Attention Deficit Delirium

For hard rock and metal fans, Geoff Tate needs no introduction. The dynamic, dramatic frontman for Queensrÿche — who have now been making music for nearly 30 years, believe it or not — has influenced scores of singers, sung on classic albums like Rage For Order and helped elevate metal into a thought-provoking art form. And he’s always a fun interview.

Just prior to Christmas, Tate discussed his wine brand Insania for a story I was working on for Grammy.com ["Eat, Drink & Rock and Roll"], and he offered plenty more to ADD about his group’s nine-month tour supporting the American Soldier album, their next release, his exploits in the wine business, his former vegan ways, the rigors of modern touring and the proposed Operation: Mindcrime musical for Broadway. (Read Part Two here.)


It’s good to hear that Queensrÿche’s recent tour did well, especially given our shaky economy.
I know a lot of media outlets have been talking about live music and saying that the whole scene is dead and that nobody cares about live music anymore, but I think that’s really false. It might be true in certain isolated places or in the country that they’re writing from, but I have to say that more people want live music. They love it. It’s not something you can replace with digital recordings. The biggest problem about live music is letting people know that it’s happening. It’s so difficult for people to find out what’s going on because the way so many websites are constructed is so convoluted, and there’s so much information, it’s hard to navigate. And there are hardly any papers anymore. That’s what I see.

What was the hardest part about this particular tour in terms of reaching out to people?
Just that, letting people know that the band is in town. It’s always the toughest thing, and I think other artists experience that same thing, too. We always talk about it when people get together. People are always saying to all musicians, “Oh, I didn’t know you were in town.” Great. Thank you, promoter!

Do you think that age also plays a factor in this? Even though I’m in the media, I find it hard to keep up with everything that’s going on because there’s so much information out there. I figure as people get older they don’t follow things as much, especially those who are outside of the business. They wait for other people to come to them and tell them what’s happening.
Yeah, that’s very true, too. A lot of people get their information off TV nowadays. So unless you’re a TV star nobody knows about you.

So the American Soldier tour did well overall?
It went great. It was really a knuckle biter at the beginning because there wasn’t a lot of pre-sold tickets, and we base all of our internal economy on touring. It slowly started building, and I have to say it was a really successful tour this year. I’m very happy about that.


You have your own brand of wine called Insania that you created in conjunction with Three Rivers Winery. Have you always had an affinity for wine, or is it something that has developed throughout your life?
It’s normal in our house to drink wine, and I really discovered through touring and traveling to different countries where they have a wine culture that I had a taste for and interest in it. Over the years I got a little more interested in it and tried several different wines. My wife and I just got back from France. We were touring the wine areas and sampling different types of wine and familiarizing ourselves with smaller wineries around the country, and we had a great time. The interest just keeps growing, and we have quite a wine collection now. In fact, I have to build a bigger place to store everything I’ve got because it’s stuck in corners and closets. You’ve got to keep stuff at the right temperature or your investment goes bad.

When you fly overseas, given that you cannot take liquids on planes anymore, how do you bring everything back?
You have to ship it back. But it is difficult.

Do you have to use specific importers to bring wine back?
Yes, you have to go through importers and people with licenses. It’s a big, convoluted mess. Our liquor laws in the United States are Prohibition-era wine and alcohol laws, and slowly state-by-state they’re trying to repeal things and upgrade them to the 21st century, but it’s just slow going. Our state, Washington, is the second largest wine producer in the country, and we just recently had some changes in our import laws and shipping laws. It took this long. California is way ahead of us on that. Unfortunately we’re a Puritan-based society that is really stuck on religions, so it kind of flies in the face of that. Other countries don’t have that kind of background and have more of a wine culture, like France, Spain and Italy. They’re so far ahead of us in what they do. We have the resources here in this country, and there are a lot of great wine producing regions in the country, but we’re just now getting a hold on it. American wine has made quite a mark internationally. You can go to fine restaurants in Paris and see American wines on the menu, which is great. When we travel we try to spread the word about what we do, not only our wine but other people’s wines as well that are based in the country.





