Any thoughts on the new QOTSA album, and the band in general?

[PorkyPrimeCut]

There's been a huge amount of promotion on Facebook & other social media platforms. They really are going for it with the Josh Homme interviews. I even bought tickets for their Berlin date in November.

While it's always good to see a solid band like them releasing new material I'll confess to giving them a rest for quite a while, with the exception of some classics that are on regular rotation in my earphones when I cycle to work.
A couple of tracks off Era Vulgaris kept me mildly interested over the last few years but I didn't listen to a single track off the following 2 records - Like Clockwork and Villains - and only started trying them out recently, when a friend played me a live version of I Sat By The Sea.

I'm now of the opinion that the latest 3 records have about 1 album's worth of great tracks amongst them, which is good enough for me. Still, when they get it right it's astonishing!! Tracks like My God Is The Sun, Head Like A Haunted House and The Evil Has Landed are up there with some of the best I've ever heard and there's a real maturity in the structure of other tracks like Smooth Sailing and Fairweather Friends (featuring Elton John....something I had a hard time accepting but which is actually painless and, dare I say it, pretty good).

As to the new album, I absolutely love Paper Machete and Carnavoyeur. Straight out of the box they got me by the balls and I'm of the feeling that the album's a bit of a grower. I'm not a fan of the chorus line on Emotional Sickness but the rest of the track is killer.

Also, I'm loving pretty much all of the artwork by Boneface. It has a more detailed Jamie Hewlett on a bad trip vibe about it.

If this setlist is what they bring to Berlin I'll be happy. I just hope his voice holds up because it'll be right at the end of the tour when I see them.

[eggwheat]

Similarly I haven't liked much past the first 3 albums. I thought the last album was dreadful. This is OK. Better than the last two but still not there.

[Flurko]

I was a huge QOTSA fan in my highschool years, I remember the Era Vulgaris release being one of the first events I eagerly waited for at that time, and them being one of the first big shows I went to in my city. I was at one of the first surprise Festival gigs of Them Crooked Vultures, enjoyed the album quite a bit, and then my tastes shifted and I stopped caring about the band, listening once or twice to the subsequent albums and being meh about them.

The new album is in the same vein for me, but I watched a recent festival appearance on YouTube and had a great time, opening with Misfit Love, one of my faves songs from Era Vulgaris. Grey bearded Josh Homme is a weird look, but he looks in better shape than the wreck he was at the Taylor Hawkins tribute, didn't we learn recently that he got cancer last year ?

It's also funny how I kept similar guitar tastes to Troy Van Leuween, enjoying both Jazzmasters and big hollowbodies, even though his signature with gold body, maple b&b and awful tort has to be one of the worst color combinations you can do with a JM.

[DeathJag]

In 2002 my friend's band toured with them and I traveled along for about six weeks in the US. Josh is an amazing fooseball player. He's the kind of player that is no fun to play with, because you never touch the ball. Just wanted to throw that out there! He was always nice to me and shared some drugs even haha!

[ldp54002]

I absolutely love Songs for the Deaf, but I'm pretty "meh" on the band overall.

When I heard that the 4th Foo Fighters album was being put on hiatus so Dave Grohl could work on an album for another band, I was intrigued. I had heard a couple songs from Rated R on the radio, but didn't really dig any deeper than that. I bought Songs for the Deaf on the strength of "No One Knows" and immediately loved the album. I ended up buying Rated R, the self-titled and later, Era Vulgaris when it was released. I like a smattering of songs on each.

I haven't actively followed the band's work post Era Vulgaris, but my wife unabashedly loves QOTSA so I've heard 95% of their output through her. In my opinion, there's a "samey" quality to everything post-2007 which doesn't sit right with me. I'll admit I haven't actually sat down and listened to the last two albums to really absorb them, but I've heard the songs enough to know that a) I don't really like them, and b) I couldn't even tell you which album each song was from, or even their names in most cases. They seemed to really settle into a groove around the time of Era Vulgaris that they haven't really ventured out of since.

There was a time in my life where I would have ranked Songs for the Deaf in my top 5 albums ever, though, so I can't truly fault them too much. I think having that album be my real introduction to them tainted me for the rest of their catalog. That said, I've seen them live a few times (a couple times where they were the headliner, and twice when they opened for Pearl Jam at their twin PJ20 concerts) and they can put on a hell of a show.

