Queens of the Stone Age

• 1. Introduction

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  Queens of the Stone Age is an American rock band, and four men connected to it share a tattoo that reads Freitag 4:15. The words mark the starting time of a set at the Rock am Ring festival in Germany in 2001. Josh Homme, the band's singer and guitarist, later called it "the worst show we've ever played and it was in front of 40,000 people." Bassist Nick Oliveri, singer Mark Lanegan, Homme and the band's soundman, Hutch, all had the time inked on their skin. Oliveri chose his ribs, so that it would hurt and he would never forget. Most bands try to bury their worst night. This one wore it permanently. That choice raises a few questions. Why would a group commemorate failure? How does a band survive when its cast of musicians keeps changing and only one man never leaves? And what carried such a restless group to the top of the American album chart?

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• 2. Kings and Queens

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  In 1995 the band Kyuss broke up, and Josh Homme moved to Seattle. There he briefly joined Screaming Trees as a touring guitarist. He then formed a new group called Gamma Ray, which released a self-titled EP in 1996. The EP carried the songs "Born to Hula" and "If Only Everything." The second would later reappear on the debut album as "If Only." Van Conner of Screaming Trees and drummer Victor Indrizzo played on it.

  In 1997 the German power metal band Gamma Ray threatened to sue, and the name had to go. The replacement came from producer Chris Goss, who had once used the nickname Queens of the Stone Age for Kyuss. Homme explained the choice with a joke about wrestling. "Kings would be too macho," he said. In his picture, the Kings of the Stone Age wore armor and fought, while the Queens kept the Kings' girlfriends company. Rock, he said, should be "heavy enough for the boys and sweet enough for the girls." He added that "Kings of the Stone Age is too lopsided."

  The first release under the new name was the song "18 A.D." It appeared on a Roadrunner Records compilation called Burn One Up! Music for Stoners. Guitarist Dave Catching played on it, along with bassist Milo Beenhakker and drummer Eva Nahon of the Dutch stoner rock band Beaver. Homme had met them during a few months in Amsterdam.

  The band's first live show took place on the 20th of November 1997 at the OK Hotel. Matt Cameron played drums, Mike Johnson of Dinosaur Jr. played bass, and John McBain of Monster Magnet played guitar. In December came a split EP that paired three tracks from the Gamma Ray sessions with three Kyuss tracks recorded in 1995. Three months after that first night, the band returned to the OK Hotel. This time Van Conner and Jason Albertini of Duster joined the lineup.

  Homme then went back to his native Palm Desert, California. There he released the self-titled debut album in 1998 on Loosegroove Records, the label run by Stone Gossard and Regan Hagar. Man's Ruin Records issued it on vinyl. Homme played guitar and bass, crediting the bass to an alter ego named Carlo Von Sexron. Alfredo Hernandez played drums, and Chris Goss and Hutch added parts. Homme reportedly asked Mark Lanegan to sing on the record, but Lanegan was busy elsewhere. That absence would not last.

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• 3. Robot Rock

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  At the 2001 Roskilde Festival, Homme gave a name to his band's formula in an interview with KUNO-TV. He called it "robot rock." He described the music as rock versions of electronic music, drawing on the repetition of trance, along with dance music, hip hop, trip hop and Krautrock. Rolling Stone saw a link between the macho American rock of the early 1970s, such as Blue Cheer and Grand Funk Railroad, and the precision-timing drones of German rock from the same years. Critics have also filed the band under alternative rock, stoner rock, alternative metal and hard rock.

  Homme described the first album as driving music, angular and recorded dry, built on solid, repetitive riffs. Of the second, Rated R, he said: "There's a robotic element to our albums, like the repetition of riffs." He wanted dynamic range too. "We don't want to get roped in by our own music," he said. That record used more instruments and more guests, and its lead vocals were shared by Homme, Oliveri and Lanegan. As Homme put it, "Our first record announced our sound. This one added that we're different and weird."

  The third album, Songs for the Deaf, kept three lead vocalists and added horn and string sections. The fourth, Lullabies to Paralyze, turned darker, with imagery drawn from the folk and fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm. The band used almost nothing but semi-hollow body guitars on it. Homme explained his thinking in 2005: "Where the poetry seems to be is when you start in the dark and reach for the light." The change of tone owed a great deal to the loss of Oliveri.

