Good to hear that Geoff and his band are doing a passable version of this. But for me personally, I just can't muster up the interest in seeing it. Part of it is that Mindcrime has just been DONE TO DEATH over the years, and having seen it in person and on video from the Empire tour, I've seen the "definitive" version.
I guess I get this. I saw QR open for Metallica twice on the O:M tour. The set list was mostly O:M; they skipped "The Mission," "Suite Sister Mary," "The Needle Lies" and the sub-2:00 "filler" pieces. I saw them later on the O:M tour as a headliner, when they did all of O:M, except for SSM. And then I saw them on the
Empire tour, where they did the whole thing. But that was nearly 27 years ago, so seeing the whole thing again was really enjoyable.
As far as the band politics, my attitude is meh.... I largely lost interest in the band after Promised Land (which, IMO, had only two good songs), and I haven't heard much of the TLT material, so I can't fairly say anything about the current incarnation of the band. However, since, for me, QR may as well have ceased to exist over 20 years ago, and a band with no Tate or DeGarmo isn't really "Queensryche," Tate performing with a cover band is probably as good as it's going to get (plus, the whole evening was free, courtesy of a co-worker who was "entertaining" a client!).