Live Review : Queensrÿche + Night Demon @ Academy 2, Manchester on February 11th 2025

Up until now, those who have been ordained to persevere in preserving Queensrÿche’s legacy have opted to avoid the trappings of retrospection. They have left this to their erstwhile frontman and one-person publicity magnet Geoff Tate, who has mined the nostalgia gravy train for all it is worth. Instead of looking back, the post-Tate incarnation of the band (now fronted by the equally golden larynx Todd La Torre) have chosen to surge forward with a flurry of decent releases, culminating in 2023’s rather spiffing “Digital Noise Alliance”.

However the allure of retreading past glories is strong (not to mention the associated commercial benefits) so we find Queensrÿche finally taking the tried and tested anniversary tour route. However, they plump not to exhume either their commercial peak (“Empire”) or their critical highwater (“Operation Mindcrime”) but instead to go back to the beginning (or origins as the tour title promises) and play the first EP and debut album in full.

Night Demon make perfect bedfellows for Queensrÿche as they whisk us back to a time when metal was metal and people weren’t busy splicing it with a dozen other alien genres. Whilst their sound is distinctly a throwback to when dragons roamed the land, it doesn’t feel passé or passed its prime. They have a timeless quality that connects with the primal brilliance of three people playing heavy rock. It is high-octane and ridiculously entertaining. The riffs are meaty, the choruses luxurious and the vibe is pure uncaring irreverence. This type of widescreen sumptuous metal may never have been cool, but the reassuringly full Academy 2 don’t give a fig and sing along with glee. In fact when Jarvis Leatherby makes an attempt to bond with the Mancunian masses by singing snatches of Oasis and The Smiths it lands as well as a porcupine at an orgy because this is a rock audience desperate to gorge themselves on the forbidden pleasures of big, pompous metal.

Night Demon give us exactly what we want. Their songs are precision engineered to be communal sing-alongs, even if you are experiencing them for the first time. There are synchronised guitar moves, lashings of audience participation and we even get a roadie dressed as the Grim Reaper for ‘The Chalice’. The fancy dress adorned crew member sticks around to present Jarvis with a birthday cake, as Queensrÿche make a brief cameo appearance to wish him a happy “21st” birthday. Night Demon know that momentum is built with familiarity and ritual and as ever the set concludes with the track that bears their name. It is a riotous celebration of the beauty of unashamed opulence. Full of majestic hooks and a beautifully contoured chorus, designed to be sung heartly with arms aloft. Night Demon feed into our desire for spectacle and grandeur, a wonderful celebration of the joy of joyful music.

In the ongoing soap opera of law suites and counter suites, it is easy to forget what a pivotal band Queensrÿche actually were. They emerged out of nowhere (a pre-grunge Seattle to be exact) and changed the landscape of metal. They existed parallel to thrash, sharing its desire to emulate what they saw happening across the pond within the New Wave of British Heavy Metal but possessing a more melodic and progressive bent. Basically they simultaneously set the foundations for both power and progressive metals. Tonight, to steal a phrase, we go back to the beginning. This is an unashamed exercise in revisiting past glories and aside from a smattering of younglings keen to know what the fuss is all about, the audience is predominantly those of us around the first time who can still recall hearing the “Queensrÿche” EP and “The Warning” album on initial release.

This is a thoroughly authentic and reverential retread. As Todd tells us during a momentary downtime this is an in full, chronological reproduction of the first two Queensryche releases using the same equipment utilised at the time. What hits you first is how well the songs have aged. Everything aired in the main set is now happily in its forties, but they don’t sound old or redundant. ‘The Lady Wore Black’ has retained every inch of its chilling melodrama and effortlessly outshines latter attempts at haunting power ballads. The same is true of both ‘No Sanctuary’ and ‘Take Hold Of The Flame’. They are smouldering pillars of power that still cause the hairs to rise on the back of the neck. For the latter Todd invites us to sing along, though to be honest we have got on the program long before he seeks our participation and the hall is a sea of vintage voices and arms held aloft, revisiting the wonders of the past.

NM 156 feels particularly prophetic, foreshadowing both our escalating reliance on technology but also how it has influenced how music is produced. It is a jittering cacophony of sound that even now feels futuristic and out of time. Confident it is uniqueness, it once again reminds us why Queensrÿche were so special. Musically the band have still got it. Only Micheal Wilton and Eddie Jackson remain from the classic line up but both Todd and guitarist Mike Stone have been around long enough to write themselves into the Queensrÿche lexicon. In fact the latter exudes cool as he stands stage right in his signature shades and cowboy hat providing the pounding rhythm to augment Michael’s carreing lead guitar.

Album playthroughs ditch the spontaneity of random playlist for reliable fan-pleasing moments. Everyone present knows how “The Warning” ends but ‘Roads To Madness’ is still greeted with ecstatic reverence. It remains a tour de force of ever-shifting passages and flattering time signatures. It retains its opulent characteristics and brings the main portion of the show to a fitting conclusion. But there is always going to be more. They take the opportunities afforded by the freeform nature of the encore to bring us bang up to date with ‘Behind The Walls’ from the aforementioned “Digital Noise Alliance”. But this is an audience desperate to revel in their collective past and ‘Walk In The Shadows’ and ‘Empire’ provide further communal choral moments with Todd relegated to the a mere backing artist as the crowd take on lead singer duty.

For all their glories of their back catalogue, Queensrÿche will always have the Mindcrime etched into their history as a seminal culture changing moment. It brought intelligence and political astuteness to metal and remains today one of the finest albums ever produced. Those pesky legal arrangements mean that they are no longer allowed to perform certain songs from its repertoire or the album in full, But ‘Eyes of Stranger’ remains in their repertoire and provides a fitting finale. Like everything else it feels fresh and penetrative, once again cementing the bands legacy, despite recent off field dramas.

Tonight is exactly what brand Queensrÿche needed, a reminder of why they are so revered. This wasn’t simple route 101 nostalgia; this was an act of rebirth. Proving to all the naysayers the brilliance of this unique band and the utter ubiquity and importance of its songbook. Queensrÿche are one of cornerstones of modern metal and tonight was their hopeful ascension back onto that throne.

Check the “In The Flesh” page for more photos!
Queensrÿche + Night Demon