After seeing me check into the event on Facebook, a friend of mine wrote to me "Are you a Child of the Fence?" And I knew exactly what she meant.
Coheed fandom runs deep, and way beyond the music. There are storylines, characters, adventures, and history that you jump into, pick up, learn. And I'm still in the process of learning. Prog rock metal scifi, adventure. Of course this appeals to me. How could it not? What's not to love! Claudio's voice (and hair), the soaring guitar work, the short interstitial songs that build into the next song. Fantastic.
Children of the Fence is the name of the fandom, see info on the 2008 full performances of their Amory Wars albums, recorded live. Songs off of the albums that they performed stand alone, and can be enjoyed out of context for sure. That's how I learned of them. I think it was Rock Band or Guitar Hero where I first heard of them back in the day.
This was a full performance of one of the albums, Good Apollo, I'm Burning Star IV: No World For Tomorrow followed by a short break and a few more songs.
We got there very late, deliberately missing the opening act in order to have dinner. That's all fine and good, but of course, by the time you get inside, the place is packed to the gills and there's nowhere to be. M&M worked their way forward to get into the middle of the crowd.
Doug and I were in the way back, no line of sight to the stage, and people just bumping into us the entire time. That's not his jam. Not mine either. If I can see the performance I can tolerate the traffic and bumping. He went out exploring the venue, and found a ledge to sit on, texted me, invited me to come hang with him, so I did.
If I didn't have Doug's ticket on my phone I may have gone in early, bypassed dinner, and found my friend Deb on the front rail to hang with her and her friends. They are all true Children of the Fence. But I decided since I can't get up front no matter what, I'll hang with Doug. He bought me a beer. A $15 beer. How, expensively kind of the venue.
Before the show got underway I moved over to the soundboard and asked the tech if I could take a picture of the set list (everyone knows basically what it's going to be, because it's a full album, right?) and he was kind enough to let me take one, and I promised I wouldn't share it until after the show.
Any person in a fandom wants to know the setlist, even if they're not there, so they can get psyched over what they're missing. Oh! They haven't played this one in ten years! I've never seen this one live!
Even though for this show, we knew they're doing a whole album, so you knew what you're going to get. The break between the album and the rest of the set list is where things get unique, different.
And, it is super bad form to post the playlist before the show. Don't do it. Ever. Happily I thanked him, and walked off to find Doug again.
We enjoyed people watching. There was a staircase down to a basement lounge where you could get beer and sit for a while, but it was crowded and busy. So we were able to watch all the for real Children of the Fence come and go.
I have to say I was truly impressed with how diverse this crowd was. I'm kind of used to going to Guster shows and they don't pull in a very diverse audience. But here, there were all stripes of humans, drawn together. It was wonderful to see so many people pulled into this one band's art. Doug eventually went outside because he just needed a break.
After he got up, two people came out who needed to take a break from being in the concert. There was another kid there, somewhere in his 20s, I'd hazard around Geoff's age. He struck up a conversation and told us the opening act is his favorite, he added "and I thought I should stick around for Coheed."
Yes, yes you should. Good choice, young man.
When they played "Shoulders" the girl in the couple next to me jumped up and ran. "That's her favorite," her partner said. That left me with this kid, who sat down and continued our conversation.
"How long have you been going to shows?" he asked me.
Oh honey.
"My first concert that I remember was the Outlaws, I think I was 12 or 13? I'm old." He told me he loves living close to the venue, because he just looks at the upcoming shows, and buys a GA ticket and goes by himself. Easy walk to and from, no problems, no drama. I thought, yeah, he should be friends with Geoff.
He put his phone number in my phone and told me to have Geoff get in touch.
"I have a few friends here in town, we play board games, drink beer, listen to metal." Okay. There ya go. Friends.
When the show was over, I went back to the soundboard in hopes of getting a copy of the set list. The tech smiled at me, and said "I saved it for you. I knew you'd come back!"
I was super psyched to get a set list, I mean, that's a prize. Baby's First Coheed and Cambria show and look - you got a set list!!! I located Debs and her pals, and somehow just knew. I gave the set list to one of her friends - he was astonished. He told me he'd had a GREAT day. His favorite race driver won a big race, he had a great dinner in town, did the meet & greet with the band and an acoustic set, enjoyed the show with all his good Coheed friends, and here we were at the end of the show with me handing him the set list. He said he's never gotten one.
Someone took a group picture, and I'm in it, so I guess it's official. I'm a Child of the Fence after all.
For sure want to see them again, but want to SEE them, and be able to see, and really soak it in.
Check this live video out, love the crowd, love Claudio pointing to them to sing out. What fun.
Good eye, sniper. Here I shoot, you run. Bye Bye Beautiful....
And pictures, Today's digits will be in another post I'll put up separate from this one. Too far away for a good band shot but, this'll do.
Me and Debs! She drove home 4 hours after the show because she had class today. Saw 3 shows in 4 days (Norfolk, VA. Pittsburgh, Silver Spring) And got to see me!
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