How seriously do people take a wine brand from a rock star? When people find out that they’re drinking something from the singer for Queensrÿche, what is the first reaction that you get?
I think very interested, until they taste it, then they go, “Wow! This is serious.” It’s a very well done wine, very elegant. In fact, we just had a really interesting experience. The band played a cruise ship that went to the Caribbean [around November], and they had these events planned. They asked us if they could do a wine tasting, and I said sure. I brought some cases of it onto the ship, and had this big wine tasting for all the guests of the ship. It was a fantastic event, then afterwards the captain invited us to have dinner with him. It was this beautiful gourmet meal, and they served Insania as the wine for the meal. On this Italian-based cruise ship, they had a master sommier. There are a handful of guys that have this title, and they’re incredibly well-trained wine connoisseurs. After a couple of courses of wine, my wife said I should get the master to sample the wine and tell us what he thought. I said, “Oh honey, this guy is a huge pro. What if he doesn’t like it?” They had all these guests there, like 75 people. She had a few drinks and got her courage up and asked him to sample it and tell us what he thought, and he loved it. He gave it a rave review in front of everybody, and we were just sitting there sweating. He’s from Italy, and they have this centuries-old wine industry. He was very kind and loved it. He finished his glass and asked for another one.

It seems like a lot of bands have been jumping on the cruise bandwagon of the last few years. It has become the hip thing to do in the last couple of years. Is it a lucrative business? Does it feel strange to do cruises, kind of like playing Vegas?
I love playing Vegas. It’s just another avenue to play music live, and we’re all about that. We’ll play anywhere. We’ve played music on the back of a flatbed truck. We’ve played it in the middle of the desert. We’ve played it on street corners and radio stations and coliseums and soccer stadiums. Wherever you can play, that’s what you do because you’re a musician. The cruise ship thing has opened up as a venue, and the fans really love it because they save for a year to get the tickets. They go for a week and enjoy themselves and get to see their favorite bands play. It’s a really great atmosphere actually. We had a fantastic time, and I’d definitely do it again.

Did the fans get to meet and mingle with the band on the cruise?
Yeah. You’re stuck on a boat in the middle of the ocean. It’s a big ship, but you still see everybody. You’re in the same restaurants and clubs, out by the pool or on excursions off the boat onto the islands. Sometimes you book the same event. We went on this waterfall tour in Jamaica where they took us up in the mountains. We got to swim in these beautiful, exotic pools of water and waterfalls, and there were fans with us as well. It was a really good time, I have to say. It’s no big deal hanging out with fans. We do it all the time. We do meet and greets after every show, where we have 50 to 75 members of the audience come back and meet the band, take photos and sign autographs. It’s just part of what we do. Some bands don’t like that, but for us it works great.


Last time I spoke to you, you suspected that one of your daughters or son-in-laws may have blown out your stereo system. Have you fixed that?
I’m on my third one since then. Right now one of the channels of my new amp is blown out, and I’m waiting on the holidays to get that fixed.

Whose fault is that?
I haven’t quite pinned it down. We still have a house full of kids, so it could be any one of them. Right now they’re all guilty until proven innocent.

That’s what happens when you have a lot of kids. You could do a semi-movie remake: Cheaper By The Half-Dozen, the rock star version.
That’s what my wife says — when all the kids are out of the house in a couple of years, we’re going to sell this place and get a small condo. But where are they going to go? They’re going to come back for the holidays or say, “Hey, I’ve got to move in for six months while I get my life together.” You have to have a place for them to go. I don’t think we’ll probably ever downsize. They’ll keep coming home and bringing friends, boyfriends and fiancées. Tonight is our Christmas, so having all the kids over. It’s Yule tonight, the longest night of the year, everybody comes over, we have a big dinner and everybody stays up all night.

As far as your future with wine, is this endeavor something you would plan to continue after you retire from being a rock star? Do you see that as a viable occupation?
Oh yeah. I’d love to keep doing it. It’s a challenge to make it every year and to keep making it consistent. You have to deal with Mother Nature, the kind of grapes you get and the kind of growing season it is. I absolutely love it. This year we’re adding a white, next year we’re thinking of adding a different brand, something that’s perhaps a bit lighter. We’re definitely thinking about the future.


Part Two of ADD’s interview with Geoff Tate is found here.



