How an honest appraisal of the new Queens of the Stone Age CD ended with my own murder

www.freetheseed.com ^ | 03.24.05 | Chris Haire

[Chris Haire]

“You know what makes us different than the animals, Red. We bury our dead,” Josh Homme says as he leans over the handle of a shovel and stares into the freshly dug pit below.

The lead singer and guitarist for Queens of the Stone Age, Homme is a man who wears many masks. In addition to his gig with the Queens, he is the drummer for the fuzz-pedal boogie-woogie outfit the Eagles of Death Metal, the cult leader behind the mythical Desert Sessions jam sessions, the Donald Trump of Rekords Rekords, and, as the one of the founders of the non-defunct Kyuss, the lord of the stoner rock universe. What is not so commonly known about Homme is that he likes to don a werewolf mask, head out to the desert and howl at the moon.

I know this because I’m standing beside him. I’m wearing a red hood and cape, and I’m looking down into an open grave in the middle of the California desert.

For the better part of two months, I’ve been trying to set up an interview with Homme, but I’ve had no luck. Why the lack of response? I don’t know, but I suspect Homme had gotten tired of explaining why he fired the Queens bassist, Nick Oliveri, from the band. Although the Queens of the Stone Age is made up of an ever-changing cast of musicians, Nick and Josh remained the chocolately center. Together, they were two drug- indulging visionaries leading a band of musical merry pranksters in the California desert. Together they created two of the finest hard rock albums in recent memory, Rated R and Songs for the Deaf.