Coheed And Cambria have just hit the road with Mastodon to take part in the The Unheavenly Skye Tour. The tour name is an amalgamation of Coheed & Cambria’s latest album The Unheavenly Creatures and Mastodon’s 2009 album Crack The Skye which they will play in its entirety.
On Saturday June 15th these two epic bands will take to the stage of the Armory in Minneapolis along with special guests Every Time I Die as the supporting band. This is an all ages show with the doors opening up at 5pm with the show starting at 6:30 pm. A variety of ticket options are available here.
Comprised of Claudio Sanchez (Vocals / Guitar), Travis Stever (Guitar), Josh Eppard (Drums) and Zach Cooper (Bass), they have gripped listeners and press around the globe with their visionary compositions and conceptual mastery. This past October Coheed and Cambria made a stunning return with their new album THE UNHEAVENLY CREATURES, which debuted at #1 on Billboard’s “Hard Rock Albums” chart, #6 current sales and Top 15 on the “Billboard 200” chart. Boasting 15 songs over 78 minutes, THE UNHEAVENLY CREATURES marked Coheed and Cambria’s furious return to concept albums, the ‘First Act’ in a brand-new story arc set within the backdrop of The Amory Wars universe. The acclaimed record is highlighted by standout tracks “The Gutter,” “Unheavenly Creatures,” “The Dark Sentencer” (premiered by Marvel Studios) and “Old Flames,” the latter of which features an official music video directed by Charles “Chas” Todd. The cinematic clip features striking choreography masterminded by Broadway luminary Jon Rua who is known for his roles in the 12-time Tony nominated Spongebob Squarepants and the Tony & Grammy Award Winning hit musical Hamilton. Sanchez also just announced in an interview with Kerrang! that he had just inked a collaboration with Neca Toys for a line of action figures featuring characters from The Amory Wars universe.
After sonic journeys inspired by fire, water, earth, air, and the cycles of life, GRAMMY® Award-nominated hard rock band Mastodon ponder the nature of time on their eighth full-length album, Emperor Of Sand, on Reprise Records set for release spring of 2017. Threading together the myth of a man sentenced to death in a majestically malevolent desert, the Atlanta, GA quartet—Troy Sanders (bass/vocals), Brent Hinds (guitar/vocals), Bill Kelliher (guitar) and Brann Dailor (drums/vocals), and conjure the grains of a musical and lyrical odyssey slipping quickly through a cosmic hourglass.
Since forming back in 2000, Mastodon have certainly made the most of their time. Most recently, their 2014 seventh offering Once More ‘Round The Sun bowed at #6 on the Billboard Top 200, marking their highest chart entry to date and second consecutive Top 10 debut following 2011’s The Hunter. Casting a shadow over pop culture, they received “Best Hard Rock/Metal Performance” GRAMMY® Award nominations in 2007, 2014 and again in 2015. Their music blasted through the Academy® Award-winning comedy The Big Short, animated blockbuster Monsters University, and sci-fi western Jonah Hex starring Josh Brolin—for which the group composed the score. After contributing “White Walker” to HBO’s Catch The Throne, Vol.2 mixtape, Dailor, Hinds, and Kelliher appeared as “Wildlings” in a popular episode of Game of Thrones Season 5.
Not only did they earn the appreciation of Time, Rolling Stone, Stereogum, Billboard, and more, but they also turned many peers into fans, including Metallica, Pearl Jam, Tool, Queens of the Stone Age, CeeLo Green, and Feist, to name a few. Performing everywhere from Coachella and Bonnaroo to Download and Sonisphere and nearly every major festival, they’ve headlined legendary venues such as Red Rocks and sold out shows around the globe. Emperor of Sand siphons raw emotion through the framework of an immersive story and intricate musicianship, digging to the core of what defines Mastodon and all timeless rock ‘n’ roll.
“The whole winter, the temperature was in the low teens. Utterly freezing,” says Every Time I Die’s frontman Keith Buckley regarding the months that yielded their eighth full-length album. Such is the price you pay for living in Buffalo, NY. Granted, the weather seems like a rather mundane topic for the normally acerbic and irreverent vocalist, but even the most acid-tongued hardcore band must have their sociable side, right? But Buckley and his cohorts Jordan Buckley (guitar), Andy Williams (guitar), Daniel Davison (drums), and Steve Micciche (bass) aren’t so hard up for pathos at this point that they’re grumbling about the temperature outside. If anything, Low Teens is their most poignant and impassioned album in a career full of sardonic illuminations and pit-inciting fervor.
The icy backdrop of Buffalo underscores a winter of dramatic change. Most notably, the band was on tour in Toronto in December when Keith received a phone call that his wife was in the hospital with a life-threatening pregnancy complication. It was a harrowing night as Buckley left the tour and raced home to overwhelming uncertainty. “I was facing death, not in a symbolic sort of ‘cyclical change’ metaphor but literally,” says Buckley with his token literary-minded self-awareness. “If I lost my wife, I would have to raise my daughter for her. If I lost my daughter, my wife and I would be forced to try and cope. But if I lost them both my life would end and I would see to it. Once I knew that in my heart it became the only certainty I had, and that was a relief.” Both wife and daughter survived the ordeal, but the moment of crisis had a lasting impact on Buckley and an inevitable role in shaping the lyrical scope of Low Teens. “It was abject helplessness, and that entirely new feeling opened up a lot of questions about place and purpose. I honestly don’t think that’s too far off from the lyrical content of our other songs but anyone that saw the news knows the source this time. They know that this is a response to a very specific event and not just a dude shoehorning an existential crisis into his routine for some interesting imagery.” When Buckley yells “untimely ripped into this world, I was born again as a girl” in the searing ring-the-alarm track “Petal”, there is no metaphor, no thinly veiled allegory. The birth of his daughter literally saved his life.
