Customer Reviews

Live Evolution (Dig)

5 star:		(21)
4 star:		(15)
3 star:		(9)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Live Evolution is a pretty good summary of Queensryche's 20 year career. It covers each one of their releases: the blistering heaviness of their EP; The Warning, with its progressive leanings; Rage for Order, the band's step into maturity with a cyber-glam metal record; Operation: Mindcrime, the legendary concept album; Empire, the commercial smash; the dark, intellectual Promised Land; the blasé Hear in the Now Frontier; and the recent hard rocker Q2K.

The band's playing is tight, energetic, and assertive. Even after two decades of soaring, technically demanding singing, Geoff Tate's voice doesn't sound much worse for wear. Still, on some of the really challenging songs, like "Queen of the Reich" or "Take Hold of the Flame," Tate goes a little easy on the pipes, which detracts some those songs intensity. Better that than him losing his voice before the end of the night, though. The vocal beast "Roads to Madness" cuts the entire fast section at the end, although that might be due to lack of orchestral backing rather than the constraints of Tate's voice. Still, his performance is heartfelt and strong. He's such an established singer that, even with his incredible skill, he's always singing with the song. There's way too many goofy metal singers who scream at live shows. Tate, fortunately, is too mature for that.

The band also knows how to keep their audiences interested. There's tons of alterations to old songs. The definitive power metal anthem "Queen of the Reich" is preceded by swirling guitar dissonance. "The Lady Wore Black"'s chorus is entirely rearranged, with a slower tempo and relying on big power chords rather than a big riff. On the Mindcrime suite, "Electric Requiem" is tossed into the middle of "Spreading the Disease," which is a neat twist even though it warps the story. Now we're paying for wars in South America again, too. "Eyes of a Stranger," which remains one of the band's finest songs, is given its best performance here...even better than on Operation: LIVEcrime! The gleaming, precise soloing of the old songs sounds like it was given a good shot of adrenaline. It's all about the intensity!

Disc 2 kicks off with a pair of tunes from Promised Land. The songs were under-arranged in the first place, and they don't gain much intensity here. I would have rather seen a lot more time devoted to Empire, which is still the peak of the band's songwriting. The crunchy guitar attack of "Empire" is corrosive and heavy, a strong contrast to "Silent Lucidity," which is the band's most beautiful song. I don't think it was written with any intention to be a good live song, but performed here it has a "bigger" sound and still conveys its arresting elegance. "Another Rainy Night," moody and dramatic, is performed very well. A lot of disc 2 is devoted to Queensryche's last two studio albums, HitNF and Q2K. I'm not big on those albums: I thin they lack songwriting focus and the edge that defined Queensryche of old. Still, the fluid guitar chords of "Liquid Sky" sound great live, and "Breakdown" is another highlight. "The Right Side of My Mind" is a minimalistic song, where adding live intensity is difficult. But the QR boys do it -- that's a testament to their ability as performers.

The album was recorded with a good live feel, and I like how the dual-guitar leads of the Wilton/Gray team are mixed in stereo. The live ambiance is pretty good, although the band's popularity has decreased over the years, and so has the crowd size. Compare the roaring crowd of "Revolution: Calling" on LIVEcrime to the crowd here... there's quite a difference! That's too bad. I think this band deserves better. Although they've lowered the songwriting hurdles over the past several years, they're still great. At least for us informed fans, we can continue to appreciate this band and their big live album.