They may hail from modern day South Carolina, but death metal veterans Nile have their minds firmly planted in the world of ancient Egypt. Driven by harsh growls, ferocious guitars, pummeling percussion and the lyrical ruminations of guitarist/co-vocalist/founder Karl Sanders, the group continues to mine dark, aggressive sounds ripe with influences from the distant past. The quartet’s sixth and latest opus, Those Whom The Gods Detest, takes their sound to the next level with top-notch production from Neil Kernon (whose credits include Queensrÿche, Cannibal Corpse and Hall & Oates). And, of course, there is their penchant for song titles both exotic — “Kem Khefa Kheshef” and “Iskander D’hul Karnon” — and epic — “Utterances Of The Crawling Dead,” “Permitting The Noble Dead To Descend To The Underworld” and “Yezd Desert Ghul Ritual In The Abandoned Towers Of Silence”.

I recently spoke with Sanders for ShockHound, and there was plenty of extra material for an exclusive ADD Q&A.


Is it true that you guys recently played in Africa?
Actually, we were scheduled for three shows, and the money was pretty good. But then they decided to cut it down to one big show, and of course correspondingly cut down our money to next to nothing. So by the time it was over we were maybe going to lose a couple hundred bucks, and we’re not in the business of losing money. We’re in the business of playing music and earning a living. So the African shows did not happen, much to our dismay.

Where were you supposed to play?
A couple of South African [cities] — Johannesburg, Cape Town and one other place.

In response to a review of your new album on Blabbermouth, one fan posted that you play “mummy metal”. I was curious as to what other tags have been given to your music over the years?
Mummy metal, that’s a good one. We gave ourselves a tag, or Ithyphallic metal. I’ve seen “Egypt-core”. I can’t think of anything else that stood out.

Over the years, after all of the albums you’ve done and all the different styles of music you’ve absorbed, how do you keep things fresh and interesting when you’re doing a new Nile record? How did you approach this album differently than things you’ve done in the past?
You’ve got to think beyond things like it has to be fast, it needs this particular minor scale and have this stuff in there. It’s about the musical ideas themselves. Having new riffs, new ways of layering things together, putting new instruments in there certainly doesn’t hurt. Also, [co-vocalist/guitarist] Dallas [Toler-Wade]  and I really work hard on the guitar playing. I still take guitar lessons, even though I teach myself. There are some incredible jazz guitarists in this town [in Greenville, South Carolina], so you can never stop learning. Superficially death metal is always going to have the elements that make it death metal. It’s going to be fast and brutal, it’s going to have those growling vocals, it’s going to have insane drums and minor tonalities and a sense of doom and destruction. That’s just a given for the genre. So you’ve got to dig deeper than that and actually examine the musical content rather than just the superficial, stylistic given.

Metal is more diverse now than it’s ever been. The subgenres themselves have a lot of clichés, but the playing field is wide open. There are still plenty of vintage metal bands that listen to, like Living Death and Bulldozer. Some of it was cruder and a little sloppier, but people weren’t playing that fast at that point.
Dude, when you listen to records made in the ’80s you go, “Holy moley. That’s so primitive sounding. People can play circles around that stuff nowadays.”

But there’s still a freshness to a lot of it that doesn’t go away. Certain bands back then might not technically have had the proficiency that you hear today, but I don’t think many people are making music of that quality today.
I would agree with that. It’s about musical content, the idea themselves. I’ll even put on a Beatles record now and then and just go, “Wow. That’s incredible. I wouldn’t have thought to put that chord there.”

What parallels do find between ancient Egyptian society and modern American society?
I don’t know if I necessarily find any, but I think there are some universal truths. Human beings are still the same evil, vicious creatures that they always have been, and I think societies are generally ruled by the top 2% or 3%. Everyone else is some form of slave. In modern America with our capitalist structure, we don’t realize that we’re slaves. We’re just economic slaves. We’re still all peasants in the eyes of the ruling class. We’re just here to be exploited. I think in recent times Americans are getting used and used a whole lot more.

