Peter Collins

REVIEW: QueensrΓΏche – Operation: Mindcrime (1988/2003 remaster)

QUEENSRΕΈCHE – Operation: Mindcrime (1988, 2003 EMI remaster)

After Pink Floyd made history by releasing The Wall in 1979, concept albums fell out of fashion.Β  Β Almost a decade later, two heavy metal albums brought the artform of the full-length story back:Β  Iron Maiden’s Seventh Son of a Seventh Son, and Operation: Mindcrime by Queensryche.Β  Of the two, Mindcrime had the more coherent linear story, but both remain high water marks for each band.

The Queensryche album sold slowly at first, as the band refused to make music videos to let the album speak for itself.Β  They changed course in 1989 when β€œEyes of a Stranger” made it to MTV and MuchMusic.Β  Fortunes changed dramatically for Operation: Mindcrime.Β  The album eventually went platinum.

The reason Mindcrime was better suited as an album than music videos was the connected storyline running through each song.Β  Employing a classic frame technique, we begin at the end with β€œI Remember Now”.

β€œI remember now.Β  I remember how it started.Β  I can’t remember yesterday.Β  I just remember doing what they told me…”

The anti-hero Nikki is an angry, aimless addict who fell in with a radical political group called Operation: Mindcrime. Β He is a disheartened young American. β€œThe rich control the government, the media, the law.”  Mindcrime’s modus operandi?Β  Using drugs and brainwashing, would-be assassins are sent out to kill strategic political targets, building to revolution.Β  Inequality, corruption and the media have made the country an ugly place.Β  Dr. X, the mastermind behind Mindcrime, has total control over Nikki.Β  He also uses the nun Mary, a former prostitute, to feed Nikki’s needs.Β  Nikki and Mary grow closer until he receives the order:Β  β€œKill her.”  She knows too much.

The first two tracks are just setup before you get to the meat.Β  β€œI Remember Now” and β€œAnarchy-X” create a powerful set of images, with anthemic guitars and the sound of massive crowds rallying to a cause.Β  β€œRevolution Calling”, the first real song, begins the narrative.Β  β€œThen I heard of Dr. X, the man with the cure, just watch the television, yeah you’ll see there’s something going on.”

Nikki is indoctrinated on the title track, an ominous riffy behemoth of a song.Β  Dr. X uses Nikki’s drug addiction to control him.Β  With nothing to lose, Nikki falls for the doctor’s words.Β  β€œThere’s a job for you in the system boy, with nothing to sign.”  Nikki has no use for the government or politicians.Β  It all sounds good to him.Β  On β€œSpeak” he receives his first assignment.Β  β€œI’m the new messiah, death angel with a gun.”  On a blazing fast track with a thick chorus, Nikki falls into his new life.Β  β€œEradicate the fascists, revolution will grow.”  On β€œSpreading the Disease”, another kickass track with a chorus that goes on for miles, Nikki tells the story of Mary and his distaste for the church.Β  β€œReligion and sex are power plays, manipulate the people for the money they pay.Β  Selling skin, selling God, the numbers look the same on the credit cards.”

Queensryche take it slower (though not soft) on β€œThe Mission”, as Nikki starts to feel disillusionment.Β  β€œI look around, my room is filled with candles, each one a story but they end the same.”  He keeps telling himself that he’s doing what’s right.Β  β€œMy mission saved the world, and I stood proud.”  But then he is given the order he dreads:Β  Kill Mary.Β  This instruction opens album epic β€œSuite Sister Mary”, 10 full minutes of riffs, choir and orchestra (by Michael Kamen).Β  The riff alone stands like a monolith.Β  Vocalist Pamela Moore sings a duet with Geoff Tate as the character of Sister Mary.Β  As for that riff?Β  Chris DeGarmo was the master riff composer in this band, a hole they have never quite filled.

The second half of the story commences with β€œThe Needle Lies”.Β  Nikki wants out, but finds that it doesn’t work that way.Β  There is no β€œout”.Β  Meanwhile Queensryche strafe the speakers with a thrashy blitzkrieg.Β  Drummer Scott Rockenfield cannot be contained.Β  Then on the quiet filler track β€œElectric Requiem”, Nikki discovers that Mary had made his choice to disobey orders irrelevant.Β  Dead by her own hand, Nikki is broken and tailspins into a mad depression.Β  This is portrayed on β€œBreaking the Silence”, another stone cold winner of a song with a mighty chorus.Β  The chunky guitar riff is to die for.

With his memory failing him, Nikki doesn’t even know if he killed Mary himself or not.Β  He questions everything on the ever-cool single β€œI Don’t Believe in Love”, one of the most remarkable of all Queensryche songs.Β  Once again the writing partnership of Tate and DeGarmo struck heavy musical gold.Β  Two shorter tracks (β€œWaiting for 22” and β€œMy Empty Room”) fill in some story points, and Nikki is eventually caught.

