In my last post I talked about how I got my first CD player from my brother and how excited I was that it was a five disc changer. The idea of owning five whole CDs that would fill that changer was so exciting to me. I didn’t know what I was going to do when I bought a sixth CD, and I’d have to make a decision as to which disc to hold out.
I can’t remember now if Queensrÿche’s Empire was my second or third CD. I know I also bought U2’s Achtung Baby around that same time. Whatever number it was, I absolutely loved it.
I’m sure I bought it because of the hit single “Silent Lucidity.” That’s a great song, and it is part of a long tradition of power ballads where hard rockers show off their sensitive side with acoustic guitars and introspective lyrics. As a teenager, I was a sucker for that sort of thing.
I have a great memory of watching them play that song at the MTV Video Awards with a full orchestra. I thought that was the coolest thing.
The rest of the album rocked. As a teenager, all of 14-15 years old, I thought the social and political lyrics were amazing. They spoke about real things. Important things. They spoke directly to me.
The opening track “Best That I Can” told the story of a man in a wheelchair who dreamed of being a writer, of doing big things despite his disability. “Della Brown” talks about a woman living on the street. “Empire” was its magnum opus, a big, loud song that talked about gun violence, the illicit drug trade, and the lack of federal support for law enforcement. That was big stuff for little old me.
I took a drama class in eighth or ninth grade. For extra credit, you could lip synch any song you liked. You needed to get the synch just right, but you were also supposed to dress up like the character in the song or bring in props.
I was way too shy to actually do any of that, but I used to sit in my bedroom, listening to this album, thinking of all the ways I could perform these songs. I created all these little dances to go with them, gyrating in tune and doing my best to create a story. I thought it would blow their mind to hear “Empire.”
Like so many of these early albums, I haven’t listened to this in a very long time. Listening now, I still mostly like it. The hit songs are still great. I still love “Silent Lucidity” and “Jet City Woman” is a banger. I like “Another Rainy Night (Without You),” and “Best That I Can” has a nice beat. I like the progressive rock angles of many of the songs.
The lyrics seem a little pompous and simplistic to me now. “Empire” has a spoken word bit about how little the federal government spends on law enforcement, which seems absolutely wild now when you realize how much we spend these days and how little it has worked.
I added a few of those songs to my regular playlist, but most of them I’ll leave off and probably never listen to again. I can’t see myself listening to the album again any time soon.
This is by far the best album out of the three I’ve thus far talked about in this series, so that’s something.
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