QUEENSRŸCHE vocalist Geoff Tate is featured in a new interview with Peter Hodgson at the I Heart Guitar Blog. An excerpt from the story is available below:

Queensrÿche have never done what was expected of them. They pioneered progressive metal with the legendary concept album Operation: Mindcrime but followed it up with the pop-metal blockbuster Empire. Then they followed Empire with the dark, moody Promised Land. They finally released a sequel to Operation: Mindcrime in 2006, and followed that up with American Soldier, a heavy, intense journey into to horrors of war, both physical and emotional, culled from interviews with actual returned servicemen. New album Dedicated To Chaos (Roadrunner) is a complete about-face from American Soldier, a rhythm-driven, kaleidoscopic examination of modern attention spans (or the lack thereof).

Drummer Scott Rockenfield and bass player Eddie Jackson kickstarted the direction of the album when they turned in a series of riffs and jams that were a world away from the guitar-driven darkness of American Soldier.

“That’s what makes it interesting and keeps us coming back for more as musicians,” says singer Geoff Tate, down the line at 2am Melbourne time. “In fact, one of the things that drew us together years ago when we first started out was the ability for almost everyone in the band to really communicate their thoughts on music, and to share their musical influences, which are pretty vast. I think if you look at all of our record collections we probably own every record ever made! I personally own seven or eight thousand records!”

Tate says part of the beauty of Queensrÿche is that each member is a capable writer, so the band has the ability to shift the songwriting focus to different combinations of members for particular projects.

“Everyone doesn’t participate equally in records,” he says. “Some people run dry. Some people are more constantly prolific, and other people have their moments. That’s what it’s about, being in a band. You give people room to grow and to change, to do what they’re going to do.”

Click here for the complete interview

Queensrÿche's new album, Dedicated To Chaos, landed at #70 on the Billboard 200, selling 8,000 copies in the US in it's first week of release. It landed at #121 on Canada's Top 200, and at #16 on Canada's Top Hard chart.

Dedicated To Chaos was released via Roadrunner Records/Loud & Proud on June 28th in North America. The tracklist is as follows:

'Get Started'

'Hot Spot Junkie'

'Got It Bad'

'Around The World'

'Higher'

'Retail Therapy'

'At The Edge'

'Broken'

'Hard Times'

'Drive'

'I Believe'

'Luvnu'

'Wot We Do'

'I Take You'

'The Lie'

'Big Noize'