Geoff Tate will need no introduction to rockers of a certain vintage. Having sold over 25 million albums with Queensryche, he’s named his new project after the band’s most talked about and influential album ‘Operation: Mindcrime’. Armed with new album ‘The Key’, Uber Rock’s Michael Anthony caught up with Geoff and attempted to unlock the mind of the man and a few of the album’s secrets.

 

Hi, Geoff! Operation: Mindcrime – it’s a name that will be familiar to a lot of people?

 

Hiya, Michael! Yeah, yeah, I hope so. [Laughs]

 

So why have you decided to use the name?

 

Well, I needed to call my new project something and the name ‘Operation: Mindcrime’ accomplishes two things. First, it’s a phrase or a name that people that are fans of what I do are familiar with, so it’s a good way for them to find me. Secondly, I think it sets the tone for the type of music I’m focusing on now, which is conceptual music, and that’s certainly what ‘The Key’ and the following two albums that are part of the trilogy are.

 

It struck me listening to ‘The Key’, and I’ve played it quite a few times now, that it’s very conceptually sophisticated, perhaps even more so than ‘Operation: Mindcrime’ itself. What was your inspiration in writing it?

 

I’ve been wanting to do a large scale conceptual work for a while, and last year my wife and I took kind of a sabbatical really, a trip across northern Spain hiking the El Camino De Santiago trail. And, you know, when you’re on a trail like that, it’s miles and miles and miles of walking and thinking and in my case writing down musical ideas and story ideas. So, I wrote a story that I quite liked that I thought I could turn into a large scale work, and when I got back from my trip I started immediately composing music for it and it all just started falling into place, really. So, it was a good trip, you know. It definitely cleared my head and gave me the peace of mind, I guess, to create something new.

 

Do you think the environment contributed to the form the story took?

 

I think the environment contributed to my state of mind and helped me to tap into my creative side. I think you need to do that occasionally, to clear your head and get on a new path, you know?

 

‘The Key’ is part one of a trilogy, you say. What can you tell us about the story?

 

Well, it’s a bit of a mystery so I’m kind of reluctant to talk about it too much in detail. Are you a parent? Do you have children at all?

 

I am. I have two daughters.

 

Then you’ll probably relate to what I can tell you about it. You know, as parents we start really early teaching our children, or, in other words, programming our children, to accept a reality that we know. And we do that by showing them things like this is a chair, this is an automobile, the sky, a dog, a cat. That sort of teaching or programming just proliferates life – that’s how we learn to identify what is real. And so, in my story there are four individuals who develop a technology that allows the user to see reality, to interface with reality, in a different way. They discover a different way of looking at reality, and, because of that, conflict arises between them. Some of them want to sell the technology because they think it’s going to be worth billions and billions of dollars. Other people in the group have a bit more of an altruistic vision of life and they want to give it to the world – they think the discovery is so important that it’s going to change the way we look at things. And so, what we have on the first album is an introduction to the four characters, and a bit of an introduction to what the technology is, and we also witness the confrontation or the division of the group and the conflict that arises.

 

And parts II and III – you said you already had the story, has the music already been recorded?

 

Yeah. The second album is in what we call ‘mix stage’, which is what I’m going to do when I get back from my trip here. That’ll be finished. And the third album is mostly written and we’re just finishing up the last couple of tracks. Hopefully, if all goes well, I’ll have all three finished by November, which is kind of what I’m shooting for.

 

What’s the plan for releasing them? You have a timescale in mind, presumably?

 

Yeah, the first one, ‘The Key’ came out 18th September 2015, and then I think the other two are slated for release 9 months apart.

 

I read, or heard, somewhere, you saying that you’re a fan of “old prog music” as it’s music that doesn’t stick to the rules. What did you have in mind when you said that?

 

Gosh, I can’t think of what the context of my comment was, but I grew up with what we now call progressive rock music – bands like Yes, Genesis, Pink Floyd, Gentle Giant, Supertramp … bands that leaned more towards large scale musical productions. That’s kind of what I cut my teeth on growing up, where my interest was really sparked. You could probably add The Beatles to that group of inspirational artists as ‘Sgt. Pepper’s’ was a huge influence on me growing up.