Operation: Mindcrime’s biggest song is its final track and first single, β€œEyes of a Stranger”.Β  Memories are but fragments.Β  β€œI raise my head and stare into the eyes of a stranger.”  It’s one of Queensryche’s most incredible recordings, a perfect storm of guitars, vocals and melody.Β  It’s neck deep in drama, with Geoff Tate at his most emotive.Β  The story ends with some questions left unanswered.Β  At least until 2006’s unnecessary Mindcrime II….

Operation: Mindcrime took Queensryche to an artistic level that fans and critics always knew they could achieve.Β  Their debut EP showed promise.Β  They didn’t live up to that potential until Mindcrime.Β  Though good, The Warning album wasn’t a stunner like Mindcrime.Β  Rage For Order was brilliant but alienating.Β  Even when it was first released, Mindcrime did not blow all the critics away.Β  Only after it had been digested slowly over time did the masses realize they were sitting on something very special.Β  Queensryche had done conceptual work before, but more abstract.Β  Nothing as well-hewn as Mindcrime.Β  Musically it was like they distilled everything they had accomplished thus far, and concentrated it into pure rock majesty.

The 2003 CD reissue had two live B-sides as bonus tracks.Β  β€œThe Mission” was originally released in 1991 on the B-side to β€œSilent Lucidity”.Β  It is a different recording from that on the live album Operation: LIVEcrime.Β  β€œMy Empty Room” is a later acoustic recording, released in 1995 as a B-side to β€œBridge”.Β  It’s interesting for its acoustic setting and percussion, but is best heard in the context of the β€œBridge” single with its other acoustic counterparts.

Is Operation: Mindcrime a masterpiece?Β  The story is a bit Hollywood and a tad juvenile, but the broad strokes are remarkably still valid today.Β  Mindcrime is rivalled by only a few.Β  It’s a worthy, nay, important addition to any metal collection.

5/5 stars

REVIEW: Alice Cooper – Hey Stoopid (1991)

First of an Alice Cooper double shot! Β Tomorrow, The Last Temptation!

ACHS_0002ALICE COOPER – Hey Stoopid (1991 Sony)

When Hey Stoopid first came out in ’91, fans were still reeling from the disappointment (but commercial success) that was the Trash CD. Fans wanted Alice to get heavier and drop the cheese, and Hey Stoopid was a step in the right direction, to be fully realized on his next album The Last Temptation.

It was the era of the virtuoso, and Cooper certainly knows a good musician when he hears one. To me it was a stroke of genius to have Steve Vai and Joe Satriani record a guitar solo together for the first time, and on a song called “Feed My Frankenstein” no less! Guest shots byΒ Ozzy (barely audible, though), Nikki Sixx, Vinnie Moore, and Slash provided enough hype for the fans to salivate.

Songwriting-wise, Hey Stoopid was a step up from Trash. The title track with its lyrical warnings of drug abuse was a fun catchy rocker with a tasty Satriani solo. The solos on this album are all too brief. Still the players being as good as they are create solos that enhance each track. Other standouts include the mindblowing “Might As Well Be On Mars”, an epic Desmond Child song that just aches before it explodes on the choruses. “Die For You”, written by Alice with Motley Crue’s Sixx & Mars, as well as Jim Vallance, has a chorus that bores its way into your brain and stays there like a parasite.

There’s still a lot of filler, something that plagues almost Alice album from Goes To Hell through to Hey Stoopid. “Snakebite”, “Hurricane Years”, “Little By Little” and “Dirty Dreams” are all songs that Alice will never play live in concert, and for good reason.

Yet there are still lots of hidden gems on this CD, all the way through to the final track “Wind-Up Toy”. A song about insanity, as only Alice can do, it is something that really hearkens back to Welcome To My Nightmare. What’s this about “Steven”?

There are also a couple lesser known tracks that aren’t on the domestic CD that are worth tracking down: “It Rained All Night” is a slowy, groovy track that was a B-side but better than some of the ballads on the actual album. “Fire” was a Jimi Hendrix cover with some fiery (pun intended) guitar playing.

The most disappointing thing about Hey Stoopid is the production by the normally excellent Peter Collins. Yes, Trash was too glossy, and yes, Hey Stoopid toughens the sound with more guitars. However the background vocals in particular are so dense, so saccharine, that even Def Leppard would blush. They are credited to different groups of people, and clearly there are a lot of voices here creating this gigantic mush of sound. It’s too much. I much preferred when Alice stripped it down on Dirty Diamonds, an album that deserves much praise. In 1991, production values just seemed to go to this extreme — witness Europe’s Prisoners In Paradise CD for a similar sounding album.

