Tickets: $35 | On-sale: Now
In April 2022, QUEENSRŸCHE finished a five-week North American tour supporting Metal gods Judas Priest. That tour wasn’t merely a fiery return to the stage for QUEENSRŸCHE after a two-year pandemic: it was a rejuvenation. The sound of a band locked-in and firing on all cylinders. “The Priest tour was a great springboard for us to get back onstage in what’s essentially a new world,” says founding guitarist Michael Wilton. “We had so much momentum going off of our last record [2019’s The Verdict] and then, the world, our business, came to a grinding halt. We had to survive, pick ourselves up and get back to being QUEENSRŸCHE.” Now, their legacy has coalesced into another career milestone for the Bellevue, Washington borne band with the release of their 16th studio album, Digital Noise Alliance.
Overcoming obstacles and defying expectations has always been at the heart of QUEENSRŸCHE. With 20 million albums sold worldwide, innumerable accolades and a career that has charted the course of multiple genres, QUEENSRŸCHE remains bloodied but unbowed. Teamed again with producer and mixer, Zeuss (Rob Zombie, Hatebreed), Digital Noise Alliance embraces and refracts QUEENSRŸCHE’s history from the classic drive of opener, “In Extremis” through “Behind The Walls” to epic album closer, “Tormentum”. Digital Noise Alliance is that elusive career-embodying album that echoes the most classic elements of the QUEENSRŸCHE’s sound. It pulses with the sort of sonic ambitions that changed the hard rock and metal landscape on albums like their multi-platinum Empire or their magnum-opus concept album, Operation: Mindcrime.
With its current lineup of LaTorre, Wilton, Jackson, guitarist Mike Stone and drummer Casey Grillo, QUEENSRŸCHE is looking towards the future while looking back on the influence and impact of its past. “When you have two of the original members, you can’t help but get those QUEENSRŸCHE elements,” says Jackson, who founded the band with Wilton in 1982. “It’s in our DNA. But it’s also nice to hear fresh ideas or interpretations from Todd, Casey or Mike Stone.” For LaTorre, that balance between the band’s past and present is crucial. “We’re all advocates for certain characteristics that are very indicative to the band’s sound,” says the frontman. “The challenge for us is blending that history and the nuances that are important and true to the band but still feel modern.”
Digital Noise Alliance is quintessentially QUEENSRŸCHE. Track to track it embodies the lush melodies, passion and intelligence that’s been the mark of the band since they first took hold of the flame with their hugely received self-titled 4-song EP in 1984. “For me, musically and lyrically, QUEENSRŸCHE has always represented something cerebral,” says Todd “At a time when bands were writing about sex, drugs and Rock n Roll, QUEENSRŸCHE were writing about politics, religion, social injustice – topics that are more relevant now than ever. Even now, we’re walking that fine line between not telling people what to think, but simply to think.”
Please Note
All Cowlitz Ballroom shows are subject to rescheduling and cancellation as necessary.
Strobe lights, lighting effects, and theatrical fog may be in use in Cowlitz Ballroom during musical concerts. If you have health or physical problems that could be affected by strobe lighting, lighting effects, or theatrical fog, including but not limited to photosensitive epilepsy, asthma or breathing problems, you should not enter Cowlitz Ballroom.