 

Presumably you mentioned it at the time because there’s stuff in that approach to music that you’ve brought in some way to this project?

 

Yeah, definitely. The style of conceptual music is really based, I think, in what we would now call progressive rock music. It’s kind of veering away from standard musical arrangements, opening up the musicians to free form, you know, a melody over a different kind of chord progression, maybe one that has many different kinds of time signatures attached to it – interesting stuff that’s a bit challenging to play. And at the same time as wanting to write compositions like that, we also wanted to tell the story. So that was first and foremost in our minds when composing the material – did it tell the story or set the tone for what was happening within the story at that given point, you know?

 

I think the album does sound quite experimental, if you like, and you get quite a sense of creative freedom listening to it. Have you found it liberating working more as a solo artist?

 

Yeah, somewhat. Yeah, definitely. Within the band I was always one to push the music into different places from where it started, you know, so yeah, the situation I’m in now of course gives me a lot of freedom to do what I like and what I find interesting and to pursue that path.

 

Though you do have some great musicians playing on the new album.

 

Yep, some great players. And everyone involved really brought a lot of positive energy. Everyone was very enthusiastic about participating and coming up with interesting ideas to add to the project. The same musicians play on all three parts of the trilogy.

 

How easy was it to find musicians who shared your vision?

 

Well, most of the guys that I played with on this project were people that I’d worked with over the years. Kelly Gray, for example, in Queensryche. And Randy Gane and I were writing music … gosh … we started in 1979, I think, in our first band together. We’ve always shared a similar musical approach and musical philosophy. Scott Moughton, on guitar and vocals, is a guy I started working with about 15 years ago who I thought was an incredibly creative writer and player. Simon Wright, who’s pretty well known around the world for playing with bands like AC/DC and Dio and myself – he’s a very creative drummer with a really special way of playing drums. The same with Brian Tichy on drums. He has an incredible sense of timing. Everybody involved was incredible, just coming up with incredible ideas on what we could do and how we could stretch out an arrangement and that kind of thing. I loved working on this project. It’s been really, really fulfilling.

 

Are you going to tour the album, Geoff?

 

Yeah, the first tour is being put together now. We’re going to be making an announcement about that very shortly. I believe it starts middle of November in Europe.

 

What can we expect by way of the show?

 

Well, I have a lot of material to pick from [Laughs]. So I think I’ll put together a set of music from all the different records that I’ve done. And I definitely want to showcase the new album, so I think I’d like to play that in its entirety and bookend it with songs that offer an overview of what I’ve done in my career.

 

The new album is fresh to me, obviously – I’ve just been listening over the last few days. But it did strike me that despite your previous achievements this could be a career defining project for you. What do you say to that?

 

That would be nice! It’s always wonderful when people acknowledge what you do and find something about it that moves them, you know. I never really go into writing music to try to please anybody, but it is nice when you hear feedback from people and they can tell you: “Oh, you know, that song or that album really was special to me.” Or “It’s something that I clung to in a dark time,” or “It gave me something to think about other than my own thoughts for a moment.” I’ve heard many stories like that over the years and I love hearing stories about how music affects people because it definitely affects me and I relate to that, you know.

 

 

In a sense the album works really well as a whole but is there anything on there that’s particularly special to you?

 

It’s all very special to me, really. Like every album it’s a statement of where you’re at as a writer and the goals and things you wanted to try to achieve. When I set out to write a record I think about what I want to do, and what I want to try to achieve musically. You know, do I want to express myself more melodically than I’ve ever done before? Do I want to really concentrate on how each song gets to the next song? Do I want to work on my phrasing and how I present a lyric? There are all these little things that you set as goals for yourself. And an album is kind of like a journal, in a sense. It’s like a diary. It’s a record of your hopes, your dreams, your fears, your passions. People ask me often, you know, do you think this album or that album was successful, and I always say yes, every album is successful because you start with nothing and you make something, and it’s something that will outlive you that’s a statement of your thinking and your way of looking at the world.

 

Well, I wish you all the very best with the new one, Geoff – thanks for your time.

 

Thank you for the interview. I appreciate it.

 

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To pick up your copy of ‘The Key’ – CLICK HERE