Operation: Mindcrime [Extra tracks, Original recording reissued, Original recording remastered]

Queensrÿche | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (May 6, 2003)
• Original Release Date: 1988
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Extra tracks, Original recording reissued, Original recording remastered
• Label: Capitol
• ASIN: B0000931QA
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Audio Cassette  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (318 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #9,264 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #90 in Music > Hard Rock & Metal > Progressive Metal

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Long dubbed "the thinking man's metal band," Queensryche have always been difficult to classify; somewhere between Iron Maiden and Pink Floyd. Mindcrime was their breakthrough album, garnering the band commercial and critical success. Arguably their best release, this is a complex, ambitious effort, with top-notch music and a complicated storyline (a disillusioned fortune hunter of the Reagan era joins an underground movement to assassinate political scumbags) that flows smoothly from start to finish. The combination of experimental, progressive music with shorter, more radio-friendly songs works well, and enabled the band to release singles from the album while keeping the story intact. These shorter songs provide the album's most exciting moments; "Revolution Calling," "Eyes of a Stranger," and "I Don't Believe in Love" are some of the best metal songs out there. --Genevieve Williams

Product Description

Features two bonus tracks.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

60 of 67 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Seminal Concept Album, September 17, 2005

By 

Mr D. "Artist/Designer/Kibitzer" (Cave Creek, Az United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Operation: Mindcrime (Audio CD)

We're not talking about just any album here. We're talking about Queensryche's 'tour de force', their 'magnum opus' or any other cliche that denotes sheer perfection. Yes we're talking about Operation: Mindcrime, not only Queensryche's zenith, considered by many as the apogee of concept albums and heavy metal in general. Basically we're talking about progressive metal nirvana.

There is a reason that the preponderance of reviewers give Operation: Mindcrime five stars. When it comes to concept albums, it is the standard to which all concept albums are compared, it has no peers. Heck I do it myself, stacking other very good concept albums against the incomparable Operation: Mindcrime.

What is a concept album? It is simply an album where each song revolves around a single concept or story.

In only their second album, Queensryche scored their breakthrough success with this most ambitious concept album, Operation: Mindcrime, which tells the story of an anarchist whose disillusionment with Reagan-era American society leads him to join a shadowy plot to assassinate corrupt leaders. The band plays fabulously and Geoff Tate does both a great acting and singing job and the music as indicated is quite ambitious, featuring, among others "Suite Sister Mary", a ten-minute track with orchestrations by Michael Kamen.

The band released two hit singles "Eyes of a Stranger" and "I Don't Believe In Love" from this album which is basically hard driving heavy metal except for these singles, which are both power ballads. Interspersed within the music are four suites of dialogue and several other cameos of short monologue or dialogue which help tell the story. These certainly add a nice touch in completing this great recording.

Da Story

Operation Mindcrime begins in a hospital ward where a patient named Nikki after a pain shot from a nurse who calls him a bastard, recalls the recent rash of murders he perpetrated at the request of Dr. X. Nikki, you see, was a psychotic, cynical malcontent who was recruited and brainwashed by the nefarious Dr. X, a power crazed evangelical preacher, leader of 'The Order', to be his personal assassin.

After getting Nikki addicted to drugs, brainwashed and dependent on him for his fixes, Dr. X sends Nikki first out to kill an unnamed corrupt politician, then his girlfriend Mary (an ex hooker) and the priest who got her off the streets because they are risks.

After completing his mission but not remembering it, he finds Mary murdered and realizing what he has done, Nikki goes on a drug binge and ends up in the hospital, the victim of a self induced narcotics overdose. From there the songs vacillate to a series of recriminations and rationalizations with "Breaking the Silence" "I don't Believe in Love" and "The Eyes of a Stranger".

My Favorites

It is truly a hard choice on this album but here is my list of the four best songs:

"Spreading the Disease"

For those faint of heart you may want to stay away from this song as it's just loaded with sex and deviancy. It is the sordid tale of Mary a prostitute, whom Nikki tries to save by getting a priest to take her off the streets. This emotive song is set to heavy double base drums at a medium/fast tempo with plenty of metal accompaniment.