I have read many reviews of this CD and I am glad to hear that people have good things to say. You have to respect Queensryche. In the 80's, they introduced a sound that could have been the future of heavy metal. Building on that progressive, different, emotional sound they invented with the classic Rage for Order, they released their crowing achievement, Operation: Mindcrime, which should rank in the top 5 albums of all time. Empire was a perfect follow up with a mature, slightly commercialized sound. Hits like Silent Lucidity broke the band into platinumsville, and finally this superior heavy metal band was given the notoriety they deserved. Contrary to popular belief, the band did not fall off the earth after that. Unwilling to commercialize too much, the band took a break before releasing their next technical masterpiece, Promised Land. Something happened to music during that break. Maybe heavy metal had become to overplayed and consisted of way too many bubble gum pop metal bands. The listening public revolted and the powers that be reverted metal back to its rawest, most immature form - Grunge. How were technical masters like Queensryche supposed to compete in an exploding world of musicians that couldn't even tune their guitars. Thats when me and many other fans of substantial music turned off our radios and stopped buying CDs. Hold it up to resilience but Queensryche managed to produce Hear In The Now Frontier, and after the departure of Chris Degarmo, Q2K. Both good to excellent albums - but they had no place in the sess pool that had become heavy metal. Now it looks as if a new day may be dawning - as 80's metal bands are rearing up for a final strike -and nostalgia is kicking in amongst listeners who want more from their music. Queensryche is the answer! Evolution is a perfect example of how this band never lost it. Music just went to sleep for a little while. In the wake of a new day - Evolution shines as a testament to this bands talent and resilience. I say to fans of the new heavy metal, check this out. Ah, music - I remember now!

Queensryche is one of the most influencing bands in progressive rock, and Live Evolution is brief history of their 20 years career. 2 CD album is prepared according to chronological order of their album catalogue, so that every listener will be able to get the idea how they have changed and grown in 20 years. Albums starts with songs from their groundbreaking EP and first and second full-length albums "Warning" and "Rage for Order" . Power metal classics "Queen of the Reich" , "Take the Hold of the Flame" , "Walk in the Shadows" and "The Lady Wore Black" will take every listener back to 80ies wonderful metallic atmosphere and blow their minds away. 2nd chapter of Queensryche was "Operation:Mindcrime", one of the best album in rock music
of all times , and most of the songs in live album chosen from this classic. Especially, duet of Geoff Tate together with Pamela Moore in "Suite Sister Mary" is amazing. 2nd cd has songs from their 90ies catologue, like "Empire", "Silent Lucidity" from their the most commercially succesful album "Empire" , "I AM I", "Damaged" from their second masterpiece "Promised Land" and history ends with tunes from their latest effort "Q2K", and only the last song "The Right Side of My Mind" fits with their early sound. Only shortcoming of the album is the lack of dialogue between auidience and Geoff Tate, that makes listener drag away from concert atmosphere. Other than that, Live Evolution is an album every rock listener must have to get the entire history of Queensryche

I've been a Queensryche fan since the mid-'80s. I saw them warm up for Metallica in 1988...perform the entire Operation: Mindcrime album a year or two later on their headlining tour...in Milwaukee on the Hear in the Now Frontier tour...in New York's Madison Square Garden warming up for Iron Maiden's first major North American show in years...and in Detroit a few months later on that same tour (with Halford and Maiden).

There aren't many bands around any more than I truly enjoy that much.

Parts of Live Evolution are stunning. Disk One, for example. I still prefer their older material, circa Mindcrime. Plus, I really like their oldest material of all: all the way back to their "Queen of the Reich" days. Vocalist Geoff Tate still has a voice that amazes me with its power and range. Granted, he can't hit the high notes in "Queen of the Reich" or "Take Hold of the Flame," but he's still several notches above all other vocalists today.

I tended to lose interest in 'Ryche after their Promised Land album, buying their CDs only sporadically, and never on the day they were released. So most of the material on Live Evolution (mostly Disk Two) doesn't impress me much. At least, not as much as that on Disk One.

Okay, here's the deal: I miss Chris DeGarmo. For the same reason many fans think Janick Gers made Dave Murray "sloppy" because of his (Gers') freewheeling, showboating style of playing (when guitarist Adrian Smith left Maiden), I think new guitarist Kelly Gray doesn't have Chris DeGarmo's finesse for bringing out the best in fellow guitarist Michael Wilton. It's not that Gray is sloppy. It's just that he has a heavier, more Seattle Grunge style than DeGarmo had. Consequently, the on-stage performances seem to be less dynamic, fluid and, well, Queensryche-ish.

I bought Live Evolution the day it came out because I've been listening to a lot of 'Ryche lately. And, since I saw them twice last year on the Maiden/Halford/Queensryche tour, I wanted to hear again what they sounded like live.

