AOL's Noisecreep recently caught up with QUEENSRŸCHE vocalist Geoff Tate to discuss the 20th Anniversary reissue of the band's classic Empire album. An excerpt is available below.

Q: Is it hard to believe that 20 years have passed since you released 'Empire'?

Tate: "It's strange. Sometimes it seems like it was just yesterday, and sometimes it feels like it was 100 years ago."

Q: The album was more melodic, less progressive and less theme-oriented than 'Operation Mindcrime.' Were you striving to make a more straightforward record?

Tate: "I have to kind of disagree with you on the whole commercial thing. We've always written songs that can be on the radio – and that's the definition of commercial. We have lots of songs like that on every record. Mindcrime had several singles on it. I think the thing with Empire was we had a million-selling record with Mindcrime, and the record company was saying, 'Oh, well we can really score on this if we really sink some money into it.' So they threw millions into promoting 'Empire.' We had TV and all the video outlets, and we made six videos for the album. That's a huge push. If you throw millions and millions of promotional dollars at most anything, you're gonna get some payback, and they definitely got it. The album went triple platinum."

Q: The band entered the creation of Empire coming off the commercial success and heavy touring of Operation Mindcrime. Was that a stressful period for Queensrÿche, or were you enjoying the ride?

Tate: "The Mindcrime tour was a long one and we finished that in '89. The thing I remember the most about writing Empire was being able to be in one place for a long period of time. Being home in Seattle was great. I moved to the middle of the city and bought a boat, and I lived on my boat. And I just soaked up living a normal every day life and catching up on everything. And that's what all the lyrics are about -- relationships and being in one place and observations of living in the city. I was addressing social issues that were prominent at the time that are still timely now, homelessness and environmentalism."

Q: Is that was 'Resistance' is about?

Tate: "'Resistace' was written about protecting the environment. This is a cause I felt connected to when we wrote the song and a cause I still feel strongly about today."

Q: Was everyone in the band getting along when you wrote Empire?

Tate: "Yes, it was a really tight knit group. It still is. Everybody gets along very well. This next August will be our 30th anniversary as a band. It was a good period. We had the beginnings of the green movement -- or at least the resurgence of it from the '60s and early '70s, and I was interested in that."

Go to this location for the complete interview.

Check out a live recording of 'Resistance', taken from Empire, here. It was recorded at London's Hammersmith Odeon on November 15th, 1990.