Given how tough everything is for bands nowadays, how is Nile holding up?
Taking a beating. In the age of downloading, everyone thinks that all the money will be made on tour. Dude, that’s also where we’re getting hit really hard. Just the rising cost of transportation — the bus and the cost of diesel fuel — is our biggest fucking expense. That stuff has skyrocketed, yet we don’t see an increase in the amount of money from the promoters. They might be charging higher ticket prices to kids, but that money is not really trickling down to us. We’re getting it on all sides, man. Some of the larger cities are imposing higher and higher fees for selling your merch. Concert T-shirts are at a stupid[ly high] price now because you get taxed 40 to 45% right out of the gate, off the top. The band has to buy the shirts to start off with, and somebody is taking 40% of the gross in every city. It’s no picnic out there.

Many musicians are now doing other things on the side to make more money.
I’m giving guitar lessons, and I’ve got my side project, so that helps a little bit. But times are tough, man, and I don’t see them getting any better.

How does your son feel about what you do?
He thinks it’s cool and all. He thinks I should buy him a guitar for Christmas, but he’s already got four electric guitars. I’m going, “What do you need another electric guitar for?” He answers, “Dad, you’ve got twentysomething electric guitars. Why can’t I have one?” I’m trying to explain his 14-year-old guy that I have those guitars because that’s how I make a living. You’re 14, why do you need four guitars?

When you’re creating art for your album covers, how much of a stickler for detail are you?
That’s always been an issue with me, because no matter how much of a stickler I might be, the reality is the record company gives you X amount of dollars for an art budget, and you have to come in under that budget with whatever artist you choose. Historical accuracy or artistic consideration takes the second tier of importance. Oftentimes you have to accept what the record company is willing to give you.

As far as production, how much comes out of your pocket and how much comes out of their pocket?
That’s a funny one because today I got my balance sheet for the record budget, and in there is $900 worth of expenses that I turned in that I didn’t get reimbursed for and had to eat. That’s always a bone of contention there, and it’s not going to get any better. CD sales are declining 35% each successive year, so in the next five years we’re going to see bands have their budgets completely slashed. We have to take a budget cut as well.

On this album you worked with producer Neil Kernon, and he’s known for doing a lot of high-profile albums. Some people are saying this is the best sounding album you’ve done. Was it like to work with him, and how did he work within your budgetary constraints?
We had to work on a great bit of the album here in my little home studio. I have a spare room that I turned into a place to record stuff. It’s where I did my [recent] solo record, and we did a lot of the new Nile record here. If you’re working at home you don’t have to pay for hotel rooms for everybody or pay for studio costs. That helped, but this is still the most expensive record we’ve ever made. Aside from money and all that, Neil’s a great guy. We love him. He knows what’s going on. He’s made a lot of really incredible records. He has so much experience and is such a musical guy, and he does incredible work.

How do you feel he helped Nile improve their studio sound on this record?
This time around Neil was a Nazi. He demanded perfection on every take. There is stuff where we did 100 takes before he was happy. It got to be a running joke. We would do a spectacular take, and Neil would say, “That’s great! That’s awesome! That’s perfect! Now do it again.” There was no room for anything less than perfection on this record. Everything’s in tune and everything’s in time. It’s what you’ve actually got to do. We figured out that to be able to hear everything clearly and cleanly takes a level of precision for music this fast and this dense. If you’re going to hear it, then it needs to be done right, just so that you can hear it. Otherwise if there are little bits that aren’t dead on, they add up. Even if it’s so imperceptible that you can’t even tell, that little bit still adds up. On this record every instrument was meticulously done. Christ, we spent from June to mid-September tracking and mixing this thing.

And your vocals sound pretty clear, growls and all. Everything is separated out.
Absolutely. We spent meticulous attention to detail on everything, on a microcosmic level, and it adds up to an album where you can hear stuff. You can tell what the fuck I’m growling, you can hear that high-speed guitar run, and the fast drums are all there and you can hear them. With declining budgets and all, we’ve raised the bar to that point. How can we ever go back? We can’t.

That makes your career more expensive.
Yeah, it means we take the hit. All record companies are going to go out of business in the next five years. So what does that mean? How does that translate down to us? That means that if we want to have a record deal, the amount of available record contracts will shrink. The amount of money the record companies can afford to pay you is going to shrink. But the costs to make these records is not going to shrink. Think about that. So that means a music career, making records, is not going to be easy in the foreseeable future. It’s going to get tougher.