Overall, I'd say this live album is one of the best released in a while. The songs are miles above anything else recorded these days. And the band -- especially vocalist Geoff Tate -- is better than most. Yet, the Queensryche I hold hear and dear to my heart is the classic lineup that included Chris DeGarmo.

Watching the band perform Operation: Mindcrime in its entirety is a memory I'll cherish forever. Watching the band today is interesting, even fascinating and fun. But it's not the Queensryche I grew up on.

Thankfully, if you're a fan of their latter material, there's plenty on this double live album to please you as well.

Now, if only Chris DeGarmo would return to the band...

Queensryche still stands the test of time with this great effort. This encorporates their best material from all of their albums. Geoff Tate still sings with all his conviction and Scott Rockenfield never misses a beat. Kelly Gray does a good job playing his own style and interpretation of the older songs previously done by ex-axeman Chris DeGarmo. Many said this group would fold after DeGarmo's departure, but Gray has been the glue holding the band in his absence. Eddie Jackson and Michael Wilton shine as always with their blending bass lines and rhythm sections. Guest vocalist Pamela Moore lends her beautiful voice once again to "Suite Sister Mary" taking listeners back to the Operation Mindcrime era. Overall older fans will appreciate disc 1 as opposed to disc 2, with the first disc having more 80's era classic songs they grew up with. The latter of the discs show a more progressive mix of newer Ryche material that some called groundbreaking or experimental. This set deserves a listen to even if you were one of the people who just knew of Queensryche from hearing "Silent Lucidity" or "Jet City Woman" on the radio. Believe me, you'll appreciate it.

This is a release I'm not really sure what to make of-- Queensryche's "Live Evolution", a double disc live album assembled into four suites, each covering a period in the band's history. Conceptually, it sounds great, but the execution of the package is so poor that it really detracts from the experience.

Before discussing the performance and the setlist, I'll take a moment to discuss the presentation-- the set comes in a double digipack with more than a couple errors in its presentation-- the first suite is listed as the "EP/Warning Suite", but three of the eight song are from "Rage for Order". This then leads to the quesion as to why the mini-Mindcrime at the second half of the disc is referred to as the "Rage/Mindcrime" suite. Its not that I necessarily have a problem with this-- in fact, I really don't care much for the early material, but this sort of sloppy attention to detail really gets to me. This is further noted by the exclusion of "My Empty Room" entirely from the track listing-- its the second to last song on the first disc and by the "EP/Warning Suite" being totally out of order on record as the track listing. This sort of sloppiness is completely inexcusable.

Beyond the packaging, the sound is really hard to describe-- its kind of fuzzy, and there's what sounds like analog distortion (and something that I'd swear was an LP pop) throughout, plus the recording is somewhat muddy-- given the other problems with this, I'm betting the muddy sound was introduced after the performance.

Now let's assume you still want this set, even given its flaws, a bit about the setlist-- I can't argue much with the first disc, they picked a lot of the really strong material from the early record-- admittedly, I'd've dropped "London" and "Queen of the Reich" in favor of "I Dream in Infrared" and "Prophecy", but thats the sort of thing any fan is going to say-- they did a nice balance of popular material, live favorites, and old gems. The Mindcrime portion is fantastic, really a nice trim presentation of the album-- they skipped hit "I Don't Believe in Love" and personal favorite "The Needle Lies" but its a good overview. The second disc's "Empire/Promised Land" suite presents all four of the "Empire" singles and the "I Am I"/"Damaged" pair from "Promised Land-- I personally love "Promised Land", so I'd've loved to have seen more of that record, and there's better material on "Empire" than the singles in my assessmenet. The "HITNF/Q2K" suite virtually ignores "Hear in the Now Frontier"-- only one song, the so-so "Hit hte Black" is used, while five from "Q2K" make it. Given that "Q2K" was the last album out, I can understand this, but given I really don't care for that one and love "Hear...", its somewhat disappointing.