"Suite Sister Mary"

A ten minute and forty second masterpiece, this 'piece de resistance' starts out with Dr. X ordering Nikki to go out and kill Mary and the priest after which, "Mary" starts out with a solo melodic guitar and a Choir which goes on to accompany Tate throughout the song. As on the whole album there are sound effects and dialogue thrown in such as thunder and sirens.
The music itself is again a highly emotional but variable paced number that is a wonderful confluence of rock/metal and opera.

"I don't Believe in Love"

In this song Nikki denies his love for Mary because he cannot face the fact that he murdered her. It is a sad melancholy power ballad. It is very melodic with a varied pace, the verses being slower than the chorus. This was released as a single because it is quite accessible and it was a minor hit even though taken away from the story it loses something.

"The Eyes of a Stranger"

This is my favorite song after "Mary", it is again very melodic varied tempo piece with a great guitar intro. Tate does some powerful singing here on the choruses. the song picks up speed as it goes on up to about a medium pace.
Another single and again a minor hit.

CONCLUSION

I have a confession to make. I don't put much emphasis on lyrics and seldom pay much attention to them, especially when they are hard to understand. Operation: Mindcrime is the exception. The lyrics are easily understood and tell a sad if not exciting, suspenseful story. I'm sure everyone will have their own interpretation of this monumental work, in my case I visualized definite similarities to the movie Manchurian Candidate.

In this day of terrorism and runaway fanatical religion this classic album/story gains even more importance.

There are so many nuances in the epic CD that everytime I listen to it I pick up something new. If you haven't heard Operation: Mindcrime, don't you think it's time.

26 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Queensryche's most ambitious work., December 18, 1999

By 

D. Mok (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Operation Mindcrime (Audio CD)

Though Empire's songcraft was a notch above that on Operation: Mindcrime, it's obvious in comparing the two albums that Mindcrime was a necessary step in the evolution of the band.

After going almost cyberpunk on Rage for Order (which I would argue is Queensryche's coming of age), the Tate-Wilton-DeGarmo core headed in an ultrasleek, aggressive metal direction with this, the brashest album in the Queensryche catalogue. Thanks to producer Peter Collins (Rush), Mindcrime is the first Queensryche album not hindered by a muddy mix. Instead, guitar solos slice through the arrangements to provide emotional peaks for the songs; Tate's vocals never sounded better; and the band was clearly on a roll in terms of songwriting: From the glistening DeGarmo instrumentals "Waiting for 22" and "Anarchy-X" through carnivorous rockers such as "I Don't Believe in Love", "Speak" and "Revolution Calling", and the album's best songs, "The Mission" and "Eyes of a Stranger" -- the former one of the best incorporations of a string section into a rock song and a majestic thematic summary for the entire concept album; the latter a stunning rock masterpiece with an unforgettable guitar riff anchoring one of the band's most intense performances ever.

Operation: Mindcrime also mines the socio-political potential of the concept album farther than either Pink Floyd or The Who ever did, creating an Orwellian nightmare in which there is no redemption for a sinner, even if his acts were not his own.

For a deeper taste of the story, hunt down the Operation: LIVECrime boxed set, which includes a CD/cassette, recorded live, containing the entirety of Operation: Mindcrime as recorded on the band's Building Empires tour, plus a video of the concert itself. A worthy companion piece to this exhilarating album.