  Homme's guitar playing rests on a scale he calls his own. It is the blues scale, altered over years of playing, with the intervals 1, music flat sign 3, 3, music flat sign 5, 5, 6 and music flat sign 7. It amounts to the half whole scale with its second degree left out. He traced his influences to polka guitar styles and the techniques of Jimi Hendrix. His falsetto became another trademark.

  By the fifth album, Era Vulgaris, the sound leaned toward dance rhythms and electronic textures. Homme called the record "dark, hard, and electrical, sort of like a construction worker."

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• 4. Breakthrough Years

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  Rob Halford, the singer of Judas Priest, happened to be recording next door when Rated R was made in 2000. He stepped in for a guest spot on "Feel Good Hit of the Summer." He was only one of many. The record was a gathering of Homme and Oliveri's wider crew. Lanegan sang, drummers Nick Lucero and Gene Trautmann played, and guitarists Dave Catching and Brendon McNichol contributed, along with Chris Goss.

  The lineup had grown since the debut. Oliveri, a former Kyuss bassist, had joined as soon as the album sessions ended, and the first tour was played by a band made up entirely of ex-Kyuss members. Catching, once a Kyuss guitar tech, soon followed. Drummer Hernandez left before the second album was recorded.

  Rated R was the band's major label debut, on Interscope Records. It drew positive reviews, far more attention than the debut, and a breakout single, "The Lost Art of Keeping a Secret." Yet the retailer Walmart judged the lyrics of "Feel Good Hit of the Summer" to promote drug use, and the record nearly disappeared from its shelves. Opening slots followed with The Smashing Pumpkins, Foo Fighters and Hole, plus a place at Ozzfest 2000. Kerrang! Awards named the band Best International Newcomer that year.

  Trouble followed success. At the 2001 Rock in Rio show, Oliveri performed naked with only his bass guitar covering him, and he was arrested. He apologized to officials and said he had not known it was a crime in Brazil. After the Rated R work, Lanegan became a full-time member, a role he kept until early 2005.

  In late 2001, Dave Grohl, the Foo Fighters frontman and former Nirvana drummer, joined to record drums for the third album. Songs for the Deaf came out in August 2002 with Lanegan on it again. The closing track, "Mosquito Song," featured Paz Lenchantin on viola and piano and Dean Ween on guitar. After its release, guitarist Troy Van Leeuwen, like Lenchantin once of A Perfect Circle, joined the touring band.

  Homme wanted the album to feel like lightning in a bottle. Its radio interludes were meant to recall the drive from Los Angeles to Joshua Tree, "more David Lynch with every mile." The record was certified gold in 2003 with sales of over 900,000. "No One Knows" and "Go with the Flow" became radio and MTV hits, and the first just missed the Billboard Top 40. Those two songs went on to Guitar Hero and Rock Band, and "Go with the Flow" later reached the Fortnite Festival. "You Think I Ain't Worth a Dollar, But I Feel Like a Millionaire" was heard in Tony Hawk's Underground and IndyCar Series, and in the films xXx, Project X and Skincare. It also opened Jak X: Combat Racing in 2005. The band's biggest year came right before one of its hardest.

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• 5. Firings and Fallout

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  In January 2004, the Songs for the Deaf tour ended with a string of headline dates in Australia. Grohl went back to his other projects. On the European leg, former Danzig drummer Joey Castillo replaced him and then joined for good. After the tour, Homme fired Oliveri. He had become convinced that Oliveri had been physically abusive to his girlfriend. "If I ever find out that this is true, I can't know you, man," Homme recalled telling him. Homme considered ending the band but found fresh determination instead.

  Oliveri hit back in the press. He claimed the band had been "poisoned by hunger for power" and that without him it was "Queens Lite." Later he softened, saying his relationship with Homme was good and that the new record "kicks ass." By October 2006 he reportedly wanted to rejoin.

  In late 2004, Homme, Van Leeuwen, Castillo and multi-instrumentalist Alain Johannes of Eleven recorded Lullabies to Paralyze. Its title came from a lyric in "Mosquito Song." Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top was a guest. Lanegan reportedly turned down an invitation to stay with the band. Even so, he sang on new tracks, including the solo vocal on the opening song, "This Lullaby." He also joined the tour when his schedule and health allowed.

  The album leaked onto the internet in February 2005. On the 3rd of March, Triple J in Australia aired it as a "World Premiere" that the station could not substantiate. It was officially released on Tuesday the 22nd of March 2005 and debuted at number 5 on the Billboard chart. Homme later said the Lullabies era was the band's lowest point. He added that the record "took the lead jacket off" the group after Oliveri was fired.

