ALBUM REVIEW: The Verdict – Queensrÿche

With a career now almost hitting the four decade mark, there’s little doubt that US metal outfit QUEENSRŸCHE have had anything other than a huge eventful lifespan. A band essentially characterised nowadays in two distinctive eras, it’s now been some seven years since the effective rebirth of QUEENSRŸCHE came about with the trading of longtime vocalist Geoff Tate for Todd La Torre – the latter having since forged on with his own now-defunct OPERATION: MINDCRIME project for a trilogy of records, while the remainder of the band are now set to release their third post-Tate album, The Verdict.

Right out of the gate, The Verdict very much sets its tone, with opening number Blood of the Levant taking off at a steady gallop, with spiralling lead guitar lines set atop a powerful rhythmic chug and La Torre’s effortlessly melodic vocals. In almost no time, he’s both shrieking his lungs out in a melodic falsetto and reaching lower with a booming presence; showcasing amazingly his versatility as a vocalist while the rest of QUEENSRŸCHE set about creating the sprawling musical backdrop in which the listener is about to spend the next 45 minutes or so.

Being reunited with Condition Hüman producer Chris ‘Zeuss’ Harris at the helm once more also means there’s a familiarity to The Verdict’s overall sonics, with the famed producer helping once again to bring a distinct clarity to the chaos put out by the Washington band. The cleaner tones found on Dark Reverie for example, are given a front-and-centre staging with just enough time at the forefront to draw the listener in, before they’re quickly stripped away for some stadium-rock-level amped up distortion, as the band embrace full pomp and absolutely go for it. It’s in his ability to control the overly-flamboyant tendencies of QUEENSRŸCHE where Harris’ production work shines especially bright too – the likes of Man The Machine and Propaganda Fashion still sound unbelievably 80’s in their sheer over-the-top nature, but the modern production sheen prevents either number from descending into a mess by giving every individual element the room to breathe. Tracks like Inner Unrest are able to get away with neoclassical flourishes all over the place too, with guitarists Michael Wilton and Parker Lundgren putting in some genuinely stellar work both here, and across the rest of the record in general.

Perhaps the highest point though, comes with penultimate number Launder the Conscience – which seems to take every individual part of what makes 2019 QUEENSRŸCHE great, and ramp it all up just that little bit further. Packing what are easily some of the most soaring choruses on The Verdict, it’s an inherently ridiculous track in sheer scale of sound, with ever-increasing amounts of furious fretwork that gradually builds to an eventual sparse atmospheric break, only to kick back even harder after the shortest respite as La Torre seems to bellow as though his life depends on it. In terms of the amount of sudden left-turns, it’s probably one of the record’s most purely progressive moments, and one that definitely pays off as a highlight not only of the record, but perhaps of the last decade of the band’s career.

Curiously, The Verdict closes out not with one final blast of speed, but with Portrait – a reverb-soaked mid-tempo stomp that strikes a strange balance between sounding like the band’s take on a Planet Caravan-style psyche-rock odyssey and AOR-like cheese. It’s a curious way to cap off what’s been a mostly all-out-rock affair, and perhaps a tiny bit too long at just over five minutes, but nonetheless still provides La Torre with enough opportunity to flex his considerable vocal muscle as to remain engaging enough.

So what’s the final verdict on The Verdict then? Well, overall it represents perhaps the band’s strongest step in decades, and demonstrates that this incarnation of QUEENSRŸCHE is more than capable of living up to the iconic legacy in their past. Perhaps the strongest realisation of their combined vision to date, this is not only the best post-Tate album in the band’s catalogue by a considerable margin, but perhaps even one of the best in their catalogue full-stop. Where they go from here is anyone’s guess, but if The Verdict is any indication, fans will surely be waiting with bated breath for more.

Rating: 8/10

The Verdict is out now via Century Media Records.

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