The saviours of rock 'n' roll or drug-crazed rockers? Ian Gittins enters the wonderful and frightening world of Queens of the Stone Age.
I've been chasing my tail trying to have a good time on this tour," grumbles Josh Homme, the towering 1.93-metre frontman of Queens of the Stone Age (QotSA), as he sucks on a beer backstage before his band's gig at Leeds University, northern England. "It's been difficult to come by. Everybody is so nervous of us now."
It's fair to say, in truth, that it's no mystery why sentient folk tend to be wary of invitations to after-hours pleasure extended by Queens of the Stone Age. The US angst-rockers have become known for Sodom and Gomorrah-style rock 'n' roll debauchery, plus a level of heroic narcotic excess that would stun a stable of horses.
"Have we earned that reputation?" says Homme, rolling the question around his mind. "Well, let's just say that we never try to put a limit on fun, shall we?"
There are copious reasons why QotSA, the intensive quasi-metallers fronted by Homme and his shaven-headed, goatee-bearded bassist sidekick Nick Oliveri, have become revered and feared as the hell-raising Led Zeppelin or Aerosmith of modern rock. One is Oliveri's liking for taking to the stage naked, a tendency that led to him being arrested at last year's Rock in Rio festival. We also shouldn't overlook their biggest single to date, 2001's Feel Good Hit of the Summer, the chorus of which ran: "Nicotine, Valium, Vicodin, marijuana, ecstasy and alcohol, co-co-co-co-cococaine!"
Yet Queens of the Stone Age are more than talent-free party animals, as rave reviews for their current album, Songs for the Deaf, have testified. Homme and Oliveri joined, at various times, by giants of the US hardcore scene such as Nirvana/Foo Fighters drummer Dave Grohl and former Screaming Trees singer-songwriter Mark Lanegan, have crafted a claustrophobic and turbulent album, frequently heavy with existential dread and paranoia. The proclamation by the NME that "this is an record you could live in for months" represented one of the more restrained critical verdicts.
As Queens of the Stone Age take to the stage in front of a rabid, sold-out Leeds audience, it's easy to see why they've been held up in many quarters as the first truly great US rock band since Nirvana. Homme, Oliveri and former Danzig drummer Joey Castillo invest thunderous rhythms with a drive that recalls rock behemoths such as Black Sabbath, Deep Purple and Hawkwind. In line with the famous Hawkwind mantra of "If you want to get into it, you got to get out of it," QotSA sound as druggy as any band can get without actually being injected into your veins.
Lanegan, who is now formally a full-time Queen, joins them sporadically. His sandpaper rasp, a result of a long-standing 60-a-day cigarette habit plus a throat condition, is an evocative counterpoint to Homme's keening vocal.
It's a memorable set, closed by The Lost Art of Keeping a Secret and Feel Good Hit of the Summer, a fact acknowledged backstage by Homme as he considers the evening: "Yeah, we f**kin'rocked tonight."Buzzing from the show, Homme is up for action and keen to explore what Leeds has to offer. "I'm going to find some f**king trouble on this tour if it kills me!" he says. The night goes on to become a blur of beers and whisky shots.
"What time did I finish up last night? Oh, about 9 o'clock in the morning," says Homme the next afternoon at Birmingham's moth-eaten Academy venue for the next night of the tour. "What happened at the end of the night? I really dare not say. I travelled a long and bizarre road, but I'd like to put on record that it finally led to a happy place."
Despite his musical inventiveness and hedonistic lifestyle, Homme looks a somewhat unorthodox rock star. Pallid, slightly overweight and sporting a side parting in his ginger hair, he resembles a vaguely seedy preppy more than a spiritual descendant of Steven Tyler or Kurt Cobain. And while he's clearly happiest swapping banter and insults with Oliveri, he shows a certain intelligence as he explains the philosophy behind his tempestuous band.
Homme and Oliveri began making music in the mid-1980s, when they were both 14. Together with two other schoolfriends from Palm Desert, California, they formed the now semi- legendary psychedelic/stoner metal band, Kyuss. Their heavy-duty riffing and uncompromising punk ethos evoked admiration in US hardcore circles, Kyuss enjoyed a degree of commercial success until intra-band strife led to a split in 1995. The seminal status they now enjoy in US rock mythology led to a recent $2 million offer to reform for one tour. "It took me about three seconds to turn that down," says Homme. "Kyuss were never about money, and to reform for that reason would be tantamount to blasphemy."
After Kyuss fragmented, Homme formed the short-lived Gamma Ray, while Oliveri joined the shock-punks Dwarves before the duo reconvened in Queens of the Stone Age in 1998. Their eponymous début album caused few ripples, but 2000's Rated R, excited rather more attention, not least due to the inclusion of Feel Good Hit of the Summer. "We knew we'd get grief from the censors for that lyric," drawls Homme, "so we just thought that we'd beat them to it."
Last summer's Songs for the Deaf, though, has upped the ante. A dark, foreboding suite of music, it features pulverising semi-metal guitar anthems, such as No One Knows and Go with the Flow, which imply the band were in a bleak frame of mind when they made the album. "Well, songwriting is a very cathartic experience for me," Homme says. "And sure, this record deals with a lot of things that were difficult at the time. We expel our demons. We had a few deaths, a few personal relationships went awry, and we lost a few friends along the way."
So does he find it hard to turn such experiences into music? "I find it hard to turn anything else into music," he says, with gimlet-eyed stare
Homme is a student of rock's historical lineage, taking great delight in being compared to Iggy Pop's landmark group. "The Stooges were the best rock 'n' roll band of all time bar none, and any analogy between them and our band is a huge compliment for us," he says.
He is somewhat less enamoured, however, of the idea of his band as saviours of rock 'n' roll. "Shit, I never noticed that rock was in a burning building and someone needed to rush in and grab it," he says. "I mean, if we saved rock from a burning building, what did the Strokes save it from? Drowning? Did the White Stripes rescue it after it broke its leg in a bizarre skiing accident? I'm sorry, I don't perceive music that way."
Wary of fuelling the band's reputation for heavy narcotics use, Homme side-steps a question about whether he feels they take more drugs than any other: "Well, I guess we take more drugs than Hanson!"
The hyperactive Homme has many extra-curricular projects. He is planning gigs with his side band, the Eagles of Death Metal, whose songs are all written by "a guy who is an acid-taking, speed addict devil worshipper Republican speech-writer from North Carolina". He has also made his début in the film world: "I wrote some songs for The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys. It's a very dark movie, starring Jodie Foster as a one-legged nun who torments some kids."
Just then Oliveri enters the room. "Did you know the Catholic church has merged with K-Mart for a big sale?" he asks. "Boys' pants half off."
One hour later, the Queens of the Stone Age take to the stage at the Birmingham Academy. Once again they are colossal, a cavalcade of thunderous riffs and belligerent rock alive with twisted undercurrents. Watching, you could easily believe you were witnessing the best heavy rock band in the world.
"People might perceive us as a bunch of drug-pumped loonies, but the making of music is like poetry or art to us," says Homme before vanishing into the night.
"It's intense. And it's very, very special." - (Guardian Service)
Songs for the Deaf is on the Interscope label. The single No One Knows is out innext week