So what is the game plan for Nile?
It boils down to how we are going to make money to counteract that. We’re talking about expanding into new, emerging world markets, like India and China, where there is a middle class that has disposable income. People in China have jobs. There’s work there. They have disposable income.

At least in India they might be able to relate to some of your Eastern sounds.
I actually get a lot of letters from India, and a lot of people there dig what we do. It looks like we’re going to have to go outside of America because America is starting to suck. I think it’s going to get worse here.




The Eighties were the pinnacle of the power ballad. While the concept originally gestated in the Seventies when hard-edged stadium rockers lightened things up a bit — for example, Aerosmith’s “Dream On” and UFO’s “Love To Love” — it was during the decade of decadence that the style was perfected by groups with big hooks, big hair and big studio sounds. It was a way for hard rock and metal bands to show their sensitive, romantic side and sell more records, and it gave fans a good reason to raise their lighters in salute.

Yet some of the most revered power ballads are, in my frank opinion, terrible. Motley Crue’s insipid “Home Sweet Home” and Night Ranger’s bland “Sister Christian” are among them. Poison’s dreaful “Every Rose Has Its Thorn” is the worst offender and features one of the most boring vocal performances ever. Yet many people inexplicably love it. (And hasn’t Bret Michaels learned anything about falling for strippers since? Evidently not. Nor vice versa.)

With that in mind, let’s look back at some great songs you may have missed and that deserve far more attention than they ever got. And remember, not every power ballad needs to be about love to be effective, as many of the following tunes prove. Nearly all of these entries have YouTube links to allow you to check out the songs and decide for yourself. I think you’ll agree that there are some real gems here.

CRIMSON GLORY “Burning Bridges”
Transcendence (1988)
Served up by a pioneering progressive metal unit from Florida, “Burning Bridges” emphasizes the power in power ballad, deceiving us with a couple of gentle acoustic sections before bludgeoning us with monster riffs, heavy synth brass and a blistering guitar solo. You can feel the agony in Midnight’s vocals as he wrenches out every last scream. Sadly, he passed away this year from kidney and liver failure at the young age of 47. In my opinion, this performance will always be his masterpiece.

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GREAT WHITE “Hold On”
Great White (1984), reissued as Stick It (1999)
Before they decided to become Zeppelin imitators, Great White were a bruising SoCal metal quartet that explored the dark, seedy side of Hollywood life with tracks like “Bad Boys,” “No Better Than Hell” and “Dead End”. During this electric ballad, rather than pine for an old girlfriend or bemoan being alone, the group addresses living on the edge of despair, with little to live for but hope itself. It’s not an uplifting song but certainly a compelling one.

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JUDAS PRIEST “Out In The Cold”
Turbo (1986)
While it came from the oft-maligned pop-metal of Turbo, this six-and-a-half minute rocker is a true classic. It is grandiose and gripping with an icy synth intro, impassioned vocals and some eternally memorable melodies and guitar solos. Thanks to Tom Allom’s brilliant sound design, the song makes you feel like its title.

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KICK AXE “Welcome To The Club“
Welcome To The Club (1985)
This Canadian quintet offered a great combination of powerhouse riffs, grooving rhythms, sumptuous vocal harmonies and George Criston’s jazz-inflected singing. The opening track to their second album, this semi-acoustic number offers consolation to those struggling to break free from their addictions. These are wise words from those who lived life to the fullest back in the day.

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KING KOBRA “Dancing With Desire”
Ready To Strike (1984)
Yeah, smirk all you want at these bleach-blonde boys rockin’ out with raven-haired drum legend Carmine Appice, but these guys cranked out some cool ‘80s metal on their debut album, especially this smoldering ballad driven by acoustic guitars, some electric axework and a steady kick drum that gives the song its lustful heartbeat. It’s an ode to desire for a sweltering summer night that will have you crooning along to its rich vocal harmonies.