The performance itself is reasonable-- much of the early material receives rearrangements, in particular to lower the vocals a bit. I'm not wild about most of this stuff, but the "NM 156" and "The Lady Wore Black" performances are particularly noteworthy and the overlong "Roads to Madness" benefits immensely from trimming four minutes of fat from it. The Mindcrime stuff comes off reasonably well as well, with "My Empty Room" being a real highlight (pity it wasn't listed!). The second disc is all solid performances, but I don't really think there's much that could be done to resurrect the "Q2K" stuff. Still, the "I Am I"/"Damaged" pair are fantastic and probably worth the price of admission alone.

In the end, there's really too many flaws with this set to really justify it as a good value. If you're a fan, you'll probably want it, but everyone else can skip it.

The double CD is worth the price of admission just for hearing the powerful version of "Screaming in Digital". Listening to this CD from end to end shows that Queensryche is still relevant and exciting. I would put anything on this CD up against anything that a Limp Bizkit, Static X or Korn (or any other new metal bands today) could put out.

I hadnt listened to the Ryche in awhile, but listening to this CD put a charge back into me. I had forgotten just how powerful the songs were. They are all here. Everything from Lady Wore Black (first EP) to Falling Down (Q2K)....

This is what we need today -- more music like what the Ryche puts out. Intellegent, hard hitting and complex. Better then the standard thug, poor me, let's smoke a blunt music that we are getting today where everybody sounds the same...

Great, great CD...I highly recommend it to anybody that would like to listen to a band that has been putting out great quality music for 20 years....

In today's day and age, music is spanned out over many different groups. Most of these groups unfortunately suck! With heavy metal being my favorite music, Queensryche has always been my favorite band, and always will be. And LIVE EVOLUTION offers new hope for progressive heavy metal and ultimately, for Queensryche's future.
This 2 disc set has it all. Classics like "Queen of the Reich" and "The Lady Wore Black" were performed with the same flawless perfection now as they were when they started their careers. Newer tunes like "Breakdown" and "Right Side of my Mind" are performed with a passion that very few bands today will try for years to obtain but will probably never achieve. The discs high points are undoubtedly on the Mindcrime suite.
Very few bands will ever have the right to say they can conquer any obstacles in their careers. Queensryche is one of only 2 bands I respect in the music world today. Yes, I miss Chris DeGarmo as much as every other die-hard fan does. But, he's gone and probably not coming back. I've made my peace with that and have decided to give Kelly Grey the benefit of the doubt. Maybe some of the other Ryche fans should too.
LIVE EVOLUTION doesn't disappoint. This 2 disc set is more of an expression of the band possibly saying "We're far from being washed-up. In fact, we're just getting warmed up!"

. . . and the most disappointing aspect - Geoff Tate's vocal performance. In many songs, he foregoes his characteristic high notes for a lower key (e.g., "Take Hold of the Flame") and in other songs, he just gives up singing the high portions altogether (e.g., "Queen of the Reich" and "Walk in the Shadows").

Also disappointing were some of the arrangements (e.g., "Spreading the Disease") and the repoire (or lack thereof) with the audience (e.g., the middle section on "Empire").

For live Queensryche, I highly recommend the reissue of 'Operation:LiveCrime', which has far more venom and is superior to the original studio recording.

It's hard to give only 3 stars to a double Cd of Q, but this one isn't really worth more.I like it but I'm not completely satisfied: I saw Q live at least 5 times and the output was much better (the concert in Milan 1990 was one of the best I've ever attended).

There's something missing in it.1) A better recording and mixing:sometimes it is really poor. 2) Guitars sounds are not as powerful and good as one could expect and demand from Q; sometimes arrangements and solo leave completely unsatisfied. 3) I don't mean criticizing Geoff's voice (ok, he's not very young any more), but often it's really down 4) the play list could be improved: I mean, I don't want The Whole Operation mindcrime, but there are so many great songs (from Rage for Order, Promised Land and Warning) completely forgotten.

Perhaps I've been a too severe judge, but as a faithfull fan of Q I had expected much more.Ok, Chris De Garmo is missing but the rest of the band is still there and they can do much better.
I hope they can find again their inspiration , power and new life with the project "Operation Mindcrime II: don't disappoint the fans !!!