GEOFF TATE Says His Former QUEENSRŸCHE Bandmates 'Can't Fight Their Way Out Of A Paper Bag'

Über Röck recently conducted an interview with QUEENSRŸCHE singer Geoff Tate. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.

Über Röck: If QUEENSRŸCHE with your three former bandmates were playing somewhere that you happened to be, would you go check them out?

Tate: Would I go watch my former bandmates play?

Über Röck: Yeah.

Tate: No. I'm not interested in that at all.

Über Röck: Hypothetically, if you were stuck in [an elevator] with them, who do you think would speak first?

Tate: If we were in a situation where we were put together who would speak first? Oh, it would be me.

Über Röck: And who do you think would throw the first punch?

Tate: Throw the first punch? Well, probably me. Those guys can't fight their way out of a paper bag. I've never seen such a bunch of... How can you be a man and not, like, defend yourself? How can you do that? I don't understand it. I probably shouldn't talk about that… I could get in trouble. [laughs] You know, Americans are really touchy about that stuff. I spit in Scott's [Rockenfield, QUEENSRŸCHE drummer] face and that is an ancient act of defiance and contempt: it's a symbolic gesture. It's ancient, people have been doing that for centuries and Americans can't wrap their head around that. They think it's juvenile, like it's something a kid does. They can't understand guys getting in a punch-up. They fear that, they're appalled by it. In other countries, Ireland for example, the Irish don't see anything wrong with it at all.

Über Röck: If it all ended now and QUEENSRŸCHE, in whatever form stopped right now, how would you like the band to be remembered?

Tate: I had a different idea of how I wanted things to end than the way they have. I've always tried very hard to take care of the name and present the band in an elegant way — since I'm the one that does all the interviews and TV appearances and radio appearances and all that, and I've always tried to communicate to the world that we are a bunch of friends who make music together and that we care about each other and always stand by each other’s side, and that we were out to, ultimately, make music for as long as we possibly could. The whole way the other guys have handled the breakup thing really saddens me because it's in direct opposition to what my belief system is. I think that we could easily have sat in a room and talked about our problems, we could have addressed things in a real civil manner, we could have come to conclusions easily without dragging our laundry through the public, so to speak. The way that they've gone about firing everybody in our organization is just cold-hearted, you know, very cold and ruthless, and honestly it's not the way I envisioned the band ending its days, to be honest... I'm really humiliated by their actions, actually…

Read the entire interview from Über Röck.

Photo credit: Stephanie Cabral