  On the 14th of May 2005 the band played Saturday Night Live, hosted by Will Ferrell. Ferrell brought back his character Gene Frenkle, a fictional cowbellist of Blue Oyster Cult. Frenkle played the wood block part of "Little Sister" on a cowbell. In November 2005 the band released a live album and DVD set, Over the Years and Through the Woods, filmed in London. Later that year the band supported Nine Inch Nails on the With Teeth tour.

  On the 19th and the 20th of December 2005, at the Wiltern in Los Angeles, Nine Inch Nails guitarist Aaron North sat in for several songs. The second night had a bigger surprise. John Garcia, Homme's former Kyuss bandmate, came on stage for the first time since 1997. As an encore the two played three Kyuss songs: "Thumb," "Hurricane" and "Supa Scoopa and Mighty Scoop." Soon after, the band would make an album with a new rhythm section.

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• 6. Duluth and Farewell

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  On Valentine's Day 2007 the band's website announced that the new album would be called Era Vulgaris. A lineup of guest singers was reported, including Trent Reznor, Julian Casablancas of The Strokes, Mark Lanegan, Billy Gibbons and the late humorist Erma Bombeck. Jesse F. Keeler of Death from Above 1979 was expected to play bass but dropped out because of schedule conflicts. The record was finished in early April and released in the United States on the 12th of June 2007. Its singles were "Sick, Sick, Sick" and "3's & 7's." Homme was now the only lead vocalist, and he later called the record a grower. His first idea for his singing was to try "some shit that was downright embarrassing."

  Touring changed hands. Bassist Michael Shuman, who also played in Mini Mansions, replaced Alain Johannes. Dean Fertita, of The Dead Weather, took over from keyboardist Natasha Shneider. Both would become permanent members.

  The band called its 2007 North American tour the Duluth Tour. It went to small towns and cities it had never visited, including Duluth, Minnesota. The tour expanded to the United Kingdom, where the band played more shows than on any earlier British run. A planned EP of B-sides, which one newspaper said could hold as many as ten tracks, never appeared. Reports said the label did not want another Queens release at that point.

  In November 2007 the band played a semi-acoustic set in an underground salt mine in Germany. The set mixed hits, rarities, covers and an unreleased song, "Cathedral City." A DVD was planned, but only a trailer and a few photographs have ever come out.

  On the 2nd of July 2008, former keyboardist Natasha Shneider died of lung cancer at the age of 52. The news first appeared on the MySpace page of Sweethead, the band of her close friend Troy Van Leeuwen. Homme replaced the band's homepage with a memorial message. On the 16th of August 2008, at the Henry Fonda Theatre in Los Angeles, the band held a concert celebrating her life. Her husband, Alain Johannes, took the stage, along with Tenacious D, Matt Cameron, Brody Dalle, Jesse Hughes, Chris Goss and PJ Harvey. They played songs by the band and by others, including covers of Cream and The Doors. Proceeds helped cover the costs of her treatment.

  The Era Vulgaris tour ended at the Reading and Leeds festivals on the 22nd and the 23rd of August 2008. Homme told the BBC that he was heading back to the studio. It would be years before the next album arrived.

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• 7. A Stopped Heart

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  During 2009 and 2010, the members scattered across side projects. Troy Van Leeuwen started the band Sweethead. Joey Castillo drummed for Eagles of Death Metal on their Heart On tour. Michael Shuman kept playing drums and singing in Mini Mansions, and Dean Fertita joined Jack White's The Dead Weather. Homme formed the supergroup Them Crooked Vultures with Dave Grohl and John Paul Jones. After that group finished touring in June, the Queens released a two-CD deluxe edition of Rated R on the 3rd of August 2010, with six B-sides and live recordings from the band's 2000 Reading performance.

  Then, in 2010, a knee operation went wrong. Homme's heart stopped for a short time because of asphyxiation, and doctors used a defibrillator to revive him. He was bedridden for four months and fell into a deep depression, during which he considered abandoning music altogether. On Marc Maron's WTF podcast he explained that he had picked up a methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus infection, known as MRSA, which his stress-weakened immune system could not fight off. He has said the ordeal shaped the writing and recording of ...Like Clockwork.

  After his recovery, the band put out a remastered version of the debut in early 2011 and toured it, performing the whole album. The band played Conan on the 14th of April and later appeared at the Soundwave festival in Australia. That summer they were on the bill at the Glastonbury Festival and other European events. On the 3rd and the 4th of September 2011, they played Pearl Jam's 20th Anniversary Festival at Alpine Valley in East Troy, Wisconsin. Those shows were the last with drummer Joey Castillo.

