Queensryche - Operation: Mindcrime
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Free Music Notes for Operation: Mindcrime
Free Music Review: Queensryche's classic third full length album proves to be the masterpiece it is
Hit: 5 Stars
Seattle based hard rockers Queensryche's third album Operation: Mindcrime was released in April of 1988.
The prog-tinged metal quintet, which comprised of lead singer Geoff Tate, guitarists Chris DeGarmo and Michael Wilton, bass player Eddie Jackson and drummer Scott Rockenfield, had released a modest receives self-titled EP and two full length albums(their classic debut The Warning and the equally impressive Rage For Order) which tanked. Despite opening up for great bands like AC/DC, KISS, Iron Maiden and trash like Ratt and Bon Jovi, commercial success ignored Queensryche until Operation Mindcrime.
Operation: Mindcrime was a concept album, in the vain of other classic concept albums like Pink Floyd's The Wall and The Who's Tommy. Mindcrime tells the story of an anarchist named Nikki whose disillusionment with Reagan-era American society leads him to join a shadowy plot to assassinate corrupt leaders.
I Remember Now begins the album in a hospital ward where Nikki after a pain shot from a nurse who calls him an obscenity and recalls the recent rash of murders he may or may not have committed at the request of Doctor X. Anarchy-X is next and is a killer overture to the album. Revolution Calling gets more into the nitty gritty of our anti-hero Nikki, a psychotic, cynical individual who was recruited and brainwashed by the infamous Dr. X who was a power crazed evangelical preacher, leader of 'The Order', to be his personal assassin. The title track is next and has Nikki addicted to drugs and brainwashed by Dr. X. Next is Speak which is a driving rocker which sends Nikki first out to kill an unnamed corrupt politician. Spreading the Disease is next and is about Mary, a prostitute, whom Nikki tries to save by getting a priest to take her off the streets. This track rocks. The Mission is next and is possibly DeGarmo's best track he ever wrote himself for Queensryche and professed Nikki's love for Mary.
The second half of the album opens with the epic Suite Sister Mary which opens with Dr. X ordering Nikki to go out and kill Mary and the priest after which the track opens with a solo melodic guitar and a Choir which goes on to accompany Tate throughout the song. The number is a wonderful confluence of rock/metal and opera with Pamela Moore singing superbly the role of Mary. Next is another killer rocker The Needle Lies which was about Nikki's love for drugs turning bad. Electric Requiem is next and is the track which has Nikki discover his beloved Mary had been murdered. Breaking the Silence is next and has Nikki seeing and hearing Mary in his head and a great rocker. I Don't Believe in Love is next and is a great rocker which had our character Nikki deny his love for Mary because he cannot face the fact that she died. This track was a major hit on rock radio. Waiting For 22 is a great instrumental with some great guitar work from DeGarmo. My Empty Room is next and has our anti-hero Nikki wondering about what has become of him and what he will do. The album ends with Queensryche's first big rock radio smash Eyes of a Stranger. This track is a great song and what a way to end the album. Some think Nikki dreamed this and some thought he committed suicide but we wouldn't find out his fate until 2006's Operation:Mindcrime II.
The original Operation: Mindcrime peaked at #50 in 1989 and gave Queensryche their first US Gold album(eventually Platinum).
In 2003, the album was re-released in a digitally remastered version with two bonus tracks which were a live version of The Mission recorded in 1990 at The Hammersmith Odeon, London and My Empty Room recorded in October of 1994 in London.
RECOMMENDED!
Free Music Review: One of the Greatest Concept Albums Ever
Hit: 5 Stars
On every album up until this point, Queensryche has evolved. Starting out as a fantasy metal band, progressive tendencies were slowly added to their sound over the next five years. Now Queensryche has emerged as a "thinking man's metal" band with a concept album. A concept album is an album where each of the songs plays a part to tell a story, dictated over the entire album. Queensryche's sound is most accurately described as a mix between Pink Floyd and Iron Maiden.
The storyline is about a man who has had enough of governmental conspiracy and corruption. He joins and is later brainwashed by a cult that kills off different leaders from the era. He and his partner, a nun who was formerly a prostitute, work together to do what they think will make the world a better place. They receive orders to kill off people and the partners are successful, but the man is eventually asked to kill his partner as a final test of faith. He refuses, and you will have to listen to the rest of the album to find out how the album plays out. Many emotions are explored, including anger, disgust, deceit, and there's even a love story sprinkled in.