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MANOWAR “Heart Of Steel”
Kings Of Metal (1988)
These guys may be known for their brief loincloth phase and displaying more machismo than a bad Schwarzenegger movie, but this epic song about finding one’s inner strength and following one’s own path will actually move you. Starting as a sedate piano and vocal number, it soon develops into a slow-moving metal ballad complete with a searing guitar solo, ear-shattering scream and majestic choral vocals. You’ll be ready to take on the world after listening to “Heart of Steel”.

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QUEENSRYCHE “I Will Remember”
Rage For Order (1986)
This one’s a little less over-the-top than some other entries on the list, but it’s still a winner. From an intense, frenetic album came this gentle, haunting song that hints at the loss of privacy in the face of technology; namely, a newly orbiting spy satellite. In a sense, it’s also about the death of the natural in an increasingly unnatural world. When Geoff Tate sings, “You will remember the star that came tonight,” it’s a warning, not romantic sentiment. The whistling and acoustic soloing are nice touches.

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URIAH HEEP “Poor Little Rich Girl”
Equator (1985)
The idea of a manipulative socialite playing games with people’s hearts may be a clichéd sentiment, but damn if these guys didn’t make it sound like life or death with lush acoustic guitar work, dramatic choruses and a beautiful, symphonic keyboard break at its center. This is the kind of wonderfully over-the-top rock opus that no one seems to make anymore.

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WHITESNAKE “Crying In The Rain”
Saints and Sinners (1982)
Yes, you’ve heard it before, but not like this. The Snake’s original bluesy ode to solitude and lost love blows away the bland pop version on their self-titled sell-out album from 1987. (Ditto for “Here I Go Again,” also originally recorded on this1982 release.) David Coverdale sings his heart out here, and the opulent keyboards of Jon Lord and the gritty guitars of Bernie Marsden and Micky Moody just can’t be beat. Don’t argue, just luxuriate in the sorrow.

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Y&T “This Time”
In Rock We Trust (1984)
His band may have been known for its loose and lethal brand of hard rock, but when frontman Dave Meniketti’s bandmates penned this affectionate number for him and his future wife, they conjured up an instant classic. There’s no drama, heartache or tension here – it’s a pure love song that very few rock bands have ever captured without sounding schmaltzy. Y&T also score extra points by performing a delicate ballad without any acoustic guitar!

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music
powerballads
80srock

As the man behind the kit for Queensrÿche, Scott Rockenfield has defined himself as a drummer par excellence, providing both rhythmic support and percussive propulsion with his signature style. A man who can make his hi-hat work as compelling as his tom fills, Rockenfield further expanded the art of metal drumming with inventive playing and showing that subtlety was just as important as aggression. Listen to the seminal rock opera Operation: Mindcrime for proof positive.

I first interviewed Rockenfield for Modern Drummer back in 1997, and since that time his work beyond Queensrÿche has expanded. He has worked on various film soundtracks, started the RockenWraps drum company and recorded and performed with the Nineties rock group Slave To The System, who finally have a second album in the works. While taking a break from Queensrÿche’s current tour in support of their new American Soldier opus, Rockenfield talked about juggling all his different endeavors and his upcoming projects.

Now that you have lived with American Soldier on the road for a couple of months, how do you feel it holds up against Queensrÿche’s other works?
We are very happy with what we were able to achieve on American Soldier, and it is translating great during the live shows. I believe we achieved our goal of really spending the time to construct songs from the stories and hearts of the American soldiers we spoke with, and to tell their tales of their lives.

Did you have a different perception of the military before you recorded the album, and if so, how has that changed?
I was very educated in regards to all things military. I suppose most people could say that. Being surrounded by this and hearing these stories from them has really made me appreciate the soldiers and their lifestyle. The stories that touched me most were ones based on the longing to be home with family and loved ones. Being that I have been a traveling musician most of my life, I could totally relate to missing them.

It’s wild to think that Queensrÿche has been together for nearly 30 years. Given that you have been playing heavy rock with the group since its inception, how do you keep things fresh for yourself as a drummer? Where do you go to seek other inspiration and learn new things?
I am always grateful for the time and longevity we have had as a group. Besides my work in Queensrÿche,  I have also been composing music for film and television for the last 20 years. I recently finished a full length score to a feature horror film titled Albino Farm which is getting ready to be released. I am also set to compose the music for four other films in the coming months. Two of the films are going to be set in a crime drama/comedy [mode] such as films like Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, and the two other films happen to be set in the genre of crime thrillers such as SE7EN and Silence of the Lambs. Real creepy stuff! Besides all that, my family is my greatest inspiration.