Hey Stoopid was Alice attempting to find his footing again, and while it stumbled, it did pave the way for Last Temptation. If grunge didn’t wipe out hard rock later that year, maybe Hey Stoopid would be regarded more fondly.

3/5 stars. Not great, but certainly not a failure.

Promotional "Hey Stoopid" memo

Promotional “Hey Stoopid” memo

REVIEW: Queensryche – Empire (20th Anniversary Edition)

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QUEENSRΕΈCHE – Empire (2010 EMI 20th Anniversay Edition)

20 years? Β Wow, they sure flew by for me! When Empire first came out I bought it on cassette, and even back then I thought it was a bit too commercial. That’s not to say Empire is a bad album, but coming off Mindcrime and the killer first single “Empire”, I expected something heavier.

Now with the benefit of hindsight, you can really hear a band coming into their own identity. Empire is kind of the end of the old “heavy metal” Queensryche and the beginning of the newer more diverse Queensryche. The next album,Β Promised Land was a another stride further away from sheer metal, but more successfully achieved.

This box set, very nice looking and all, would have been better released as an individual live album, because disc one is identical to the previous Queensryche remaster version. The bonus tracks are the same. (“Last Time In Paris” from the Ford Fairlaine soundtrack, “Scarborough Fair” from the “Anybody Listening” single, and “Dirty L’il Secret” from the much later “I Am I” single. Β Yes, “Scarborough Fair” is a Simon and Garfunkel cover. Β Much more gothic though!)

The live album is from the same tour (but not the same show) as the Operation: Livecrime album. Think of this as representative of Queensryche’s non-Mindcrime live set, so if you have both albums you kind of have one complete show. It’s a good live album, although without the Mindcrime material to balance it, it is way too Empire-heavy. 7 of the 10 tracks are from Empire. That’s not me complaining really, just an observation of the feel of the set, as an album. For non-Empire material, you get the awesome “Walk In The Shadows,” “Roads to Madness”, and “Take Hold Of The Flame”, representing the first couple Queensryche full-lengths.

(As an added note, the Operation: Livecrime reissue also had one additional song not on this, which was “The Lady Wore Black” originally from the first EP.)

The live stuff sounds great, very clear with a good performance by the band. Tate is in peak voice at this point — he nails all the notes in “Take Hold”! The whole band sounds really good, especially in the backing vocals department. It also sounds pretty live and not messed with, which is my preference. Β I’m sure there are backing tapes, Queensryche do use them, but the overall feel was one ofΒ spontaneity. Β The liner notes claim there are no overdubs whatsoever.

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If you’re not familiar with the Empire album and you’re buying it for the first time, you are definitely going to be familiar with most of the album’s six singles:

  • “Empire”, the dark forboding tale of drug trafficking, with killer spoken word-style vocals from Geoff Tate.
  • “Best I Can”, the power pop rock song, with uplifting (but cheesey) lyrics.
  • “Silent Lucidity” one of the three songs that defined the term “power ballad” in the summer of 1991. (The other two were “More Than Words” by Extreme and “To Be With You” by Mr. Big.) A great song with brilliantly sparse-yet-lush arrangement. Still stands up today!
  • “Jet City Woman”, my personal favourite simply for that unstoppable bass groove.
  • “Anybody Listening?”, the epic album closer, and one of the all time best songs Queensryche have ever written.
  • “Another Rainy Night”, not one of the better songs, in my opinion. Kind of repeats the pop rock stylings of “Best I Can” but with lyrics about missing some girl.

There are also buried treasures within the album tracks. “Resistance” feels like a polished-up Mindcrime outtake for sheer tempo and mood. “Della Brown” is unlike anything the band ever attempted before, an atmospheric tale of a homeless woman that foreshadows the direction of Promised Land.

The band were really gelling at this point, and an album like this makes me really wish Chris DeGarmo was still in the band. He wrote or co-wrote almost every song, and his backing vocals really enrich the record. Everybody was playing great, though, and big props to Eddie Jackson for his killer bass sound.

The package includes an Empire poster, booklet, and five postcards featuring stills from the “Empire” music video.

To sum up, there is absolutely nothing wrong musically with this album, or the bonus live album. This is a 5 star album for music, for packaging, for sound, and all that stuff. I have to deduct one star simply because the first disc is just the same Empire I already owned and I think the live disc on its own could have been released alone for the 20th anniversary of Empire.

4/5 stars (5 for music -1 for rebuying the album, again!)

More Queensryche:

Mike Ladano: Exclusive EDDIE JACKSON interview, part I

Mike Ladano: Exclusive EDDIE JACKSON interview, part II

Mike Ladano: Exclusive EDDIE JACKSON interview, part III

Mike Ladano: Exclusive EDDIE JACKSON interview, part IV