The night owl sat silently on the grotesque gargoyle statue on top of Count Buzum's God-forgotten tower. The smell of dried out human blood had now become quite annoying, causing desperate grins of disgust and repulsion. Filled with fear, we started holding hands just like 2 EMO kids at an As I Lay Dying concert... Oops, for a moment I thought I was writing the intro to some novel titled The EMO Chainsaw Massacre... I'm afraid I'll have to spoil the fun mood I was in and try to be serious for a while here. This is actually the live report on Queensryche's third visit to Greece in just 3 years.

First time I ever saw Queensryche perform live was in 2004 at (the usual) Rockwave Festival in Greece, along with the reunited Gods of Metal Judas Priest and other bands like W.A.S.P., Nightwish etc. Good times; I got to see Queensryche perform the entire Operation: Mindcrime album live back then, which was a tremendous relief after all the crap (in my humble opinion) this band's been about ever after their fairly good Empire album. A mere example of my overall disappointment with this band is the fact that when they came to Greece for the first time, I simply didn't go. Why? Because they were touring in support of the utterly crapola Tribe release and yeah, as you may have correctly guessed, I had better things to do (like do the dishes, soap the shit-hole, take my imaginary hamster Poopsie out for a walk etc...) and I rather spent my money on the next day's Whitesnake concert (which ruled, but that's another story anyway).

A couple of years went by and Queensryche decided to pay tribute to their roots by releasing the sequel to the monumental Operation: Mindcrime, which reasons of this specific move still remain the source for endless discussion amongst metalheads (some say that it was due to the band's gradually declining course, sales wise, from the early 90's and up to now). I won't turn this report into an analysis of why Geoff Tate might have decided to do this (the REAL reasons), I'll only say that I think Operation: Mindcrime 2 is the band's best effort in the last 15 or so years but that doesn't automatically slate it as anything even close to a masterpiece (like the first album was).

The gig on June 14th was initially set to take place at Rockwave Festival's usual grounds, Terravibe, which to tell you the truth kills the mood of wanting to go see any band out there, unless it's a really major act, since it's long drive out of Athens and well... I don't even own a driver's license for a skateboard (...). So, I wasn't really looking forward to seeing this concert just because of the distance (and me having to find a way to get to Terravibe) and because - yup - I OF COURSE had better things to do (and yes, this time even better than taking Poopsie out for a walk, trust me). Thus one of my dear partners in crime here at the magazine, Michael, was assigned with the dirty job but... unfortunately he got syphilis after having sex with an orangutan and died just a day before the concert so I had to fill in for him. Thankfully, good news came when the concert promoters decided to change venue for the concert after the *predictably* low pre-sales of this particular gig (you don't bring Queensryche to a tiny country like Greece and have them play a show all on their own at a venue that takes up to 28,000 people when the grandiose Black Sabbath along with 3 more bands didn't manage to surpass 20,000... you just don't, unless it's AC_DC).

We headed down to the Gagarin 205 club, on a cool June evening and went straight into the venue which was fairly packed with more or less 1,200 Queensryche fans. Now THAT looked more appropriate (imagine what 1,200 people would look like in an area meant for attendances at least ten times bigger - which reminds me of a Megadeth concert we once attended where there were 1,800 people at a venue built for 10,000...) for this sort of concert (not meaning of course that I don't want to see bands like Queensryche attract more people to their shows; on the contrary) and we took our spot among the cheerfully anticipating crowd.

With a slight delay, Geoff Tate and Co. as well as exceptional female vocalist Pamela Moore, hit the stage with a set that comprised of (mainly) songs from the first Operation: Mindcrime and the sequel. Therefore the show was split in two halfs in order for the whole concept to unfold and make sense. The first half was my (and most likely everyone else's too) favorite part of the show. Comprised of such hit songs like Revolution Calling, Spreading The Disease, I Don't Believe In Love, Suite Sister Mary (!!!), The Needle Lies, Breaking The Silence and Operation: Mindcrime, a happy Gagarin 205 crowd sung along and jumped up and down endlessly, throwing devil horns in the air while headbanging (well, not all of that at the same time...). Here I should mention that I was quite impressed by Tate's voice this time, compared to his really mediocre vocal performance back in 2004. Still... Pamela Moore's voice was the star of the night.

The lady (wore black, ahem, actually white) is always stunningly awesome, performing her parts in the songs at top notch! So, if this was a battle of the vocal chords, I'm afraid Moore would have beaten Tate with no sweat (but it's not a battle of the vocal chords, let alone any sort of battle apart from us battling to get a clear view of the stage). The theatrics (yes, this tour included some theatrics to go with the story) were simple but to the point, yet Tate and Moore were more than enough to keep a satisfied eye on when it came to drama so anything extra would probably seem too God damn much! to me (nope, I'm not a fan of musicals, I never really liked The Sound Of Music ...).

The second part of the show featured songs off the sequel. Well, the venue might have not been jumping up and down in its entirety; still, there was a good amount of metalheads who knew the new songs and enjoyed this more than the rest. By the time we were into the second half of the show, the PA had managed to elevate the sound quality a bit which was slightly mediocre during the first part. Oh, I also got to see live one of my favorite tracks off the sequel, If I Could Change It All. I actually think I like the new songs more live than on the CD...

After a total of 90 minutes of both sets (with the 2nd one ending in a gladly received Eyes Of A Stranger), it was time for a small encore. Unfortunately Jet City Woman and Empire were not enough for the noticeably hungry-for-more crowd which stood there insisting for another encore. I personally haven't seen such a demand for more in a long time and I felt the crowd absolutely deserved at least 1-2 more songs. But, you know how some bands are (I won't buy shitty excuses like the band hadn't rehearsed any other songs or they were too tired). The fans make bands who they are. Yes, the bands are the creative source of all this but without the dough, you don't get any further than your local pub. All I want to say is, a little more appreciation and obvious respect for the fans wouldn't hurt anyone. Oh well...

Overall, performance wise, this was the best Queensryche concert I've ever seen, the sound quality was good but could have been better, Pamela Moore rules, there still is no Chris DeGarmo yet Mike Stone is a fine guitarist and I hope the band decides to extend its setlist a bit in the near future.

Queensryche setlist:

Operation: Mindcrime
01. Intro / Revolution Calling
02. Operation: Mindcrime
03. Spreading The Disease
04. Suite Sister Mary
05. The Needle Lies
06. Breaking The Silence
07. I Don't Believe In Love

Operation: Mindcrime 2
08. I'm American
09. One Foot In Hell
10. Hostage
11. The Hands
12. Signs Say Go
13. A Murderer
14. If I Could Change It All
15. An International Confrontation
16. Eyes Of A Stranger

Encore:

17. Jet City Woman
18. Empire

Special Thanks: Terry - for being there (and for the photos, of course!).