The ninth album from California rockers Queens of the Stone Age is the band\u2019s softest effort to date. The stoner rock veterans have always melded psychedelic riffs, pop melodies, and danceable grooves with brutally heavy rhythms. On Perfecth, however, that heaviness is missing. There are no crunching guitars, and even the tunings are different. Though they\u2019ve played in a variety of tunings, Queens of the Stone Age are best known for playing tuned down two full steps to the low, growling C-Standard. The songs on Perfecth are played in standard tuning and other brighter alternate tunings, giving the album a lighter tone.<\/p>\n
In place of the heavy, chugging guitars, the band places more of an emphasis on melody. Josh Homme\u2019s vocals take center stage as his softer guitar interplays with the guitars and keyboards of multi-instrumentalists Troy Van Leeuwen and Dean Fertita.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The album opener, \u201cIt\u2019s Only Love,\u201d is a brooding mid-tempo track with a thick, murky sound. In the song, Homme lays out the overarching theme for the album of love as a double-edged sword. \u201cIt\u2019s only love, this twist of hope I\u2019m hanging on,\u201d Homme croons, then contrasts it with the next line. \u201cIt\u2019s only love, this greasy rope I\u2019m hangin\u2019 on.\u201d It\u2019s the sort of clever wordplay that Homme\u2019s lyrics are known for.<\/p>\n
\u201cInsignificant Other\u201d is a soulful, mid-tempo track built on shimmering guitars and a bouncing groove. It\u2019s the QOTSA version of yacht rock, with Homme crooning about a lover who\u2019s become distant and made him feel insignificant.\u00a0 \u201cA quick rescue, then you left to repeat your mistakes,\u201d Homme sings over the catchy groove.<\/p>\n
Perfecth strips most of the aggression and intensity from the Queens of the Stone Age sound, but there is still a spirit of experimentalism, from the intertwining melodies and jazzy feel of \u201cMono\u201d to the punk-inspired \u201cSunday,\u201d a song Homme originally recorded with Iggy Pop for his 2016 album Post Pop Depression.<\/p>\n
Country singer Nikki Lane provides guest vocals on the acoustic strummer \u201cEasy Street,\u201d one of several acoustic tracks on the album. The song again focuses on an unhealthy relationship, this one of the love-hate variety. \u201cI\u2019m not like that anymore, been dead a long time; I don\u2019t believe in luck, so you can have mine,\u201d Homme and Lane sing in a folksy harmony.\u00a0<\/p>\n
There are a few moments of aggression on Perfecth. The menacing thump and squealing guitars of \u201cWhere the Goth Girls At\u201d is a welcome change of pace. The album-closing \u201cRunaway from the Mob\u201d starts as another mid-tempo acoustic ballad, but in the final minute, the loud, distorted guitars crash in for a frenzied outro jam.<\/p>\n
The melodies on Perfecth are good. Homme has always had a knack for composing melodic hooks and memorable vocals, but without the heavy riffs and bursts of intensity, the melodies are all that\u2019s left. The result is a Queens of the Stone Age album that is solid but not at the same level as the rest of the catalog.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The ninth album from California rockers Queens of the Stone Age is the band\u2019s softest effort to date.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":386669,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[9,24,63,122,124,123],"class_list":["post-386668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/386668","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=386668"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/386668\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/386669"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=386668"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=386668"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=386668"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}