Before the Great Seattle Grunge Invasion, there was the Mini-Metal Invasion from the chilly, rainy, Pacific Northwest. (Of course, Metal Church is the only other metal band I can think of right now...) Lead by opera-trained vocalist Geoff Tate, these guys struggled HARD before they got the break they so richly deserved. Of course, as is often the case, their sudden MTv popularity totally killed off the band's creativity.

Oh, you should also check out "Last Time in Paris" from The Adventures of Ford Fairlane movie soundtrack -- WICKED song, that one is! (The same cannot be said, however, for "Real World" on the Last Action Hero soundtrack.)

"Queensrÿche"

1. "Queen of the Reich" (4:22)
2. "Nightrider" (3:46)
3. "Blinded" (3:06)
4. "The Lady Wore Black" (6:13)
5. "Prophecy" (4:01)

I remember hearing "Queen of the Reich" for the first time in 1983, when I was first getting into heavy metal, and thinking it was the most EVIL-SOUNDING song I had heard up til then...of course, I had a real hard time figuring out the band's name (perhaps that's why they were obscure for so long?) "Lady Wore Black" shows how power ballads are SUPPOSED to be done, and "Prophecy" is a great, fast number that originally didn't appear on this EP, but was thankfully included on the CD version.

"The Warning"

1. "Warning" (4:44)
2. "En Force" (5:14)
3. "Deliverance" (3:17)
4. "No Sanctuary" (6:02)
5. "NM 156" (4:38)
6. "Take Hold of the Flame" (4:54)
7. "Before the Storm" (5:13)
8. "Child of Fire" (4:31)
9. "Roads to Madness" (9:43)

Their first full-length album features slower, more power-oriented metal, but once again, they show how "power metal" is SUPPOSED to be done..."Take Hold of the Flame" sounds downright evil, and the techno-ish style of "NM 156" is utterly brilliant!!

"Rage for Order"

1. "Walk in the Shadows" (3:34)
2. "I Dream in Infra Red" (4:18)
3. "The Whisper" (3:36)
4. "Gonna Get Close to You" (4:37)
5. "The Killing Words" (3:56)
6. "Surgical Strike" (3:20)
7. "Neue Regel" (4:55)
8. "Chemical Youth (We Are Rebellion)" (4:15)
9. "London" (5:05)
10. "Screaming in Digital" (3:37)
11. "I Will Remember" (4:25)

They just keep getting better! A few songs hearken back to the sound on Warning ("Walk in the Shadows" and "Chemical Youth", in particular), but overall, there's more of an electronic, pseudo-industrial feel to the music here. GREAT STUFF!!

"Operation: Mindcrime"

1. "I Remember Now" (1:17)
2. "Anarchy X"--instrumental (1:27)
3. "Revolution Calling" (4:42)
4. "Operation: Mindcrime" (4:43)
5. "Speak" (3:42)
6. "Spreading the Disease" (4:07)
7. "The Mission" (5:46)
8. "Suite Sister Mary" (10:41)
9. "The Needle Lies" (3:08)
10. "Electric Requiem" (1:22)
11. "Breaking the Silence" (4:34)
12. "I Don't Believe in Love" (4:23)
13. "Waiting for 22"--instrumental (1:05)
14. "My Empty Room" (1:28)
15. "Eyes of a Stranger" (6:39)

Now this is ultimate Queensryche...a concept album, featuring some guy who's recruited by the mysterious "Mr. X" to become a mindless assassin. Definitely a 1984 feel to the whole thing. Personally, I think the album as a whole works better than the individual songs...taken out of context, some of the music sounds a bit one-dimensional. And still, NOBODY seemed to know they exist -- I remember hearing that Geoff Tate had to work at a laundromat just to support himself!

"Operation: Livecrime"

1. "I Remember Now" (1:19)
2. "Anarchy X"--instrumental (1:27)
3. "Revolution Calling" (4:58)
4. "Operation: Mindcrime" (4:26)
5. "Speak" (3:44)
6. "Spreading the Disease" (5:05)
7. "The Mission" (5:47)
8. "Suite Sister Mary" (11:37)
9. "The Needle Lies" (3:19)
10. "Electric Requiem" (1:16)
11. "Breaking the Silence" (4:21)
12. "I Don't Believe in Love" (4:19)
13. "Waiting for 22"--instrumental (1:27)
14. "My Empty Room" (1:37)
15. "Eyes of a Stranger" (8:25)

For some reason, I refrained from buying this live boxset when it first came out, a year after Mindcrime. Well, it *was* kind of expensive...but nowhere NEAR as expensive as it is now, since it's loooong out of print!! Heck, the CD alone auctions for nearly thirty bucks...well, good fortune shines on me once more, as I found this thing, sans booklet & video, nominally priced at $7.99 used! Purty kewl, huh??

