Official Queensryche thread: Kickstart the next album

[El Barto]

SNIP

I see your point about the ending of MCII,  but at the same time,  All the Promises was actually one of the better musical bits from the album.  The Andrew Lloyd Webber style vocals were ultra-cheesy,  but the two guitar parts sounded great together.  Live,  which is the only way that the silly thing is even bearable,  it was easily the highlight of the second set.  

[The Dark Master]

SNIP

I see your point about the ending of MCII,  but at the same time,  All the Promises was actually one of the better musical bits from the album.  The Andrew Lloyd Webber style vocals were ultra-cheesy,  but the two guitar parts sounded great together.  Live,  which is the only way that the silly thing is even bearable,  it was easily the highlight of the second set.  

Yeah, I always thought ATP was a decent enough song, and never really had any problems with it, but it definitely was not strong enough to close out the album.  If it had lead into big finale, similar to Eyes of a Stranger, then it could have worked, but the song on it's own just ends weak and it leaves you with this feeling that there should have been more.

For the record, I actually think MCII, taken as a stand alone album, rather then a sequel, was a pretty decent album.  Despite the fact that the actual band wrote very little of it, and the whole idea of a Mindcrime II being a blatant money-grab, it actually seemed to be a genuine effort to return to something that vaguely resembled that classic Queensryche sound, not just musically, but thematically as well.  It is actually my favourite of the post-DeGarmo albums (which isn't really saying much, but bear with me here).  Sadly, the album was brought down by the fact that it was a literal sequel to OM rather then simply a thematic one, a musically inconsistent second half, and a lackluster ending.  

Taken for what it is, I feel it is the closest thing to a solid album Queensryche has made since Promised Land, but unfortunately, it is damaged by some pretty severe structural flaws as well as the fact that it is a shameless attempt at trying to relive the past.  Because of all that, it ultimately reinforces the belief that Queensryche really is beyond recovering their legacy and reputations and a world class act, rather then dispelling it, which is clearly what they were trying to do by making a sequel to their magnum opus.  The album failed at it's primary reason for existing, and the end result is just another chapter in the long, painful decline of this once magnificent band.

[Nick]

Guys, don't let an actual great Queensryche album lose in this poll.

https://www.dreamtheaterforums.org/boards/index.php?topic=27367.0

[El Barto]

Just noticed that they're playing down here tonight.  In a 1,625 seat venue, they're currently offering 4-packs for $27 (individuals are $35).  It would appear that they're really trying to put bodies into the place.  Wouldn't surprise me if one could show up and get in for free.

[Samsara]

Promoters are often known to give out free tickets just to put bodies in there. Tour is not selling well. A couple of the usual places were filled, but hell, they couldn't even sell out Irving Plaza in New York. I mean come on.

And they've hugely downgraded in San Francisco, playing the Regency Ballroom (the first time they played here, it was the Cabaret debacle, and was only half full, if I recall correctly. It was just a few years ago they were at the Warfield Theater.

Apparently Geoff is singing "better," but he still cuts all the notes and can't sing high consistently. And he looks like a melodramatic fool on stage.

[El Barto]

If I knew I'd be able to get in uber-cheap (meaning free, in this case), I'd pop down for the second half of their set.  The setlist is actually pretty good.  That, and of course a strong sense of morbid curiosity. 

[Samsara]

Don't go for the second half. That's pretty much the lame half. The first half, except for the ridiculous opener of "Get Suckin'" (Started) is pretty bad ass. Nothing eye-popping, but goo heavy and dramatic opening run of tunes except for the first one.

[El Barto]

Aside from Damaged and IDBiL, there's nothing there that interests me.  On the other hand, NM156, Screaming, Lady Wore Black, Walk/Shadows and Right Side is a very nice 5 song stretch.  To each their own, I suppose.

[Samsara]

I thought the opening run of the set had all those songs, plus A Dead Man's Words and At 30,000 Ft. from American Soldier?

The second half of the set had stuff like Lucidity, Around the World (blech), and to be honest, other than the standard three-song encore of Empire, JCW and Eyes, I don't remember the rest.

[Phoenix87x]

So out of the blue today, I listened to Operation Mindcrime. It had been quite a while, but man I forgot how incredible it was. It got me so pumped up, I was having a blast. I had really forgotten how much I love this band.

and I really wish that they would do more Rage for Order shows.

[Zook]

I'd be glad not to hear Geoff Tate butcher the vocals.

[jingle.boy]

We shall enjoy their past greatness.  We shall mourn our loss of that greatness too.

