Interview

Rhino Records just released Queensryche’s epic new concept album, American Soldier. The ambitious record encompasses a dozen songs inspired by numerous interviews with veterans conducted by Geoff Tate, the group’s singer and chief songwriter, who was intent on telling their story using their words. After speaking with soldiers who served in various conflicts — from World War II to Iraq — Tate turned their firsthand experiences from the frontlines into an unflinching musical examination of the life of a solider and the consequences of war.

Tate recently sat down in L.A. to explain the inspiration and story behind each track on American Soldier.

Sliver

The song “Sliver” is based upon the drill sergeant. We’ve also seen the drill sergeant character kind of immortalized in films. We’re talking about boot camp here. We’re talking about the initial entry into military life, which is pretty intense. That song just kind of had this feel to it that it felt like that to me. I was playing it for one of the soldiers who I had interviewed – just the music to it – and he was really relating to the song. He was a younger guy and he really liked the rhythm of it and the feel of it. And I said, “I’m writing this about boot camp.” And he said, “Aw, that would be perfect! Yeah, I can see that already! It’s got that beat!” So that made me feel like I was on the right path.

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Unafraid

“Unafraid” is a song that came about – again very heavily based on interviews with soldiers – it’s actually about two soldiers, one from Vietnam and one from the Kosovo conflict who are talking about their experiences. What’s interesting to me is that it’s almost like the stories are interchangeable. Was he talking about Vietnam or was he talking about Kosovo? The story’s the same, really. What is also the same is the mindset a soldier has to have when he goes into a conflict and that’s where the song’s title comes in.

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Hundred Mile Stare

“Hundred Mile Stare” has sort of an anthemic quality about it. It’s a big, moving piece of music that really makes me think of a unit of soldiers, that feeling they have of unity and being a team. I wanted to get across that idea with a song in some way, that the job that they have is a very difficult one and they get it done and they do what they have to do. And that’s how they think, they think as one. They move as one. They’re just this rolling unit of solidarity and that to me has a rhythm to it in a sense.

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At 30,000 FT

I was talking with a fighter pilot who had flown many missions in the Gulf War and he was expressing the disconnection you feel, as a pilot especially, from almost everything around you. You’re so high in the air – 30,000 feet in the air. You’re up above everything and you’re looking at video screens and target locators and you push a button and you fly away. And it’s not hand-to-hand combat. It’s not one on one. It’s a complete disconnection from the enemy. I found that to be an amazing concept. How surgical and sterile. It’s almost like life with rubber gloves on. You don’t touch anything, you don’t get your hands dirty. So that idea was kind of floating around in my head and when I heard the guys come up with this piece of music, immediately it latched onto that. I thought that those two are going to work really well together – that lyrical concept and that music.

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A Dead Man’s Words

“Dead Man’s Words” is based upon a story I was told. The story goes that a soldier was shot down behind enemy lines and very badly injured. And the military has this motto, “no man left behind,” and so they ask for volunteers to go back and get the guy. Three soldiers volunteered and they went out to get the guy and it was three day hike in to where they had to go. They couldn’t get dropped in because it was so deep in, so they had to hike in. And they rescued the guy but two of them died in the rescue attempt. So the song is based on that story and it’s sung from the point of two different soldiers – the one that’s injured and the one that’s rescuing – so two different perspectives.

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The Killer

“The Killer” is a song that has its origins from when I was a kid. In the ’70’s soldiers were coming back from Vietnam and it was a very unpopular time for what the soldiers were about and what they were doing. People called them baby killers. It was just a very negative time in our history as a culture. So the song is an attempt to explain that position of being a killer. How do you do that? How do you kill somebody, or many people, and then kind of meld back into society? Does it change you? It’s something that none of us can really relate to, I think, unless we’ve been there and done it. How do you face somebody down who’s trying to kill you and kill them? It’s like a survival mechanism. You have to be the killer if you want to live. That’s one of the lines from the song: “I want to live.” So I have to do this. I have no choice.