What makes this album's songs different from other concept albums' songs is the amount of full songs. There are several instrumentals, but they serve as introductions to the following songs. After a spoken intro where the man recalls his story, the album goes into "Anarchy X/Revolution Calling," and then "Operation Mindcrime" for a strong beginning to the album. Next comes "Speak," and "Spreading the Disease" both with strong choruses and great vocal harmonies by Geoff Tate. "The Mission" starts out slow and quiet, then "BAM!" it quickly picks up and is another great song, with an unforgettable chorus. "Suite Sister Mary" is decent but goes on too long. "Breaking the Silence" is one of the album's best songs, with more great vocal harmonies by Tate. "I Don't Believe in Love" was the big single off of the album, which received significant airplay on MTV. "Eyes of a Stranger" is one of Queensryche's best songs ever. Tate delivers a great performance and this is the highlight of the album, you can really hear the influence of Pink Floyd on the solo. The bonus tracks are disappointing though. Although a live version of "The Mission" is nice, why would they include a live version of "My Empty Room?" All it is are some screamed vocals and a clock in the background. That second bonus track is disappointing, but the remastering for the album is excellent.
In case you didn't figure it out before, Tate does an outstanding job on vocals with great harmonies in every song, it is incredible the way he his vocals can add so much emotion to each song. DeGarmo's solos are just icing on the cake, although I do have a problem about the way that they sound; it isn't the clean metallic guitar heard on "Empire," but I do not know enough about guitars to understand what may have caused this. I have to say that this is one of the greatest concept albums of all time, but the group, Savatage, probably holds the greatest one (they actually have several really good ones). If you liked the concept part of this album, check them out.
Free Music Review: Flawless
Hit: 5 Stars
If you have never listened to QueensRyche this is probably the CD for you.
The entire CD is great listening that flows with conceptual brilliance. Every track bursts with truly great hard rock and an influential storyline that progresses the CD to the very end. Now I haven't listened to very much
progressive rock myself but this is most likely one of, if not the best in the genre.
The CD starts off with a man in a hospital trying to remember how he arrived there and why. Now I can write a short description of how every track on the disk is incredible, but I feel the best way to interpret them is to listen for yourself; you want be dissatisfied.
QueensRyche is an amazing band. So much different from the other bands that came out of the same era. If you ever see them reperforming Mindcrime anywhere(its only happened once), go and see it. To actually hear this CD live is something.
This is arguably their best CD but there are a few others worth a mention. The warning, Rage for order and Empire. The other CDs that were released weren't nearly as powerful as the ones that I have listed. Which is great considering that most of the bands today would be greatfull to recieve the accolade of one great CD. The only thing that I can list as a negative is the fact you cant just listen to one track at a time. No, no,...NOOOO!!! You must listen to them all.
[MTV Rocks]
Even though you have written something so blatantly stupid that should not elicit any kind of rational response from anyone, it appears that you really do deserve it and so will receive a taste from me as well.
First: The review name MTV Rocks: Actually MTV doesn't rock and hasn't for quite some time. Just an empty shell of a great idea that is now more focused on making as much money as they possibly can off of the current(yeah it didn't used to be this way) ignorance of american youth.
Seriously guys grow up and gain some perspective on your own.
Second: Your comparing apples and oranges, but since you opened up the door for this I'll slam it in your face.
You picked one the most unimaginative artists of our day as your mode of comparison. Unlike QueensRyche Usher
in no way stands out from the group. So is the way of most of today's rap. They seem to just lack the original thought
and sound of the NWA artist's of old. Honestly im sick of hearing the newer rap. It really does sound like the same
junk in a different package. Not creative at all.
Third: QueensRyche still gets played and hey their still cutting tracks. After 23 years from their original debut that's not bad. Pretty sure Usher wont be able to say the same thing in the following years. Im pretty sure that Usher as uncreative as he is, couldn't create a hand bag to carry his BS in.
Fourth: Dude learn how to type or spell. Gees! There isn't a line one in the "review" that doesnt contain some sort of typo.
Free Music Review: One of my all time Favorites!!
