In 2009 Geoff Tate – singer with Queensrÿche until their spectacular falling-out in 2012 – looked back on the success of their genre-defining concept album Operation: Mindcrime, and discussed its relationship with its less-revered sequel, Mindcrime 2, offering a glimpse into the band’s approach to creativity at the time. (He’d go on to release Mindcrime III in 2026.)
When the notion of metal with a progressive edge is being bandied around, the name Queensrÿche is bound to come up eventually – not least because the Bellevue, Washington veterans came closer than most to defining the genre once and for all with their 1988 masterpiece Operation: Mindcrime.
A concept album relating a tale of governmental corruption, murder, brainwashing and hookers-turned-nuns, it remains one of the most revered of all prog metal records – and so it’s cast something of a shadow over the rest of Queensrÿche’s career, with only its 1990 follow-up Empire having anything like comparable level of commercial impact.
To many, Queensrÿche are prog metal masters; which makes it all the more surprising that vocalist Geoff Tate, one of the genre’s most revered singers, is reluctant to acknowledge the idea. “We’ve always just tried to stay away from labels or labelling ourselves,” he states.
“I kind of understand the need for labels from a marketing standpoint, but from a musical standpoint they tend to pigeonhole you – put you in a creative box. Even the fans label the band, so it’s hard to get away from that. I guess if we’re going to categorise ourselves I’d say put us under ‘Q,’ alphabetically. That’s the way to go!”
Seemingly existing in an idiosyncratic spot, just to the left of the heavy music mainstream, Queensrÿche’s problem has long been that the sheer diversity of their material, veering from heaviness bordering on thrash to opulent balladry and even dalliances with the dour rumble of grunge, has often led to the impression that the band are awkward characters, hell-bent on keeping their admirers guessing.
But again, Tate is happy to disavow such ideas. “We just don’t think about what we do in that way,” he says. “I think if you referenced every possible person in the world, there would be a very small percentage of people who had heard of Queensrÿche. There are other things to worry about than whether people know who I am or whether they like the music I write.
“It’s always nice when somebody does, that’s for sure. We were in the lobby of a hotel the other night and there were 25 fans in there, all with everything we’ve ever done and wanting us to sign it – and that’s very flattering. But then again, you can’t let that kind of thing dictate your life. That would be pretty narcissistic, wouldn’t it?”
In truth, Tate and Queensrÿche have never been the flashiest or most ostentatious of metal bands, even bearing in mind the occasional complexity of their musical ideas. Intelligence and quiet authority have been their most enduring traits over the years, and it’s their refusal to repeat themselves or to pander to nostalgic notions of what the band should be sounding like that have occasionally left critics scratching their heads.
The most obvious example emerged in 2006 when – after two decades of pleading from their fans, they finally caved in and produced a sequel to Operation: Mindcrime. Sensibly titled Operation: Mindcrime 2, it met exactly the kind of mixed response you might expect the follow-up to an all-time classic concept record to receive, with opinion divided roughly in half, but the loudest voices coming from those who felt they’d squandered the opportunity to complete an epic story.
With hindsight, Mindcrime 2 is a decent record that improves with each successive spin; but embarking on the project in the first place still seems like a folly of major proportions.“For us it was a success,” Tate counters. “Every record that you do is a success. If you can ever get more than one person on board with an idea and you can create something, then that’s a success. It’s so hard to get people to agree on anything!
“But making both of those Mindcrime records was a wonderful experience. Finishing the whole thing was a weight off the shoulders. I just listened to them back to back, and man, I really enjoyed them! It was a good feeling.”
It seems improbable that Tate is ever likely to embrace the idea that his band are flying the flag for progressive metal – but he does seem content with their reputation as a band that remain proudly and defiantly apart from the herd.
“I think what we do will stand the test of time and inspire people, or at least get them talking and thinking about something outside of themselves,” he says. “I don’t think we’re really a political band, but we look at social situations, more like an anthropologist would ask, ‘Okay, so culturally we’re moving that way – why are we doing that? Shouldn’t we go in this direction instead?’ That’s the only way we can move forward, right?”