Do you try to keep up with the latest drum gear, or are you old school at heart?
I really don’t try and keep up with gear in the drum world. I know what I like and what works for me. I have always been mostly interested in building many of my own drum kits. I currently use Ddrum shells and then customize them to my liking. I also like using mainly drum racks. Pearl is my current favorite.

You have worked with Paul Speer in the past on atmospheric instrumental music, particularly the Grammy-nominated score for the computer animation movie Televoid. Have you stayed in touch with him in recent years?
Paul and I remain friends to this day. He lives in Nashville now, and so our contact and working relationship is done [mainly] via Internet. Paul is currently working on a new solo project and also producing local artists, I believe.

Did your work with Paul directly catapult you into the world of scoring for trailers, commercials and indie films, or did you find other ways to break in?
I was exploring the film score world early on in the 80’s, and when I met Paul we were naturally able to do some very inspiring work together. Breaking in is always the biggest challenge. It’s hard to explain. Just did what I had to do and still have to do. [laughs] The best way I am able to find work is through the networking I have done via my other clients, the Internet and my manager. It is a very competitive field to be scoring music for films, and so I have to always work extremely hard at getting to know as many contacts as possible.

You were initially exposed to film scoring through the late Hollywood composer Michael Kamen in the ’80s when he first worked with Queensrÿche on The Warning. What did you learn from him over the years, and what do you miss about him?
Michael Kamen was a great first inspiration to me. We first started to work together in 1984 when he spent time composing the sessions for songs like “Roads To Madness” and “Sanctuary”. I learned many “secrets” of how to approach film scores and their emotions from being around him. I miss his joyful laughter and creative endurance.

How challenging has it been for you to score feature films like Albino Farm? Are you going to take on more film composing soon?
Films are always a huge challenge but very satisfying. I really love scoring.  I have four more film scores being negotiated and should start some of them in the coming months. Keep posted to www.scottrockenfield.com for all further updates. My biggest challenges are really just finding the opportunities. There have been many rockers turned composers through the years — Trevor Rabin from Yes, Stewart Copeland from The Police, Danny Elfman from Oingo Boingo — so my main goal is to expand my field of writing orchestra music and present it in the best possible scenarios.

What inspired you to create RockenWraps, and how are you evolving your business in these tough economic times?
Rockenwraps was born from my desire to make my own kits unique. It worked so well that I had all these other drummers constantly wanting some of the material as well. The ones we did for the current Slipknot tour are pretty cool. We did some really great Black Sparkle wraps with a gold “S” of the Slipknot logo on all the drums. Very classy looking. The band was very happy with them. Keeping above water in these economic times is always a challenge, but fortunately we seem to survive.

Earlier this year, Geoff Tate commented to me that Queensrÿche does not make money releasing albums but through touring, merchandise and outside projects. How do you feel about this, and what advice would you give to younger musicians coming up?
Yes, we do make most of our income by touring and selling merch. My best advice to up and comers is to learn and control everything about your business — accounting, management of your affairs, business decisions, people you hire…

You have drum wraps and composing, Geoff has wine and Michael has a clothing line. Have you ever tried Geoff’s Insania brand or Michael’s Whipwear clothing line?
Yes. Geoff’s wine is fantastic and Michael’s clothing is top of the line. Eddie [Jackson] has been working on some other music of his own, and yes, we always help each other by referring business where needed.

As you get older, how do you juggle touring, working on your outside projects and being a father?
You just get by. I suppose all the years of doing this type of lifestyle has taught me how to juggle it all. Thank the Lord for my family being so supportive!

Any chance your other group Slave To The System will record or tour again?
Yes, we are working on new material as we speak. Slave To The System is a great escape for all of us involved. We have great chemistry together. More news will be coming soon. We actually have one new song that is included on my Albino Farm soundtrack CD, which is available at my website.

Finally, what do you think your fans would be surprised to learn about you?
I am just the guy next door.