  In March 2011, Homme said that rehearsing the first album was reshaping the new one. What had been bluesy was turning "trancey, broken" and, as he put it, "The robots are coming home!" Recording did not begin until August 2012, and in November Homme told BBC Radio 1 host Zane Lowe that Castillo had left. Dave Grohl would play drums on the new album, as he had on Songs for the Deaf. Former members Nick Oliveri, Alain Johannes and Mark Lanegan took part as well. Guests included Trent Reznor, Jake Shears of Scissor Sisters, Brody Dalle, Elton John, Alex Turner of Arctic Monkeys and James Lavelle of UNKLE.

  A new drummer, Jon Theodore, formerly of The Mars Volta, played on some tracks. He made his live debut on the 30th of March 2013 at Lollapalooza Brasil, where the band premiered "My God Is The Sun." ...Like Clockwork came out on Matador Records on the 3rd of June 2013 in the United Kingdom and the next day in the United States. The band produced it itself, and it was the first to include full contributions from Shuman and Fertita. It debuted at number one in the United States, the first Queens album to do so. Nick Oliveri sang backing vocals on it, his first contribution to the band in nine years.

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• 8. Villains and Catacombs

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  After the band played the Made In America Festival, which Jay Z owns, Homme complained about the visit in a radio interview. Security had frisked his band before the show. He also described a bottle of champagne and a request for a photo as a gift that was really a marketing tool. "That's not a gift, that is a marketing tool," he said, and he destroyed the bottle. That autumn the ...Like Clockwork tour ended with a Halloween party at The Forum in Los Angeles. Oliveri joined the encore for "Auto Pilot" and "Quick and to the Pointless," which the band had not played in a decade.

  The band played at the 56th Annual Grammy Awards with Trent Reznor, Lindsey Buckingham and Dave Grohl, then toured Australia with Nine Inch Nails in 2014. By March 2016 Michael Shuman said the band was on a break. Homme and Dean Fertita worked on Iggy Pop's 2016 album Post Pop Depression, and Van Leeuwen joined the supergroup Gone Is Gone. In April 2017 the band posted a new logo and the words "Coming Twentyfive." Villains was announced on the 14th of June 2017 with a teaser in which the band took a polygraph test alongside Liam Lynch and producer Mark Ronson. It was released on the 25th of August 2017. On the 24th of October the band headlined Madison Square Garden for the first time, having opened there for Nine Inch Nails in 2005. Three sets of free tickets were hidden at stations along the Q line of the New York City Subway.

  On the 9th of December 2017, at the KROQ Acoustic Christmas concert in Inglewood, California, Homme kicked a photographer's camera into her face and injured her. He was under the influence of alcohol. He apologized in a video on the band's Instagram page, saying, "Goodnight, godspeed."

  In June 2019, Billy Gibbons said he had played on a new Queens album and that Dave Grohl had been involved. Grohl denied it, saying he and Homme had only spent time "riding motorcycles and eating waffles." In early May 2023, a product listing for In Times New Roman... appeared on the band's website and was quickly removed. The first single, "Emotion Sickness," came out on the 11th of May, followed by "Carnavoyeur" and "Paper Machete." The album arrived on the 16th of June 2023. Neither Gibbons nor Grohl appeared, but Matt Helders of Arctic Monkeys sang and The Section Quartet played strings. The song "Emotion Sickness" was nominated for Best Rock Song, one of nine Grammy nominations the band has earned across its career.

  The End Is Nero Tour ran from 2023 into 2025. In July 2024, Homme needed emergency surgery, and the band canceled several European shows, with Jack White filling in at some festivals. On the 23rd of August, the rest of the year's dates were canceled or postponed because Homme needed "essential medical care for the remainder of the year."

  That same July, the band had recorded a concert in the Paris Catacombs with a three-piece string section. The performance became the film Alive in the Catacombs, announced on the 13th of May 2025 and released digitally on the 5th of June. It made them the first band granted permission to play inside the catacombs. At its end, Homme can be heard on an unreleased song credited as "Insignificant Other," and a new song called "Easy Street" opened the tour's first night. Homme said there had been "too much time in between" Villains and the last album. The Catacombs Tour is set to resume in spring 2026 with Libby Grace, followed by summer dates with System of a Down in Europe and with Foo Fighters in North America.

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