McIver - Queens of the Stone Age : No One Knows

Copyright 2005 Omnibus Press
This edition 2015 Omnibus Press
(A Division of Music Sales Limited, 14-15 Berners Street, London W1T 3LJ)

EISBN: 978-1-78323-393-9

Front cover photo courtesy of Garret Doyle.
Back cover photo courtesy of Ross Halfin.

The Author hereby asserts his / her right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with Sections 77 to 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages.

Every effort has been made to trace the copyright holders of the photographs in this book, but one or two were unreachable. We would be grateful if the photographers concerned would contact us.

A catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library.

For all your musical needs including instruments, sheet music and accessories, visit www.musicroom.com

For on-demand sheet music straight to your home printer, visit www.sheetmusicdirect.com

This book is dedicated to Dimebag Darrell Abbott.

He told me, When people try to tell you what to do tell em Fuck you!

When I was asked to write this foreword, my first reaction was that of inherent but mostly been-through-it horror. Not another writer trying to vicariously rock by frotting with the pill-iratti of rockn rolls new white dope, that title belonging to rocks new figureheads, old vanguards of the new melodious heavy scree-rock sonata, Queens Of The Stone Age in futile hope that some of the toxic sweat emanating from the pores of their double-coil AA anti-average charged battery-acid attitude will rub off on them and their calloused elbows.

The horror was ephemeral. While the authors elbows remain intact, the bands fingers drip a blistering concoction of astro-arcane, acid-rain strain of music that seethes with the feeling that we arent the only ones around that feel the world is but a stage and we are all (guitar) players. I was lucky enough to hold court while touring with Kyuss, now the present members of Queens it was a royal gas. Literally. Your Highness got lit, pilot-light sky-stylie freak-kite-flying nightly. Hardly anything done light or quietly. Extremely fun-duh-mental. Visceral and true.

The exceptional excel, and the Queens are no exception to the powers of high-frequency reception innovation. They are fresh yet hauntingly familiar, like a black cat straight from the muse-magicians hat. True, they play crop circles around the field of electricity that surrounds and grounds them. Electro-magnetic hyperkinetic-phrenetic. They are monster musicians.

The feeling I get when treating my earholes to Queens Of The Stone Age is like finding a perfectly preserved ancient buttercup stem, made from the heaviest gauge of steel, hiding behind the mouldiest of old cuneiform-encrusted sarcophagi, filled with myriad virtual musical notes shimmering inside, and in that high C moment I remember what it is that I had forgotten about anyway. A dose will do ya. Its the good shit. Not for the vacuous among us. Their music spirals, ascends into ether world and curls back down, only to collect the remaining sound left resounding under troglodyte ground where we mere mortals await to hear the seers lift us into their rarified-air, sans-silence, add-loudness atmosphere. May we hear their ringing ears clear from over here, have nothing to fear my dears, because as long as the day is stoned, they will continue to manipulate their hedonistic-headphone-phoenix sound, for out of the ashes of those that are Long-Gone stoned, rises a monolithic spectacle to behold (theyre really tall dudes).

Heres to the rulers and perpetual reign of the masters of overground. Their Sky Pilots crown finally stripped from that Gratefully Dead old head.

Them Kings is dead. Long live the Queens.

Kat Bjelland, 2005
Babes In Toyland, Katastrophy Wife

Emma, Alice, Tom, Robin and Kate, Dad, John and Jen, Carlos Anaia, David Barraclough, Scott Bartlett, Jacqui Black, Max and Gloria Cavalera, Chris Charlesworth, Dave Clarke, Ben Cooper, Joe Daly, Chris Dixon, Helen Donlon, John Doran, Jason Draper, Mark Eglinton, David Ellefson, Ciaran Fahy, Marty Friedman, Lisa Gallagher, Matthew Hamilton, Gemma Hill, Bill Irwin, Michelle Kerr, Tina Korhonen, Borivoj Krgin, Guy Little, Rachel Mann, Patrizia Mazzuocolo, Alex Milas, Eugenio Monti, Bob Nalbandian, Martin Popoff, Scott Reeder, Ralph Santolla, Jonathan Selzer, Kirsten Sprinks, Wes Stanton, Dan Travis, Mick Wall, Alex Webster, Chris Williams, the staff of Bass Guitar Magazine and the families Alderman, Arnold, Bhardwaj, Bowles, Cadette, Edwards, Fraser, Freed, Harrington, Herbert Jones, Hogben, Jolliffe, Knight, Lamond, Lamont Skeens, Legerton, Leim, Mathieson Spires, Mendona, Metcalfe, Miles, Parr, Storey and Woollard, the many journalists in the UK and abroad who interview me and review my books, and of course the visitors to www.joelmciver.co.uk and www.facebook.com/joelmciver and followers at @joelmciver.

T HE first edition of this book was published in 2005, at least 10 years ago as you read this, which is an eon in rock time. Nowadays, bands come and go with ever-increasing frequency, at least partly because the music business has been starved of cash for a decade or so and theres not enough money to go round. Fortunately, Queens Of The Stone Age, now almost 20 years in business, got in before the cash dried up and, although times are hard for them as there are for everyone in this strangest of industries, built a foundation of solid albums before iTunes and CD burners were widely available. Theyre still touring the globe and playing the worlds biggest festivals, shedding a member here and there as they go, but managing to outface more or less all of the problems that have beset them along the way.

These have on occasion been serious: founder Josh Homme, the Queens leader, came close to death after a botched knee operation in 2011, and a band comprising members of Hommes former band Kyuss led him to take legal action. And yet the musicians bounced back to new heights, with the creation of the supergroup Them Crooked Vultures one of their recent achievements. How and why QOTSA have so far failed to succumb to the pitfalls which have taken down so many of their contemporaries is one of the major themes explored in this book. This is a band of fighters. Enjoy their story.

Joel McIver, 2014
www.joelmciver.co.uk

P ALM Desert is where wealthy, sun-worshipping Californians go to die.

A two-hour drive from Los Angeles, the Coachella Valley town (population circa 42,000) is surrounded by desert and started life as a community of Agua Caliente native Americans, who had been living there for over 2,000 years before the US government arrived in 1853. The authorities brought with them law, order, civic amenities and also smallpox, which wiped out most of the Agua Calientes a decade later. Generously, the officials handed out parcels of land as a consolation prize of sorts, although the recipients werent permitted to sell the land they were given. By 1890 a few white people were living in Palm Desert, with hotels, railroads and a business infrastructure springing up in their wake. The fearsome heat that envelops the town didnt put anyone off for long.

A century later Palm Desert had seen a fair bit of life come and go: President Eisenhowers Equalization Law of 1959 enabled the Agua Calientes to make money out of their land thus shifting economic power more squarely across the community and more than a few Hollywood legends and visiting royalty from Europe had made homes there. A stint as a training ground for troops in World War II led to the construction of an airfield in nearby Palm Springs, which a couple of decades later had become Palm Springs International Airport. With the lush environment of the desert and the nearby Joshua Tree National Park, which offers visitors the chance to see some of the most awe-inspiring natural beauty in America, tourism boomed and the area is now a popular retirement destination for ageing Los Angelenos who want to spend their autumn years in the countryside. There are casinos, convention centres, celebrity tennis tournaments and plenty to do if youre of a certain age and disposition.