thePULSEQueensryche – American Soldier
By Mary Ouellette
Queensryche, the quintessential kings of concept albums, return with their latest work of art ~ American Soldier. The album takes you on a rollercoaster ride of the up close and personal and sometimes gut-wrenching perspectives of our American heroes, the veterans of war. Born on a base in Germany and growing up in a military family, lead singer and songwriter Geoff Tate had never heard his father talk about life in the armed forces. It wasn’t until he was in his seventies that his father was able to open up to him about his experiences; when he finally did, it was the initiating factor for American Solider.
Having always written from a personal perspective, the band was presented with an entirely new challenge with American Soldier ~ telling someone else’s story. In order to accomplish this, Tate reached out to veterans spanning from World War II to present day Iraq, interviewing them about their stories, hardships and struggles ~ a process that was both eye-opening and inspiring. “One of the things I realized right off in talking with various soldiers was that I was coming at it from a platform of complete ignorance. I’ve never been a soldier. I’ve never been in war. I’ve never had a gun pointed in my face. I’ve never had to react. I’ve never had to defend my country, so I didn’t know anything about it” said Tate. “All of these songs are about other people and I was merely acting as a biographer for the first time.”
From the start, Tate wanted to ensure one thing, that the message was not a political one. “I think one of the things that we often fall victim to in our culture is speculation. We speculate about everything, even things we don’t know about. I didn’t want to be in that position. I wanted to explore the actual real events and the real effects of war. I was really looking for commonalities in the experiences of the soldiers, and once I found those commonalities then that’s what I focused on as far as making a story out of it.”
From the opening track “Sliver,” which starts out where a lot of soldiers do, boot camp, to “At 30,000 Ft,” a song fittingly about a pilot’s experience from the air, the album resonates throughout and takes the listener through a broad range of emotions from sadness to pride to overwhelming gratitude. On one of the more touching tracks, “Home Again,” Tate shares lead vocal duties with his ten year old daughter on a song inspired by a soldier’s letters to those back home while he was at war.
According to Tate, this album is a dedication to the soldiers. “If anything I would like this record to be for them, so they can realize that when they are far away from their homes and their families that this is an album about them and they might find some strength in it by listening to these stories and feel connected in some way, knowing that they’re not there alone, that someone understands what they’re going through.”
www.queensryche.com and www.myspace.com/queensryche
Unholy – New Life Behind Closed Eyes
By Jillian Locke, Music Editor
Something that I absolutely love to discover is similarities between like, yet not-so-like things. Take for instance these three bands, which could not be more different: Century, Cattle Decapitation, and Unholy. The first band is straight-up, intelligent metalcore, the next is the musical embodiment of a doomsday army, and the third is a brutal metal band from upstate New York. Yeah, they all play extreme music, but it’s the themes that run through their music that is the real tie that binds.
Century’s 2008 Prosthetic Records release Black Ocean is a concept album that paints a gruesome picture of a savage, unforgiving afterlife of pain, mutilation, cannibalism, and man finally becoming the hunted. Cattle Decapitation’s 2009 Metal Blade release The Harvest Floor focuses on man being the ultimate evil as we’re lead to the chopping block, just like the animals on which we indiscriminately feast. Now Unholy, who is currently touring for their 2009 Prosthetic Records release New Life Behind Closed Eyes, takes all of these themes and injects them with a furious, super-powered, consistently bruesome (brutal + gruesome) delivery; the kind that makes you smile that “this is sick as hell” smile when you hear something new and unabashedly awesome.
This 10 track package of complete pummelage boasts gallops that harkens to likes of Unearth, vocals that echo the energy and passion of Machine Head, and serious lickage and poundage that call to mind early Pantera. The melodies are super catchy yet complex; the breakdowns are enough to get any kid to throw down in the most death-defying pit, and the delivery and content of the lyrics is enough to snag the attention of anyone who shares a similar putrid distaste for the plague that is humanity and the raping and pillaging of this planet that has so graciously hosted us. Unholy isn’t necessarily doing anything new; what they are doing, however, is spreading an epic message supported by bombastic force and fierce passion.
Unholy has the appearance of a hardcore band, which is mostly due to the hulking, tough-guy build of vocalist Billy Price, but they dominate the metal stage, and with the help of founder/guitarist Jonathan Dennison, bassist Gary Mann, guitarist Steve Caiello, and drummer Andy Miller, will continue to do so until the end of the summer. They’ll be touching down at Rocko’s in Manchester, NH, alongside Evergreen Terrace, Cruel Hand, and The Acacia Strain on July 30th. Be there to witness a very personal, very brutal awakening, courtesy of Unholy.