As for the music...well, I was a bit disappointed. For one thing, it's JUST the Operation: Mindcrime songs, and I know for a FACT they played "Queen of the Reich", at least, on this tour (at least they did at the show where they opened for Metallica, although they only played half the album there...my brother got to see the concert where they played the WHOLE ALBUM, fucking bastard...) There's also quite a few performance errors, such as at least one part where the "spoken" part didn't play (and I assume it should have), and Geoff Tate introduces "The Needle Lies" as "Operation: Mindcrime" (well, perhaps he was referring to the album title, but it sure did sound out of place...) They do reprise "Anarchy X" at the very end, which is way cool, and most importantly, the entire show is played with vigorous energy, showcasing the band at the peak of their power. Certainly, it would never been seen again...

"Empire"

1. "Best I Can" (5:30)
2. "The Thin Line" (5:42)
3. "Jet City Woman" (5:20)
4. "Della Brown" (7:04)
5. "Another Rainy Night (Without You)" (4:44)
6. "Empire" (5:07)
7. "Resistance" (4:47)
8. "Silent Lucidity" (5:45)
9. "Hand on Heart" (5:30)
10. "One and Only" (5:52)
11. "Anybody Listening?" (7:40)

An excellent followup to Mindcrime--"Best I Can" blows out the speakers with its punctuated keyboard chords, and songs like "Resistance" and "Hand on Heart" are sung passionately. Then the inevitable happened...a year after the album's release, "Silent Lucidity" was released as a single, and all of a sudden, Queensryche is TOTALLY POPULAR! And really, I can't think of any band that deserved it more (although I really got SICK of seeing "Jet City Woman" on MTv every two hours...)

"Promised Land"

1. "9:28 a.m."--instrumental (1:43)
2. "I Am I" (3:56)
3. "Damaged" (3:55)
4. "Out of Mind" (4:34)
5. "Bridge" (3:27)
6. "Promised Land" (8:25)
7. "Disconnected" (4:48)
8. "Lady Jane" (4:23)
9. "My Global Mind" (4:20)
10. "One More Time" (4:17)
11. "Someone Else?" (4:38)

And guess what...now that these guys are rich & famous, it totally KILLED the band's aggressive edge. (Hard to sing about revolution when you've got millions in the bank, I guess.) The first two songs, "I Am I" and "Damaged", are classic Queensryche, just as powerful as anything they've done before (must have been recorded before "Silent Lucidity" was released?), but the rest...well, it SUCKS!! Lots of "Lucidity"-like ballads, and attempts at funkiness here and there, but really, this isn't the same band anymore. What a shame. :-( I wasn't even going to buy this CD at all, except that I found a good copy for $4.99 and figured what the hell, it's worth it for just the first two songs...

"Hear in the Now Frontier"

1. "Sign of the Times" (3:33)
2. "Cuckoo's Nest" (3:59)
3. "Get a Life" (3:39)
4. "The Voice Inside" (3:48)
5. "Some People Fly" (5:17)
6. "Saved" (4:09)
7. "You" (3:54)
8. "Hero" (5:25)
9. "Miles Away" (4:32)
10. "Reach" (3:30)
11. "All I Want" (4:06)
12. "Hit the Black" (3:36)
13. "Anytime/Anywhere" (2:54)
14. "spOOL" (4:53)

To my chagrin, I originally wrote a lukewarm review for this album. Make no mistake, this is CRAP, SHIT, GARBAGE, JUNK, DOG POO, TOTAL STINKING STEAMING FECAL MATTER!!! At least Promised Land had 2 good songs...this one has NONE. I'm serious!!!

"Q2K"

1. "Falling Down" (4:28)
2. "Sacred Ground" (4:12)
3. "One Life" (4:48)
4. "When the Rain Comes..." (5:05)
5. "How Could I?" (3:44)
6. "Beside You" (5:14)
7. "Liquid Sky" (4:53)
8. "Breakdown" (4:11)
9. "Burning Man" (3:42)
10. "Wot Kinda Man" (3:15)
11. "The Right Side of My Mind" (5:51)

This album was supposed to be "getting back to their roots" (read: they've become MTv has-beens already.) However, a few soundclips from their homepage failed to thrill me, and when this thing was released in late '99, the reviews were resoundingly negative (Perpetual Motion voted it the worst AND most disappointing CD of the year.) Well, I wasn't even going to get the damn thing, until I found a cheap used copy and figured, what the heck, I was curious to hear just how BAD it really was...

