There are few bands in rock music whose individual members have résumés as long and as impressive as those in Queens of the Stone Age.
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Guitarist TroyThere are few bands in rock music whose individual members have résumés as long and as impressive as those in Queens of the Stone Age.
Guitarist Troy Van Leeuwen has graced albums by A Perfect Circle, Puscifer, Eagles of Death Metal and Gone Is Gone, a new alt-metal supergroup featuring Mastodon’s Troy Sanders. Guitarist/keyboardist Dean Fertita has moonlighted with the Raconteurs, the Dead Weather and, most recently, Iggy Pop with QOTSA frontman Josh Homme.
While few bands would tolerate such infidelities, these Queens seem to thrive on it.
“I’ve been in this band for almost a decade and it just feels like home,” says Fertita. “It’s been a luxury to be in such a great group and still have the freedom to play with so many different people over the years. The idea is we’ll all grow as musicians and bring it back to the band.”
Van Leeuwen concurs. “It’s a very healthy creative environment. When we circle back to making a Queens record, we’re all recharged and psyched to play together again.”
Playing in a band with three guitarists no doubt demands an ability to work well with others, but it’s almost shocking to hear the enthusiasm the trio has for adding their piece of the puzzle.
Was there a guitar game plan going into this album?
DEAN FERTITA Conceptually, we knew we wanted this record to be very upfront. That immediately suggested looking for smaller, layered sounds that wouldn’t take up a ton of space. It was fun. We had to get creative on how we were going to do that, and not just go to some default settings that we’ve used over the years.
There are a lot of guitar cooks in the kitchen in the Queens of the Stone Age. How do the arrangements get