GEOFF TATE: "OKAY, WE SUCK, THERE I SAID IT!"
The rise and fall of a band that actually began to
live up to its pre-career hype

     When Kerrrang! proclaimed Queensryche to be
"the next big thing" in 1982, most readers said,

"Yeah, whatever."  But the Seattle progressive
thrash band's self-titled EP proved the naysayers
wrong as it kicked out five tracks of phenomonal,
original, heavy kick ass metal.
     Vocalist Geoff Tate may have been a little
too good for the rest of the band on that first
EP, but that changed as everyone's talent was
showcased on 1984's The Warning.  1986's Rage
for Order followed, and of course the band
peaked with 1988's Operation: Mindcrime.  While
lacking the trash elements of the first two
releases, Mindcrime was a heavy, progressive,
kick ass album that; in this writer's opinion;
is the greatest concept album of all time.
     Geoff Tate was interviewed by The Cut Out
Bin to discuss not these glories of days past,
but rather to try to make some sense out of what
has happened to Queensryche since 1990.

COB: So, Geoff, let's start with Empire.  What
were you guys thinking?
GT: Well, after Mindcrime there was a lot of
record company pressure to release a piece of
radio friendly crap.  And, well, except for the
title track and "Best I Can," we obliged them.
COB: The musicianship was still solid; you
couldn't have thrown a couply crappy singles
onto an otherwise great album?
GT: Then we wouldn't have had those *three* hit
singles, and an album in the same vein as those
singles to keep the easy listening crowd happy
with.  To put it bluntly, we decided to sell
out.
COB: I see.  And four years later, on Promised
Land...that was horrible, Geoff.  It didn't
have any of Empire's redeeming qualities.
GT: No, it didn't.  With the grunge movement
picking up, EMI wanted something even mellower
than Empire.  We spent a lot of time listening
to Fates Warning's Parallels album, saying, "We
could do something like like!"  We were almost
done with the album when we heard an advance
copy of Inside Out, and said, "Yeah, we can do
something like this!"  Unfotunately, it just
didn't make it onto tape that way and what we
recorded that year was an unlistenable,
coma-inducing turd.
COB: Hear in the New Frontier...A marginal
improvement, but still pretty awful, don't you
think?
GT: Oh, absolutely.  We threw "Sign of the Times"

out as a bone to our ex-fans; it sounded good
compared to the rest of our crap; but the rest of
HITNF was more of the same drivel.

They used to be good... (sniff)

COB: When Chris DeGarmo left, I thought maybe
he had been the problem.
GT: Yeah, you'd think, wouldn't ya?  But when he
joined Jerry Cantrel...
COB: Yeah!  I thought wrong...
GT: Exactly.  Chris just wanted to suck on his
own terms, I guess.  We certainly don't need
each other's help to do that.
COB: Q2K certainly proved that.
GT: Oh man, did it ever!  I mean...well, okay, we
suck, there, I said it!  Really, nothing we've
done post-Mindcrime is worth the powder to blow
it to hell.  God, we suck!  But judging from what
Jim Matheos is saying on the net, the new Fates

album is looking like it'll continue to make up
for our complete, utter, abysmal failure over the
last ten years.  Fates Warning kicked off their
"modern era" only a year before we descended into
musical hell; it's almost like they replaced us!
COB: Yeah, but you guys somehow manage to sell
more records than they do.
GT: Yeah...There is no justice, is there?

ACTUNG!: What you just read is BULLSHIT!!! I made it up! Muchas gracias, merci boku,
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