The latest Queensryche release, self-titled, is by one of
two bands currently operating under the band’s name. This Queensryche is
composed of all the band’s recent members except vocalist Geoff Tate, whom the
band replaced with Todd La Torre. The other Queensryche is Geoff Tate and
whomever he chooses to work with. I haven’t listened to the Tate Queensryche’s first
album, Frequency Unknown, but my
expectations for the La Torre Queensryche’s first album weren’t disappointed.
The early releases “Redemption,” “Where Dreams Go to Die”
and “Fallout” all immediately suggested the Queensryche fan’s Queensryche circa
Empire (1990): heavy, melodic, lots
of twin guitar riffs, tightly structured and radio-friendly. I was pleased to
find that the other songs on the album were even better, immediately likable,
lyrical, and always quintessentially Queensryche. Clearly, the drama of the past
year has not taken anything away from this Queensryche other than Geoff Tate.
For some, the loss of Tate is a gain. Many longtime fans
have been turned off by the group’s releases in the years since Promised Land (1994), the increasing
control of Tate over the band, and a sound that hasn’t evolved so much as gone
through mood swings. Dedicated to Chaos (2011)--with its funk, sax appeal and sometimes
embarrassingly bad lyrics--was such a wild swing in weird directions that many
would hesitate to call it Queensryche.
While I’ve had initial qualms with many Queensryche
full-length studio albums, I’ve come to love almost all of those same albums. While
they aren’t fan favorites, I consider Operation
Mindcrime II (2006) and American
Soldier (2009) to represent a Silver Age of sorts for Queensryche after
they spent Q2K (1999) and Tribe (2003) finding their groove again,
and I quickly realized that the unexpected sound of even Dedicated to Chaos is one I enjoy--once I learned which tracks to
skip. Nonetheless, as a friend said after the release of Dedicated to Chaos, with a title like that, you expect some
cool-ass heavy, and take the album or leave it, cool-ass heavy it is not.
The La Torre-fronted Queensryche has declared from the start
that they intend to base the new Queensryche sound on the old Queensryche sound
(Queensryche EP through Empire), and
the new release has clearly been designed to sound as much like core Queensryche as
possible, even with an appearance by Pamela Moore (Sister Mary from Operation Mindcrime I, II) and production by James “Jimbo” Barton
(Operation Mindcrime, Empire, Promised Land). It rocks from start to finish and, simply put, is
the Queensryche album many have been waiting for.
Still, it is also new. Scott Rockenfield sounds to have
picked up some new moves, or at least a new spirit, spending much of the album
pounding out staccato, tribal tattoos with an intensity that reminds me less of
recent album performances than it does his concert drum solo. He also appears
to have found some new drums. A favorite of mine sounds like a fine-tuned tin
pail sounding from the distant corner of an aircraft hangar.
And then there’s Todd La Torre, who is, let’s face it, the
make-or-break element of the new album. Longtime fans can be forgiven if they
simply can’t accept a Queensryche without Geoff Tate, but La Torre is a
competent replacement. He may not be as operatic and theatrical as Tate, but he
does have the chops to pull off the soaring melodies, he contributed to the
album’s impressive songwriting, and in interviews he comes off as a genuinely
great guy.
At some point a judge will decide which Queensryche gets to
keep the name, but whatever the outcome, I will be looking forward to this
group’s further efforts under any name.
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