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Middle of Hell

One of the soldiers I interviewed was in Baghdad and his job was going out on these patrols in the city. And you’re driving in these Humvees and the weird thing about it is, as he said, was that you never were certain who the enemy was because you’re in a civilian population and it could be anybody. You just don’t know. So you’re on constant high alert. Adrenaline on 10. You’re paranoid, you’re looking around, you don’t know what’s what. He was writing a letter back to his dad and he quoted that line because his dad said when he joined the military that he was going into the middle of hell. And the soldier wrote him back and said, “Yeah you’re right. I’m here. This is hell. I don’t know what’s up and what’s down.” So when they’re driving in these patrols all over the city, down the roads and highways, they have to drive in a certain formation. When he got back to the States on leave he was driving his car and he got pulled over by a policeman. The policeman said, “Do you know what you were doing wrong?” And the soldier said, “Well, no.” And the policeman said, “Well, you were driving down the middle of the road. You gotta pick a lane.” And the soldier told him, “Look, I just got back from Iraq and you can’t drive in the lanes because that’s where the bombs are. So you drive down the middle of the road.” So he didn’t get a ticket. But that song is based on this whole experience.

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If I Were King

“If I Were King” is a song that was based on an experience that a soldier had in Somalia. He was 19 years old and he was in charge of a small patrol of soldiers and one of his buddies got shot and died. The particular soldier, who was the leader, felt very guilty about the death and very remorseful. And it took him a long time to understand the dynamics of what he had experienced and he wished he could change things. He said at one point, “If I were king, I could change anything. I wish that my friend was still alive. I wish I could have done something.”

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Man Down

“Man Down” is a song that is based on a soldier’s experience of coming back from conflict and trying to meld back into society. He never really felt quite right about being in one place and so he had some money saved up and he bought a car. He through everything he had in the car and started cris-crossing the country about eight or ten times, just driving all day long, all night until he got too tired. Pull over, grab a motel, sleep, go again. Just a constant movement made him feel comfortable. So the military has a saying, they call an injured soldier “man down,” a call to rescue or a call to arms. To me, what that soldier had suffered was emotional trauma and he truly was a man down.

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Remember Me

One of the experiences I found very constant with the interviews of soldiers that I conducted was the feeling of loss and separation from families and friends. And “Remember Me” is a song using that as a theme. You know when you go to work in your life you’re gone 8-10 hours a day and you can be in touch with your family during the day, but you come home at night. But when a soldier goes into a conflict he’s usually on the other side of the world and he’s in a very very dangerous situation where it’s life threatening. So there is no sense of security for the family to know that daddy or mommy is coming home. And you’re usually deployed for quite a long time – months at a time, 6 months, 8 months – and that’s a long time to be away from your family and your kids. So this causes a lot of trauma with soldiers and their families and I wanted to write a song about that.

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Home Again

“Home Again” is a song that is based on the theme of separation of family. In this case it is a father and daughter. The father’s gone off to war and the daughter is writing him a letter and he’s writing her a letter and their communicating that way. And they’re saying the same things: “Be strong, be safe.” “Come home to me.” “I’ll come home to you.” “I’m sorry I would be there with you in your life at all times, to watch the school play and be there for you, but I’m going to come home. I promise, I promise.” And she’s saying the same things back to him and I found that to be a touching framework to write a song around. It was great because I got to work with my daughter Emily on it. She sang the part of the daughter and I sang the father’s part and so that song has a lot of meaning for me.

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The Voice

“The Voice” is a song I wrote from the standpoint of a critically wounded soldier. They oftentimes hear a very calm voice in their head when they’re in a situation where they’ve been badly wounded and maybe a life-threatening wound. I found that to be an interesting idea that seems rather constant with the soldiers that I interviewed – that they all were hearing the same kind of thing. I thought that was kind of interesting and unique. Even my dad said it when he was injured in Korea that the voice just talks to you, “It’s okay, relax, it’s all gonna be alright.” Whether you believe it or not is another story, but it’s interesting stuff for a song.

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Editor’s Note: Help honor the AMERICAN SOLDIER by sharing (1) stories of service and sacrifice, (2) song dedications to military personnel at home and abroad, and (3) your list of top-5 songs related to war and life on the frontlines.

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