[dongringo]

Awful isn't a word I'd use to describe Mindcrime ll. Even if it's mostly Tate and Slater, at least it sounds like QR, unlike DTC which sounds nothing like QR apart from one song and can be truly classified as awful.

Yeah, I pretty much agree.  It has some definite problems and missed opportunities, and has a few "awful" moments.  In terms of just being "an album of songs," it isn't "awful" at all because there are definitely some very good songs.  The problem is, it is a concept album, and those awful moments drag down the entire story, which taints the album as a whole. 

Personally, I feel the album is very strong up through Re-Arrange You.  Is it Mindcrime awsome?  Perhaps not, but it is still plenty solid.  But things start to go downhill with The Chase, unfortunately.  The song itself is a good idea that suffers because of (1) poor execution (mainly because it just becomes so melodramatic that it begins to alienate a lot of listeners) and (2) carries the stigma of the unfortunately stupid production during the tour that simply cannot be erased from the memory banks once it is seen (which, I suppose, goes back to the melodrama thing).  Murderer? picks things back up again and gives the listener some hope.  But by this point, an album that was pretty solid up to this point just starts to go all over the place in terms of quality, and a lot of the problem is the shift in focus to the love story and the issue of Mary as Nikki's conscience.  To me and many other fans, this idea just doesn't work.  Could it have?  I suppose.  But, again, melodrama and poor execution ruin it.  I mean, it's kinda cool that we don't really know how much of the Mary/Nikki interaction at this point is real, imaginary, or something in between.  But it just goes over the top and doesn't culminate in anything satisfying, as far as I'm concerned. 

There are lots of things I would want to fix if, hypothetically, I were in charge and could take this back into the studio to rework before releasing it.  But pretty much anything I would "fix" would have the consequence of taking the story in a different direction.  Which, as a tangent, forces me to at least give Geoff/Slater a slight nod for creating a story where all the pieces, regardless of whether they were executed well or poorly, actually do move the story along and contribute something to the story.  Listeners can debate all they want about whether any particular piece is a worthwhile contribution, but that's a separate issue. 

Anyhow, back on track, I guess the simplest solution for me is just to eliminate the last track.  Get rid of All The Promises, and you have the story ending with Fear City Slide, and not really knowing how Nikki died and what it all meant, which is a good thing.  I remember the speculation when the album was new about whether Nikki simply OD'd, whether the explosion sound toward the end of FSS meant he blew up XCorp (or some bigger target), or something else.  And that was pretty cool.  The ambiguity felt nicely in sync with the themes and intentional ambiguities in the original Mindcrime.  But then you have All The Promises, which kinda just makes you throw up your hands and say, "who cares?"  Eliminate that song and just put in some sort of outro that maybe musically links the album back to Anarchy X or the end of Mindcrime, and call it a day.  Maybe something like this:  the original ends with Nikki in the hospital.  You have that ominous symphonic fade in that cuts off when Nikki repeats the "I remember now."  Maybe the same or similar fade-in, and you hear faint beeps from an EKG machine, and then a flatline tone as the symphonic chord either fades back out or cuts off.  Nice, simple, chilling, vague ending that ties up the album nicely without monkeying with it too much.  Something like this one simple change would easily bump the album up a notch or two.  Problem is, Geoff had his vision, and that was that, even if it ended up dragging the album down.  Someone needed to step up and tell him it wasn't a good idea.  Problem was, the only people with him for most of the writing, Slater and Stone, weren't in a position to do that.  And the result is an album that could have been pretty good, but ultimately fails because a few dumb ideas resulted in poor execution that dragged the album as a whole down with it.  That's my take.

Wow, just now noticed this. Thought this thread had stopped dead in it's tracks. Anyway, I like your ideas, especially cutting out All the Promises and replacing it with an outro of some sort. That one song alone does indeed bring the whole thing down. It just doesn't work at all.

[Phoenix87x]

So I just ordered Hear in the Now Frontier.

Its the only album with Degarmo that I never bought and I'm curious. I'm gonna go into this open minded.

[wolfking]

You need to be very open minded for that one.  Good record though.

[WildeSilas]

So I just ordered Hear in the Now Frontier.

Its the only album with Degarmo that I never bought and I'm curious. I'm gonna go into this open minded.

I don't mind it too much. It reminds me of Ty Tabor A LOT.

[contest_sanity]

HITNF is a really good album.  It's no Promised Land, but still a good album.  DeGarmo's track on there where he sings lead vocals, "All I Want," is especially special IMO.  That particular song, now that it's been mentioned, actually
 

reminds me of Ty Tabor A LOT.