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A musical experience that excites on so many levels, April 2, 2004

By 

Ian Buonamici (Ontario, California USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Operation: Mindcrime (Audio CD)

An immense pleasure I am now experiencing while listening to Queensryche's stunning "Operation: Mindcrime", coupled with the surprisingly small number of reviews here have urged me to put digit to keyboard and wax poetic about this incredibly emotive sonic masterpiece. Sadly, this masterwork may have been overshadowed on one side by the predictable poses of the popular "80's hair metal bands", and the technically brilliant yet sometimes emotionally chilly "thrash" of the late 80's; yet Queensryche nevertheless garnered much critical praise and expansion of their core following with a cohesive work that delights on many levels of lyric, melody, and emotional resonance. And today, nearly 15 years after its original release, Mindcrime continues to evoke a passionate listening experience through its well-written compositions of sheer power and emotional catharsis.

The core Queensryche "sound" finds its influence in a diverse blend of rock idioms, from the expertly performed art and progressive rock circles to the edgy and incisive sounds of punk rock rebellion. Blend in a pinch of theatrical classic rock in the vein of The Who's "Quadrophenia" and Pink Floyd's "The Wall", and the listener has transcended the run of the mill, stagnant musical forms that occupy a good deal of the record store bins and radio station playlists. Yet Queensryche manages to defy the conveniences of category, presenting an arsenal of sounds and moods that frankly put many of their contemporaries to shame. The vocals of Geoff Tate are inspired and sincere, unlocking the deepest emotional meaning in the passionate lyrics -- If Nero carelessly played his fiddle while Rome burned, Geoff Tate is employing his stunningly melodic vocal gift to inspire the fiery insurgency! And what an insurgency it is, with Mr. Tate relating how the mechanized culture of greed and media manipulation "spread the disease" during Mindcrime's socio-political themed first half, while exposing deepest torment of the soul and it's heart-wrenching sadness on the album's latter half, affording us a look through the eyes of a lost stranger who through tragedy no longer believes in love. Noteworthy songs such as "Speak", "Spreading The Disease" (with a heart-stopping middle break that positively tears asunder the greed and hypocrisy of the dominant 1980's political culture), "The Mission" and "Eyes Of A Stranger" showcase Tate's limitless vocal range and keen ability to locate the melodic heart of a lyric through his vocals.

Suffice it to say that Operation Mindcrime features brilliance not only in the technque of Geoff Tate's voice, but also in the songwriting of the "Tri-Ryche" trio of Tate and guitarists extraordinaire Chris DeGarmo and Michael Wilton. Virtuosos Wilton and DeGarmo unleash pummeling power chords, lilting arpeggios, and soaring solos as if their very lives depended on it, forging a sound that grips the listener and fits like a silken hand inside the velvet glove of Tate's vocals. The fullness and clarity of sound on this 22-bit remaster reveals the excellent rhythm guitar tracks that form the bedrock for technically and melodically gifted solos galore (a common complaint about 80's metal "shredders" is that they lacked in the rhythm department -- definitely not so with the 'Ryche!) The depth of the layers of melody here are cemented by a persistently rumbling bass courtesy of Eddie Jackson (brilliantly exemplified in the album's title track), an ever-audible bass that adds a rhythmic foundation to the symphony of guitars (how many 80's rock albums are marred by a nearly invisible bass? Again, not on Operation: Mindcrime!). Rounding out the rhythm section is drummer Scott Rockenfield's cymbal crashes and fiery snare work, a combined assault that not only provides a rhythmic pulse but also a melodic compliment with a fine employment of the ride and hi-hat cymbals.

Nearly 16 years after it's initial release (and about 15 since I first listened), Operation: Mindcrime continues to fascinate, perhaps more than ever on this sonically enhanced, remastered edition. Countless trends have come and gone, but art in its most sincere form is able to defy the fickle tastes of those who listen merely for the "hot new sound" or the latest fashion trend shrewdly marketed through the vehicle of a "musical" group. An album that inspires on so many levels (I find myself concurrently singing, air drumming and strumming, and dancing about in sheer abandon in my living room as I listen ... not to mention pondering the deeper lyrical meanings!), I offer the highest recommendation possible to Operation: Mindcrime, an album that any lover of music can appreciate for it's thought-provoking sound, charging forward through the centuries to bare it's fierce and fiery musical soul to all who venture to listen.