How old is rock’n’roll now?...if we use 1955 has some kind of abritary ground zero, rock is now eligible for all kinds of senior’s discounts….

That’s a long time…and the older rock gets, the more difficult it becomes to stick out, to find distinctive approaches and to be unique in an ocean of other acts…

How many bands of the last, say, 20 years, can you name that has a sound so distinctive that you know exactly who they are within just the first couple of seconds?

I have one: Queens of the Stone Age…there’s something about what they do that sonically sets them apart from everyone else…

But it’s more than just guitar sounds, arrangements and lyrics…the elements required to create this uniqueness are complex and varied—and, I think, worthy of study…in fact. You can’t separate the sounds of Queens from their history—which is also very, very complex…let’s see if we can untangle everything…

These are some secrets of Queens of the Stone Age, part 1….

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