Hit: 5 Stars
It's always fascinated me when "stuffy" rock journalists criticize Concept albums. In my opinion a good Concept album is even more difficult to create than a "normal" album simply because it requires a coherent story line. And a good concept album is closer to pure art than a normal album because it can be readily turned into a book, play or even a movie (think of Pink Floyd's "The Wall" or The Who's "Tommy").
And I think "Operation Mindcrime" is one of the best, not quite up there with "The Wall" but I personally like it even more than "Tommy" simply because it's more "my kind of music". Tommy, after all, is really rock Opera and I don't really like Opera!!! In fact I don't like a lot of sides 3 & 4 of The Wall either, for the same reason. Mindcrime is not just pure rock, it's really good progressive influenced Heavy Metal!!!
And many of the songs also stand alone just fine, "Eyes of a Stranger" is my personal favorite and one of my all time favorite songs period. "Revolution Calling", the title track, "The Needle Lies", "I Don't Believe In Love" and the center piece; "Suite Sister Mary" are also standouts.
In fact, this was turned into a "movie" which was really more of a collection of MTV styled videos, which, unfortunately, is missing some songs (guess they had a limited budget and decided to spend it on quality rather than make videos for every single song) but the story still flows well. This came out on VHS before the "Operation Livecrime" box set, a couple of the videos were shown on MTV at the time and I have never seen a DVD of it, though they did release "Livecrime" on DVD.
As for the band, I have always thought Scott Rockenfield is one of THE great overlooked drummers and Chris DeGarmo is sadly missed and his absence (especially his compositional skills) had a very apparent effect on the band as a whole. And Geoff Tate has one of THE great voices in rock PERIOD.
The band also released a companion follow-up, "Operation Mindcrime II" in 2006 and I have seen a lot of criticism of it because it's not as good. Well, come on folks, how could it be?!? I personally feel it IS a worthy companion to this original. Even if it's not as good as the original, it's still better than a lot of the stuff out there masquerading as prog-metal!! So I would tell anyone who does like this original to shell out a few $$ for a used version of the new one.
Bottom line, if you like rock at all, in any form, you should already own this album!!!
Free Music Review: As good as its reputation.
Hit: 5 Stars
Widely regarded as the band's masterpiece, "Operation: Mindcrime" was a rather bold undertaking-- following in the footsteps of The Who's "Tommy" and Pink Floyd's "The Wall", Queensryche assembled a concept album about a disillusionment and revolution, with a healthy dose of tragic love in there for good measure. Like Pink Floyd's "The Wall", the greatest moments in Mindcrime are not when the narrative is served, but rather when the pieces take on a universal quality, when the protagonist is clearly someone whose shoes we have worn. All of us have been disgusted with big business, all of us have loved and lost. Admittedly, most of us don't end up as assassins for cult leaders, but noentheless, there's a resonance here that's hard to capture.
Musically, its really a culmination of what's come before-- "Rage For Order" clearly points the way to this one, but this time the progressive elements and the seemingly endless styles mesh much better with the base metal form the band works within. Admittedly, parts of it do sound a bit dated (the title track being the best example), but there's a real timeless quality to much of the music here.
Highlights are numerous here, certainly the opus "Suite Sister Mary", ten minutes plus of orchestral rock with chanting choirs, moody guitars, and a passion filled duet vocal became singer Geoff Tate and guest Pamela Moore is pretty central, and there's quite a bit of powerful metal pieces ("Revolution Calling", "The Mission", "The Needle Lies") that exceed the quality of similar songs on past releases, but its odd little moments on the album that really shine-- "My Empty Room" foremost on this. An odd melancholy song, haunted, horrifying, and totally bizarre and unprecedented in the band's material.
For the remaster, the sound is somewhat improved and is crisp and distinct. The album is augmented (in my opinion to its detraction-- I prefer the album as a statement unto itself) by two live tracks, a great take of "The Mission" from 1990 and a rerecording of the rearrangement of "My Empty Room" the band played on the "Promised Land" tour in 1994. The latter is definitely well worth having as it really is quite inventive and creative.
This is one of the masterpieces of the metal genre and cemented Queensryche's reputation. While I personally find "Promised Land" to be a superior album (for reasons of personal taste), this is a superb record, a great place to begin exploring the band's catalog, and essential listening.