[dinosaurkale->]

kyuss >

[GilmourD]

Am I the only one that has a bad taste in my mouth regarding Homme since that whole face kicking incident?

[eggwheat]

Am I the only one that has a bad taste in my mouth regarding Homme since that whole face kicking incident?

No..I feel it too. He has a long history of violence. He assaulted his ex-wife's new partner recently. Head butted his wife.. the whole Brody Dalle divorce/custody battle looks very ugly.

[GilmourD]

Am I the only one that has a bad taste in my mouth regarding Homme since that whole face kicking incident?

No..I feel it too. He has a long history of violence. He assaulted his ex-wife's new partner recently. Head butted his wife.. the whole Brody Dalle divorce/custody battle looks very ugly.

It's nowhere near the way I feel when I hear lostprophets but it makes it hard to listen to QOTSA. There's some good music there (although apparently not on the last album before this new one ) but it makes me not want to seek it out.

[ldp54002]

It's nowhere near the way I feel when I hear lostprophets but it makes it hard to listen to QOTSA. There's some good music there (although apparently not on the last album before this new one ) but it makes me not want to seek it out.

One of the curses of the information age--you really have to work hard to separate the art from the artist.

Post-2020 was especially bad, when you found out that artists you otherwise liked had some...let's say "questionable" thoughts on COVID and it's origins/cause, vaccines, etc.

[GilmourD]

It's nowhere near the way I feel when I hear lostprophets but it makes it hard to listen to QOTSA. There's some good music there (although apparently not on the last album before this new one ) but it makes me not want to seek it out.

One of the curses of the information age--you really have to work hard to separate the art from the artist.

Post-2020 was especially bad, when you found out that artists you otherwise liked had some...let's say "questionable" thoughts on COVID and it's origins/cause, vaccines, etc.

Some of them didn't surprise me in that sense, especially if you paid attention to the 2008 election. But I've been connected digitally in some way since the '90s, so I guess the quickness with which information like that blows up doesn't surprise me.

I just love that people are still shocked by Garth Brooks. His position has never changed but people assume that because he's a country guy he leans a certain way.

[Embenny]

One of the curses of the information age--you really have to work hard to separate the art from the artist.

I'm OK with not separating the art from the artist. I love Chuck Berry as a teenager and wanted to see him live before he died, until I learned about his conviction for having sex with a 14 year old, that woman he beat the shit out of in the 80's, and recording women peeing in thr bathroom of his restaurant.

The nice thing about art is that there's so much of it that has been created by people who aren't violent sex offenders, so you can just set the bar wherever you want and ignore the artists who ruined your enjoyment by being pieces of shit.

I haven't looked into the stuff about Josh Homme so I'm not saying he's on Berry's level of ick. I liked Kyuss more than QOTSA, and Brant Bjork and even John Garcia have made much more music I enjoy without Homme than Homme has made without them. They even joined forces 10 years ago for Vista Chino, which only released one album, but man was it ever a good one.

[ldp54002]

One of the curses of the information age--you really have to work hard to separate the art from the artist.

The nice thing about art is that there's so much of it that has been created by people who aren't violent sex offenders, so you can just set the bar wherever you want and ignore the artists who ruined your enjoyment by being pieces of shit.

Definitely agree, though it can be difficult when it gets into multi-member band territory. You run into situations where one member of a five piece band that you love turns out to be a terrible person, and you start to question the integrity of the rest of the band. Do you leave your fandom of the band behind, or do you consider them "that band I like with the asshole guitarist"?

Luckily I've rarely faced that situation.

[sal paradise]

It's nowhere near the way I feel when I hear lostprophets

Where are you going to that plays lostprophets? In the UK their music has essentially been deleted. After the guilty verdict no one even mentions them anymore.

[MayTheFuzzBeWithYou]

Meh.
They do have their justification of existence. A few songs are good but they just never moved me.
The fact that he‘s such a violent and arrogant asshole doesn‘t make me liking them more either…

And: my ex bandmate was a huge fan - and I hated it when he put on THAT shirt for our live shows. He even wore it for a photo shoot even though we agreed on no band shirts (and no shorts) for that shoot.

Also on „like clockwork“ there is a song with an intro that is a straight rip-off from Santana - I would have to listen to it again to name the song(s)…tomorrow maybe.

Yet somehow I still ended up on the side stage during their festival show in Austria in 2014…and drinking some vodkas with Brody… but only thanks to a friend who worked there…