Never noticed that until right now.  Good call WS

[jjrock88]

HINF is a good album; however, it's the first QR with a noticable drop in quality IMO.  There are filler songs- this being a first for a QR disc.  I listen to EP-PL all the time.  All the others, including HINF, I listen to once in a blue moon.

[Lowdz]

Been playing MC this week and man, what an awesome piece of music and drama Suite Sister Mary is. Could be my favourite piece of music ever.

[Cyclopssss]

HINF I actually threw in the bin disgusted after about onen and a half lissten. What a piece of dreck, I thought it had only one 'listenable' song on it. I might be able to change my opionin if I'd listen to it all those years later, but I doubt it.

O: MC I blew my mind when it came out. I've been only recently watching some video's fromt the Livecrime video on Youtube. Man, what a great show that was.
O: MC II isn't as bad as I expected, there actually are a slew of pretty good, rocking songs on it. It's just that the name Mindcrime makes you expect so much more.

And I agree on the last song, totally misplaced. Goddamned, this band used to be so AWESOME! 

[dongringo]

https://www.groupon.com/deals/gl-queensryche-ponte-verde

 

[Perpetual Change]

Yeah, IMO HITNF is worse than even recent Queensryche. The difference? The newer stuff is bad, but it's still fairly standard underwhelming rock. HITNF is bad, and it's out there too. I just can't get a grip on the record at all, and nor do I want to because I do not enjoy it.

[dongringo]

Yeah, IMO HITNF is worse than even recent Queensryche. The difference? The newer stuff is bad, but it's still fairly standard underwhelming rock. HITNF is bad, and it's out there too. I just can't get a grip on the record at all, and nor do I want to because I do not enjoy it.

I'm with you. Never liked it.

[Phoenix87x]

https://www.groupon.com/deals/gl-queensryche-ponte-verde

 

Wow.

[bosk1]

Yeah, IMO HITNF is worse than even recent Queensryche.

This post is a perfect example of why drugs are bad for you.

[Perpetual Change]

Um.... I don't use drugs, but I'm pretty sure someone was on them when they were recording that album

[MasterShakezula]

I hope you're just talking about DTC but too high to remember the title right. 

[Perpetual Change]

Yes, I'd enjoy listen to it more than HITNF. I don't like either at all, but at least DTC almost falls into the "so bad it's good" category. It'll, at least, bring the lols.

[jingle.boy]

I haven't subjected myself to the misery that DTC supposedly is, but perhaps HITNF feels so bad because it was such a HUGE drop in quality from PL.  IMO, they peaked with O:M.  Empire is fantastic, but just a titch below O:M.  PL is pretty damned good, but not as good as Empire.  HITNF is pretty close to a steaming pile of doo (relatively speaking).  Perhaps we've just come to accept this mediocrity (and from what I understand, that's a very complimentary way of describing DTC) from QR at this point.

[bosk1]

...but I'm pretty sure someone was on them when they were recording that album

Well, yes, but that's beside the point.

[Perpetual Change]

I haven't subjected myself to the misery that DTC supposedly is, but perhaps HITNF feels so bad because it was such a HUGE drop in quality from PL.  IMO, they peaked with O:M.  Empire is fantastic, but just a titch below O:M.  PL is pretty damned good, but not as good as Empire.  HITNF is pretty close to a steaming pile of doo (relatively speaking).  Perhaps we've just come to accept this mediocrity (and from what I understand, that's a very complimentary way of describing DTC) from QR at this point.

Actually, I agree with this now that I think about it. I used a similar argument when dredg's latest album came out.

Dropping from the top of a 100 story building (here, PL) onto the roof of a 30 story one (HITNF) hurts alot and is definitely fatal. Falling off the roof of a one-story house (American Soldier) onto the ground (DTC) doesn't hurt nearly as bad by comparison.

So, maybe HITNF is better, but damn does having that album from the original line-up hurt more. 

[Ruba]

What does spOOL mean? It's one of their best songs, but I have no idea, what the title or lyrics are telling.

[wolfking]

Yeah, IMO HITNF is worse than even recent Queensryche. The difference? The newer stuff is bad, but it's still fairly standard underwhelming rock. HITNF is bad, and it's out there too. I just can't get a grip on the record at all, and nor do I want to because I do not enjoy it.

No.....just no.

[Samsara]

We shall enjoy their past greatness.  We shall mourn our loss of that greatness too.

Amen.

[King Postwhore]

I never got the hate for HITNF.  I like the album.