COHEED AND CAMBRIA TAKE OVER LONDON, AND IF YOU DIDN’T LEAVE HUMMING A CHORUS - YOU WEREN’T PAYING ENOUGH ATTENTION

⭐⭐⭐⭐(4.5/5)

COHEED AND CAMBRIA AT O2 ACADEMY BRIXTON, LONDON
PHOTOCREDIT: **CHARIS LYDIA BAGIOKI**

Coheed and Cambria’s return to London was not only highly anticipated by the masses but also felt like a comic book coming to life – with equal parts space opera, prog chaos and communal singalong therapy sessions. Backed up by rockers And So I Watch You From Afar and up-and-coming-act (and personal favourite) unpeople, it was a night where heads was about to bang.

If you haven’t heard of unpeople, you honestly live under a rock. Having taken over massive festivals all over Europe, including Download and Reading/Leeds, the band’s rise has been nothing short of meteoric. They went from playing small grassroots venues to O2 Brixton in the space of almost six months, and their name is currently absolutely everywhere – including all over my Spotify daylists. Their sound is the perfect mix of alt-rock and experimental, with intense solos, drums and vocals; equally, their songs sound like absolute rage and having a jolly time at the same time – so how can you not love that? They opened the night with riffs, energy, smiles and closed off their set with a circle pit around their guitarist, a ritual that is the highlight of every set they do. Their setlist was also a joy for fans – Waste, Overthinking, Smother and finally The Garden, they enticed sing alongs even to people who had just been converted to unpeople-y fans.

If unpeople were the mysterious prologue, Belfast’s And So I Watch You From Afar were the joyful explosion. Mics on stage were fairly redundant, as the band focuses on their instrumental wizardry and less about showing off. Their set was a glorious wordless sermon of riffs, rhythms, drums and jumps, combining post-rock/math-rock sounds with swagger and a cinematic backdrop with a big of groove and punch. Crowd favourites included Mother Belfast (Part 1) and (Part 2), Mullaly, Set Guitars to Kill and Big Things Do Remarkable, with a lot of cheering and headbanging accompanying the precision of the instrumental execution of their sound. The band is a great example that the crowd does not always need lyrics to communicate, all they need is the language of groove – because they proved they can speak it fluently.

And then came the main event. Coheed and Cambria walked onstage to a roar from the audience, haloed by stage lights. The band tore straight to Goodbye, Sunshine and Shoulders, looking like prog-rock messiahs in a comic book convention. What makes Coheed special is not just their musicianship (which, let’s face it, is obscene), but their sincerity and love for what they do. They were obviously very excited to play to an audience that was wired since the first note, bouncing and singing along collectively. The setlist was also a feast for the ears, comprising of Everything Evil, The Suffering, A Favor House Atlantic, a cover of Mr Brightside and finally the all time favourite Welcome Home.

Musically, the band was flawless, from riffs to drums to vocals, they didn’t miss a beat. As the lights changed, they even had an inflatable figure on stage that made their set all the more theatrical, as smiles and waves started flashing between the audience and the band. Highlights of the night were the acoustic set under a solitary spotlight for Corner My Confidence and of course, the double guitar for the final song to end the night in the most apocalyptic and extravagant way possible. The crowd cheered as the sci-fi spectacle came to an end. Overall, it was a night to remember and to celebrate a band who has been going for decades and hopefully will keep going for more decades to come.