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spl140's Reviews

Frequency Unknown [CD]

Customer Rating

Not Queensryche - Read On

on June 28, 2013

Posted by: spl140

from Mass

As a consumer you need to know what you are purchasing. In 2012,

Geoff Tate, the iconic vocalist for the band Queensryche, was fired from the band - there is plenty of dirt online you can dig up to figure out how this came to a head. But the long and short is that Geoff took his former band to court to stop them from continuing on as QR until the 'who owns the rights' issues were dealt with in court. His injunction was denied, but the judge did not specifically state that Geoff could not form his own version of the band and also tour, so that is what Geoff did. His former band filed a similar injunction, it also was denied, with everything to be hashed out in November 2013 as to who gets to keep the name, and how much the other party would be bought out for.

So we have two Queensryches, the original with 3 original founding members and a new vocalist, and Geoff's version, made up of members of his former solo band and some 80's namesakes, or depending on the schedule, fill in bassists and drummers.

Geoff has since Operation Mindcrime 2 forged a working relationship with Jason Slater, whose job it is to produce songs, completed songs, for Geoff to write lyrics and sing vocals over. Jason has been doing this since OM2, and where some songs are written for these releases, some songs are unfinished but complete demos that were never used, and some songs were fully produced songs for his own band and other bands, reworked with new lyrics to create these 'new' QR songs. Again, there is plenty of history online on all of this stuff if you have a day to read up.

So for Frequency Unknown, Jason is back engineering and has contributed the most on the songwriting end. In addition, Geoff has brought in other writers, notably Lucas Rossi (former Rockstar: Supernova winner) for the lead track 'Cold'. There is one song penned by his long time keyboardist Randy Gane, a song penned by Martin Irigoyen and a song penned by Chris Cox, those latter two I have never heard of. The issue here is that you have songs coming from different collaboration groups, the only consistent thing being Geoff, so these songs among themselves do not sound like each other. The song 'Dare' for instance is a song that Jason Slater wrote, recorded and produced for a project called Revenge of the Triads, called 'Serve' - on his personal website to go listen to and compare (also interesting as you can find tracks that made their way onto American Soldier and Dedicated to Chaos). This is part the issue with this album, consistency from song to song, there just isn't enough cohesiveness to make you feel like all these songs were recorded as a band.

And that is the other issue, because although it says Queensryche on the front of this disc, this is the farthest from a band effort as it could be, and it is heard. Aside from songs written by different people in different ways and styles, every song is recorded by a different assembly of musicians. Session musicians and guest musicians, in addition to the touring band that Geoff is promoting as his Queensryche, are what you hear on this album. You can look at the Wikipedia page to get the specifics, but all in all, you have 11 guitarists, 4 bassists, 4 drummers, 2 keyboardists, and in addition to Tate on vocal, 3 additional people singing background vocals. You have vast differences in playing styles, so you add that to songs written by others, and the whole album is all over the place. The only consistent thing is Geoff. While people say 'this is a Geoff solo record'...it really is, because usually a solo record will allow a singer to explore many different styles and work with many different players.

My biggest issue with this record is that it, to me, does not sound like Queensryche, and for me there are two defining eras of this band: the era where writing was done as a band, and the era where Geoff ran the ship with outside collaborators. So figure EP through Tribe as the first era, and OM2 through DTC as the second era. If you listen to any track from the first era, then any track from FU, it sounds like two different bands. If you listen to any track from the second era, which in theory it should sound more like FU, and then listen to a track from FU, it still does not sound like the same band...part of that probably being that although the second era was dominated by outside collaborators, the goal was always to write stuff that the original band would play. With FU, that is not a consideration.

Also, where Geoff now appears to write lyrics over complete songs, he lyric writing and vocal delivery has changed, he is not singing the same as he did back in the day. And no, diminished vocal range was never an issue for me with Geoff.

So as a consumer, look at what brought you to Queensryche in the first place. If it was Geoff, and only Geoff, then you might like this album. If it was the music from those early releases, then you most likely will wonder what you just bought. Understand that if you were a fan of the band, that band doesn't exist on this album. If you are a fan of Geoff's current touring band, then they too do not exist as a band on this album, because at no point do they play as a band on this record, even though all members do appear, albeit in some cases very briefly, on this album.

The production...there are also two mixes of this album, and in the second mix, alternate solos and parts were used, so know which you are getting. It hasn't been clear as to what version is shipping out to stores. The remixed version, some say it is slightly better, I think it sounds little cleaner, but it is still far from perfect, and with engineers mixing only one track each, you have a wide range of approaches/mixing styles showing up as well.

If Geoff had done this album as a solo album, I would have rated it higher, as the expectation of buying the record would not be that of a band. But QR is such an iconic name, and while many casual fans may not be aware Geoff is out of the original band, many may not know that Geoff's band does not have Eddie Jackson, Michael Wilton and Scott Rockenfield in it, and for them they may be the reason to buy a QR album, more than Geoff. Geoff has been purposely ambiguous around details of who is on this album, so when a casual fan of QR goes into the store and see a new album, he/she will pick it up having no idea who is on that album. Imagine if you picked up the new Black Sabbath album, and found out that Ozzy was the only original member on it, yet it was still being caused Black Sabbath?

Some bands have always done the rotating cast of characters, with the front man being the only constant. That front man usually ensures there is a sound maintained by the members he brings in. Geoff has not done this with this record, has gone on record to dismiss any notion of a 'Queensryche sound', and has called bands that try and maintain a sound and image as being stuck in the past. But there was a sound, it was how the majority of fans came to like this band, and why when those albums drifted further and further away from that sound, the album sales suffered, the shows got smaller and smaller.

You may very well like this album. I did listen to it, and there was nothing I could grab onto musically, nothing to my ears that reminded me of Queensryche. I own and was not a fan of Geoff's first solo record, but at least that was a calculated departure, his own thing, an honest record. Geoff's last solo effort sounded more in line with Dedicated to Chaos, and this record, done out of spite at his former band, was done with a few key purposes: be heavy (because that is allegedly what the fans wanted) and be first (which is why it took a month to record, couple weeks to mix, additional couple of weeks to fix). I think artistry was a second thought on this album, that it was more important for him to have an album out for the November court date. Had this been a solo effort, it would have rated higher. Had this album at least been recorded by the touring band, I would have at least given that to Geoff. As it is, the band just started playing the lead single (released in March/April) this month (June) 'Cold' live, because it took them this long to learn the song, because they were not the band to record this.

As far as the re-records, know this: Martin Irigoyen did all the instruments...guitars sound direct, drums sound like drum machines or electric/programmed. All background vocals are done by Geoff's daughters. These four songs were what solidified his record deal, as the record company has already sliced them off into a Silent Lucidity greatest hits EP. They are terrible, and for the same cost to buy this electronic EP, you can buy the originals. Listen for yourself, they are a shadow of what the originals were, and calling him singing plus one session guy 'Queensryche' is shameful.

Judge the music for yourself, I tried to be fairly objective on the circumstances around this album, but I make no bones about not liking what I heard and my reasons why.

What's not so great: Geoff Tate with outside collaborators and musicians

No, I would not recommend this to a friend.

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