Lyrical motifs aside, other big changes were afoot during that Buffalo winter. From a sonic standpoint, the most crucial development was writing with new drummer Daniel Davison. Fans of Every Time I Die’s caustic combination of savage metallic hardcore and pentatonic riff-laden classic rock will not be disappointed by Low Teens’ thrash attacks and Southern-boogie breakdowns. But Davison’s heft, dexterity, and creativity pushed the band forward. “Daniel joined and not only further unlocked Andy and Jordan and Steve’s potential but put such a unique force behind the band’s dynamic,” Buckley says of his new bandmate. “I know that everything that has happened is necessary for what is presently happening but, man, to think about what the band might have been like if we had him sooner—private jets, shows on the damn moon.” You can hear this new energy on “Glitches”, which blazes with the kind of raw basement hardcore that originally catalyzed the group, but rages with a pinpoint accuracy beyond any meager hardcore band’s reach. “C++” marries desert rock croons, Unbroken’s metallic riffage, and a pile-driving chorus into a relentless hook-laden anthem. “The Coin Has A Say” operates as an extremity test, with every gear-shift somehow pushing the band into inexplicably heavier territories. Yes, Every Time I Die has always juggled hardcore urgency, metal brutalism, and rock melodies, but never has it felt this instinctive or this vicious.
Low Teens’ razor-sharp sound and auditory barbarism was also abetted by engineer and producer Will Putney (Acacia Strain, Body Count, Exhumed). Every Time I Die have always opted to avoid complacency and mix things up with the recording process, but Putney proved to be an even more valuable component to the album than expected. “We just like change,” says Buckley. “Will had a hunger we found exciting. He was willing to do whatever it took to make this record which included coming to Buffalo and working in a strange studio. If he was willing to step out of his comfort zone, so were we. And I definitely don’t mean to disparage any other producer we’ve had but I have never in my life heard so many incredible ideas for an Every Time I Die record come from one man.” And indeed, Putney adeptly captured the band’s dichotomic ability to juggle melody and malice. Low Teens’ guest vocalists further demonstrate these polarized extremes, with formidable bellower Tim Singer (Deadguy, Kiss It Goodbye, No Escape) roaring alongside Buckley on opening track “Fear and Trembling” and longtime friend Brendan Urie (Panic! at the Disco) providing a melodic counterpoint on “It Remembers”.
Change may be a welcome element to Every Time I Die’s creative process when it comes to studio personnel, but family crises and rotating band members can be debilitating developments. The pressure drop that yielded Low Teens could have crippled a lesser band, but Every Time I Die weathered the winter to deliver their strongest offering to date because of, not in spite of, these hardships and roadblocks. Epitaph Records is proud to release Every Time I Die’s eighth album Low Teens on September 23rd.
Mastodon, Coheed and Cambria, Every Time I Die Tour Dates:
05/28 – Louisville, KY @ Iroquois Amphitheater
05/29 – Columbus, OH @ Express Live! Outdoor Amphitheatre
05/31 – Atlanta, GA @ Coca-Cola Roxy
06/01 – Simpsonville, SC @ CCNB Amphitheatre at Heritage Park Simpsonville
06/02 – Baltimore, MD @ MECU Pavilion
06/04 – Asbury Park, NJ @ Stone Pony Summer Stage
06/06 – Boston, MA @ Rockland Trust Bank Pavilion
06/07 – Brooklyn, NY @ Ford Amphitheater at Coney Island Boardwalk
06/08 – Camden, NJ @ BB&T Pavilion
06/10 – Pittsburgh, PA @ Stage AE – Outdoors
06/11 – Detroit, MI @ Michigan Lottery Amphitheatre at Freedom Hill
06/13 – Council Bluffs, IA @ Harrah’s Council Bluffs – Stir Cove
06/14 – Chicago, IL @ Huntington Bank Pavilion at Northerly Island
06/15 – Minneapolis, MN @ The Armory
06/18 – Kansas City, MO @ Starlight Theatre
06/19 – Denver, CO @ Fillmore Auditorium
06/20 – Salt Lake City, UT @ The Great Saltair
06/22 – Seattle, WA @ Marymoor
06/23 – Portland, OR @ Theater of the Clouds at Moda Center
06/25 – San Francisco, CA @ The Masonic
06/26 – San Diego, CA @ Petco Park – Park at the Park
06/28 – Las Vegas, NV @ The Joint at Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Las Vegas
06/29 – Los Angeles, CA @ Greek Theatre
06/30 – Phoenix, AZ @ Comerica Theatre
07/02 – Austin, TX @ Austin360 Amphitheater
07/03 – Irving, TX @ The Pavilion at Toyota Music Factory
