind of C&C frontman Claudio Sanchez that produces the band’s extended narratives, so it’s not super surprising that Stever – who plays lead guitar in the nearly 25 year-old band, as well as the pop-punk supergroup LS Dunes – is sort of just a dude (and a solid dad, to boot). He calls me from his hometown of Nyack, NY, the very place Coheed got its start and one of Sanchez’s earliest inspirations for material. “There are planets named after specific people […] within this concept that represents things that happened right here in Nyack.” It’s like if James Joyce made Ulysses for Marvel nerds. And what a beautiful concept that is.
The majority of Coheed albums center around The Amory Wars, an intergalactic struggle that is detailed in the comic book series of the same name. Each Coheed album has a corresponding run of comics that detail that chapter of the saga, written by Sanchez (sometimes with a co-author). The band’s name itself comes from two of the characters from this series.
Stever and Sanchez have been collaborating since their teenage years in the 90s, when Stever would provide some musical structure for his songwriting partner’s wildly imaginative fantasies, which have been ever-present in Sanchez’s work. Stever says, “[Caludio] would have projects since we were teenagers that would have elements of conceptual sides. Numerous Side projects with other concepts to them.” In Stever’s mind, while plenty of other musicians have approached songwriting with highly conceptual mindsets, it’s not to the same extent as Sanchez. “He would have full on story lines that would go with pretty much everything. He described it as, he was shy and worried about wearing his heart on his sleeve, so he would kind of mask the personal stuff that would come out in the lyrics with concept and fictional story lines. That was there even when we were younger.”
It’s clear that Coheed have built a lasting legacy among their fanbase, a devoted fascination to experiencing this extended multimedia universe. “You could like the band just for the music and not be concerned with any of this other stuff,” says Stever. “But a lot of them get involved and kind of – we’re very grateful for it – but kind of obsessed with what the whole thing represents, who’s behind the curtain on all of it.”
Travis Stever of Coheed & Cambria
For their 2023 tour, the band is focused on their 2007 album Good Apollo, I’m Burning Star IV: No World For Tomorrow. This was a complicated time for the band. They had recently seen the exit of drummer Josh Eppard (who has since returned to as the band’s current bassist) and bassist Michael Todd. The group’s future was in doubt. That uncertainty, coupled with the general discomfort of being an American in 2006, was the main inspiration for the album. As Stever describes it, “It was an album about us just trying to stick together and pile through some really hard times. I think the name says it all. There was a lot of uncertainty around us and the rest of the world around that time. It’s no different now. That was 2006. The Bush Era presidency, the wars that were going on then.” When it came time to record NWFT, they band enlisted the help of Sunny Day Real Estate and Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins (R.I.P.).
Now some 16 years on, Stever is more excited than ever to bust these songs out live. “It’ll be the first time we’re playing a lot of these songs with Josh and Zack. So it’s gonna be exciting. They’re gonna bring a whole new element to it. Taylor Hawkins, one of the things we really loved about his playing is that he sounded a lot like Josh, and vice versa. So it was like, ok we can’t have who we would usually do this stuff, but Taylor Hawkins is a pretty good alternative. So it’s kind of honoring that whole era of making lemonade out of some really, really big lemons that we had in our way.”
Stever also described Boston – and the Northeast in general – as a second home for the band outside of their native Nyack (and Brooklyn, where Sanchez currently resides). “May the 4th be with you!” he exclaims when I remind him that Coheed’s Boston show will be on Star Wars day. “ I consider Boston and Philly like home as well. They’re so close. I spent a lot of time in all these cities growing up.” He cites classic Boston hardcore bands like Bane and Cave In as huge early influences, cites an affinity for Western Mass icons Dinosaur Jr., and even expresses a fondness for Aerosmith. If you’ve heard and of Coheed’s music, you can hear all of these distinct influences finding their way in, because as much as they’ve got a foot firmly planted in the pantheon of beloved emo bands, they have also been labeled a prog rock group. Stever considers this label a blessing, due to the gatekeeper attitude prog fans have around the genre and its musicianship. “Someone was asking me earlier, is that offensive? Do you take offense to that sometimes? No, prog bands are awesome. That’s something that sets the band apart, if anything.”
As far as live chops are concerned, C&C have still got it. Unsurprisingly, they’re still able to draw in a full house, swinging by Roadrunner on May 4th with support from Deafheaven. The crowd – now aged into their 30s and 40s, many with kids of their own – hung off every word and riff, singing along like they were still 16. Blackgaze idols Deafheaven (this writer’s favorite band) were an interesting choice of tour partner; the two bands have pretty different fanbases (one woman behind me at the show said she thought the opener was “fucking awful,” and I feel so happy that she thinks that; Deafheaven is not for the faint of heart). Being the 10th anniversary of their masterpiece SUNBATHER, they opened with the first three tracks from that album, absolutely filling Roadrunner with glorious noise, George Clark’s righteous screams, and their unrelenting rhythm section. But let’s not forget the band’s immense dynamic range: for as loud and brutal as they can get, they still offer plenty of atmospheric, melodic interludes that fill thew soul with nourishing warmth. Coheed followed suit, rifling through the entire tracklist of No World For Tomorrow plus an encore filled with selections from their most recent album, 2022’s Vaxis – Act II: A Window of the Waking Mind. I love seeing shows from artists who rose to popularity in the early to mid 2000s because the audiences know every single word.
The day after I spoke to Stever, I was at a music and arts festival in Somerville. There was a dude there with a stand selling used records, books, and graphic novels. At the bottom of one of the stacks of graphic novels, I spied two of The Amory Wars’ collected editions (The Second Stage Turbine Blade and In Keeping the Secrets of Silent Earth: 3, the band’s first two albums). As I was flipping through the pages (I won’t buy a comic if the art doesn’t pull me in; the work of Wes Abbott and Chris Burnham, respectively, is more than adequate to catch my eye). The stand’s owner noticed me perusing, and said, “Hey, man, do you know the band Coheed & Cambria?” When I told him that I had just spoke to Stever the day before, it is no exaggeration to say that his mind was blown. He let me snag both novels for a combined $50, so although I had previously never taken the dive into The Amory Wars, I’m one of the latest to find entertainment and meaning within Coheed & Cambria’s rich, ever-expanding sci-fi world. Come find me.
Check out our photos from Coheed & Cambria’s Boston show with Deafheaven below.
