The Verdict
2019 | Metal
“He'll see your good deeds and raise you two rights. -- He'll lose it all just to stay in the fight. -- And if you're still blind sing praise from your knees. -- His heel in your back from once where you stood free. -- Building your walls again and all that remains."
Trivia
- The album hit #16 on the Billboard 200.
- Queensryche formed in 1980 in Bellevue, Washington, out of the local band The Mob.
- Current vocalist Todd La Torre, additionally performed drum parts on the album due to the absence of drummer Scott Rockenfield.
THE HOT TAKES
Luke Tatum
For years, the only Queensryche song I really knew was "Operation: Mindcrime." While that entire album is a trip, (a concept album about political assassination) the song of the same name was all I had heard. In 2019, I was incredibly surprised to see the band resurface with good material, and especially that they have stayed outside the mainstream with their political voice. "Chin up, back straight, don't ask, just hate," are lyrics that remind me of one of the first songs we did this year: Silent Running by Mike and the Mechanics. Queensryche is a bit more aggressive with the message, but it's a story of lost liberty and willful ignorance, and a solid jam to boot.
Sherry Voluntary
"So hail, hail to deathmocracy, hell for your thought crimes, hail to your piety.Oh, the irony, the antidote is the disease, the balancing of ignorance and atrophy. Tear down the walls again, it's more of the same."
This line Hell for your thought crimes, hail to your piety reminds me of the pledge/anthem debate. All those "patriots" who want to murder you for..., oh excuse me, want The State to murder you for not worshiping appropriately, (they generally don't do their own dirty work), will talk about freedom, and rights, and "snowflake libtards" till the cows come home patting themselves on the back the whole time for their reverent virtue, but betraying the very things they believe they hold dear. Most of them don't know anything about making a principled stand on an issue. The founders of these United States that they also worship would find them utterly base and worthless. America was founded on rebellion, these domesticated sad sacks know nothing of independence and freedom. They only want to rule and be ruled, continuing the cycle of abuse of mankind. When you have those who back force, whether it's Republican force, or Democrat force, you can tear down all the walls that you perceive are in the way of freedom, but you just end up with more of the same.
Nicky P
Easily one of my favorite discoveries on this project. I always just assumed these guys were a stupid hair metal band and never bothered with em. If i'd known they were both solid performers and wrote killer political dissections I wold have surely given them more time. This particular song illustrates our subservience to the class who owns us. The politicorporate class. Slowly as you fight they erode away your rights until the only right you have left is to serve. We'ere not quite there yet here but it creeps closer every year as laws are expanded at the behest of people who don't know how to decipher the state from culture and allow themselves to be manipulated.