...but, surprise of surprises...it's really not that bad! In fact, it's PRETTY DAMN GOOD!!

Ok, it's no Operation: Mindcrime by any stretch of the imagination, and a few songs certainly tank (especially "Liquid Sky"), but it's a helluva lot better than their last two albums!! Admittedly, it's more grunge-rock than metal, sort of a cross between Alice in Chains and Stone Temple Pilots. (Which is probably why PM bagged on it so much, that type of music doesn't go down well there.) Still, I can't figure out why I hated the samples so much...no matter, at least this album shows there's some life left in the band yet.

"Live Evolution"

If only they had come up with this idea ten years earlier...this is basically a "greatest hits live" set, tracing the band's musical evolution from their first EP onward. The meat of the concert is in the first eight songs from their earliest, most progressive years, great stuff! The "Mindcrime" suite is kind of redundant, since it was done much better on "Operation: Livecrime" (which just got reissued, by the way) -- overall, Geoff's voice is the weak point, and he doesn't even bother trying to hit the high notes anymore. Ironically, they chose the two best "Promised Land" songs and the four WORST "Empire" songs, go figure...and the final suite isn't even worth mentioning! (I actually enjoyed it on the first listen, since the less ambitious music better fits Geoff Tate's capabilities these days, but on the second time through, I quit listening after "Sacred Ground".) Overall, this is a decent and long-overdue live set, which manages to be enjoyable for all Queensryche fans, despite its many deficiencies.

"Tribe"

1. "Open" (4:32)
2. "Losing Myself" (4:12)
3. "Desert Dance" (3:57)
4. "Falling Behind" (4:28)
5. "The Great Divide" (4:01)
6. "Rhythm of Hope" (3:31)
7. "Tribe" (4:39)
8. "Blood" (4:13)
9. "The Art of Life" (4:12)
10. "Doin' Fine" (3:52)

Queensryche continues their quest to become the world's most average grunge band with this latest offering of boring music. It's hard to say whether it's better, worse, or the same quality as Q2K, since I haven't bothered listening to that CD since buying it...and this one will likely be collecting dust on the shelf as well. Chris DeGarmo returned to the band for this one -- hmm, I didn't even realize he'd left. Sure didn't help the music one iota.

"Rarities" (bootleg CDR)

1. "Scarborough Fair" (3:49)
2. "The Prophecy" (4:01)
3. "I Dream in Infrared"--1991 acoustic version (4:00)
4. "Last Time in Paris" (3:58)
5. "Real World" (4:27)
6. "Chasing Blue Sky" (3:46)
7. "Dirty Lil' Secret" (4:17)
8. "Someone Else"--full band version (7:23)
9. "Damaged"--live (4:23)
10. "My Empty Room/Real World"--live (6:40)
11. "Silent Lucidity"--live, 1992 Grammys (4:21)
12. "Della Brown"--live, MTv Unplugged (6:07)
13. "I Will Remember"--live, MTv Unplugged (4:03)
14. "The Killing Words"--live, MTv Unplugged (4:08)

I got this bootleg mainly for the songs I don't have on CD already: "Scarborough Fair" (a Simon & Garfunkel cover), "Chasing Blue Sky", "Dirty Lil' Secret", and I suppose the two re-recorded versions. (There's another song called "Two Miles High" that only appears on a DVD or something which is not included, grrr.) The live tracks are a mixed bag -- "Damaged" and "Real World" are excellent quality, which tells me they almost certainly come from official band singles. "Silent Lucidity" is atrocious...I should re-dub that song from my video tape of that performance, it couldn't come out any worse! The Unplugged tracks are okay but I'm sure there's better-sounding versions out there somewhere.

"The Geoff Tate Band: Seattle, WA 6/29/01" (live bootleg CDR)

1. "Gonna Get Close to You" (4:49)
2. "spOOL" (4:42)
3. "Helpless" (5:03)
4. "Til There Was You" (4:35)
5. "Pieces of Everything" (4:52)
6. "Every Move You Make" (4:56)
7. "The Thin Line" (4:44)
8. "Over Me" (4:08)
9. "Grain of Faith" (5:43)
10. "Della Brown" (7:06)

This bootleg comes from a live show by Geoff Tate's solo band, but I'm sticking it on this page for now, until I get around to buying his solo CD (which hadn't been released yet, when I acquired this.) Sound quality is merely okay (B/B+ audience), but it's worth it for the six new songs, which sound kinda pop but are still enjoyable. ("Over Me" borders on pure grunge.) There's also a jazzed-up, "lounge" version of "The Thin Line"...heh, cool.

videotapes:
• "Video Mindcrime"

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