Reviewed by Thomas
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Tourname: The Art Of Live World Tour 2004
Special guest: ---
City: Gothenburg, Sweden
Venue: Trädgårn
Date: 08 July 2004
Headliner set-length: 90 min

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Queensrÿche

22.30 - 00.00
Skeppet

Long time no see, Queensrÿche was back in Gothenburg with their tour and God knows how long it was since the last time. If they ever been headlining here before?, if they have it must have been before the time I was old enough to go to concerts.
And Geoff Tate made a remark about it have been a long time since they were here but said that the fans seemed to have been ageing well. And I guess that he is right there since it was mostly older fans and not that much of younger people as on many other concerts.
Although the last time Queensrÿche stepped on Swedish ground was last summer at Sweden Rock Festival and that time their performance left me feeling rather satisfied when I got to see them for the first time.

It all started a bit trembling with the track Tribe from their latest studio-album with the same name. It continued as a good concert but not really much more with a mix of some older stuff and with some new ones. Best track of the first third of the concert was Hit The Black from Hear In The Now Frontier that probably was the heaviest one so far. Tribe and Open proved to be better as well as heavier live but those songs cant really match up with the other stuff Queensrÿche have in their bag so it never got better than simply ok with those moments.

The concert started to hit it off with Jet City Woman from the album Empire and that is the first track that really got the crowd going and singing along loudly. That track was followed by another three from the same album and it was easy to see that both band and audience was liking it much more now than the trembling start. As the band was starting to loosen up and a bigger part of the audience was singing along with the songs it reached one the greater moments this evening with the song Empire. Geoff Tate also took the opportunity to make a political statement wearing a denim jacket with a picture of president Bush on the back with the word Liar printed on top. Something that produced a bit of extra cheering from the crowd. By this point the concert had turned from descent to really great but would soon turn into bloody fantastic.

Operation: Mindcrime, do I really need to go on? Just to hear the name of that album fills me with delight. And when they delivers six songs in a row from that album in such a fired up way they did, now this was the moment when everything became as great as it could be. If the band liked to perform the tracks from Empire they completely loved to play these ones by the looks of it. This third of the concert was nothing but incredible, both the band as well as the crowd was loving every second of the six tracks.

Far too soon as it felt we reached to the point of the short encore that ended after only two tracks. Take Hold Of The Flame was the last song of the evening and it all ended after about ninety minutes, and why couldn't they done a longer set? With no special guest as they had on their other performances they did in Sweden I expected a bit of a longer set. And got a little disappointed when it ended so soon as it did.

It was simple but great. No backdrop, effects or stage show whatsoever. Just a perfect delivery from all of the guys in the band even if it was Geoff Tate and Scott Rockenfield that seemed to be having most of the energy this evening. Michael Wilton and Eddie Jackson didn't make to much of a fuzz on the stage and Mike Stone was trying really hard to preserve his cool attitude, and pull he pulled it off. Mike Stone separates himself with his bleached hair and big tattoos but fills the spot of Chris DeGarmo greatly, perfect guitar playing and he even adds a bit more metal to the sound of Queensrÿche. Geoff Tate is of course the main character on stage and his voice was in excellent condition. He has one of the greatest voices around and proves that is just as good live as it is on record.

To summon it up you can tell by their set-list when they have been the most successful, eleven of the eighteen tracks are picked from Empire and Operation: Mindcrime while none is brought out from Q2K. Focus on the career highlights and throw is some additional new ones and a couple of the old favourites, Queensrÿche knows what their fans wants and they delivers it. But I'm a bit surprised though that they didn't included any track from Promised Land, and left out the classic The Lady Wore Black.

SETLIST

Tribe
Sign Of The Times
Hit The Black
NM 156
Screaming In Digital
Open
Jet City Woman
Thin Line
Empire
Anybody Listening?
Operation: Mindcrime
Speak
The Needle Lies
Breaking The Silence
I Don't Believe In Love
Eyes Of A Stranger
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Best I Can
Take Hold Of The Flame

Related links:
www.queensryche.com