There’s a moment about halfway through ‘Keep Your Eyes Peeled’, the opener of QOTSA‘s sixth record, in which Josh Homme yells “wake me!”; his voice rifles out through your speakers, rattles you like a bottle of pills and leaves you chasing the Kyuss-like riff that powers the track. It’s a great way to return after six long years since Era Vulgaris, and an even better way to announce that you’re literally back from the dead. You see, Homme had a bit of trouble after some routine knee surgery and essentially died for a few minutes, so you can imagine that this record has been an even more carefully filtered return than it might possibly have been. Not that filtered even comes close to describing how void of shit this album is.
Homme has said that after his near-death experience, “pieces of him were missing”. Perhaps to fill whatever hole these pieces might have left, QOTSA drafted in a few guest slots, of which much has been made in interviews with the band. In reality they’re minor inclusions, bit parts from the likes of Elton John (apparently the only thing missing was an actual Queen), Alex Turner and Trent Reznor, and they work really as a garnish on top of what would still have been a brilliant record.
‘I Sat By The Ocean’ is smothered with west coast sunshine and some sleazy slide parts, and leads irresistibly into ‘The Vampyre of Time and Memory’, a broodingly low-key number that sees Josh in a suitably celebratory mood (“I’m alive, hooray”). Then the sluttiest groove you’ll hear all year kicks off “If I Had A Tail”, which comes across as a beefier, filthier brother to ‘Make It Wit Chu’. Seriously, you’ll find yourself mindlessly disrobing before it’s done. Alex Turner waltzes into this one right at the death, but you won’t be to blame if you don’t notice him.
When you’ve put your trousers back on and made proper introductions with …Like Clockwork, you’ll realise that it’s a collection of hugely personal songs. Take ‘Kalopsia’ for example, a track that opens with the rasping of a respirator and a wonky ballad-esque verse, before delving into an industrial attack on “copycats in cheap suits”; there’s a quality of escapism in this track, not least in the whispered “kalopsia”‘s that float through the background. Incidentally, kalopsia is the delusion of seeing things as more beautiful than they really are, which is just a wonderful idea, and presumably indicative of the fog that Homme found himself in post-op.
Elton John features on ‘Fairweather Friends’, surprising given that it’s not even the most piano-heavy track on the album, a proper rock-ballad which closes brilliantly as Homme tails off with “I don’t give a shit about them anyhow…”. After that, ‘Smooth Sailing’ dials up the funk-o-meter to the more deranged end of the spectrum, while ‘I Appear Missing’ is trademark Homme lyricism: “Calling all comas, prisoner on the loose, description: the spitting image of me”. It’s a cliche but …Like Clockwork is one of those rare records which genuinely yields more with repeated listens. When you know what’s coming it’s even more exhilarating than the first time around, and you’ll be craving it like, you know, Nicotine, or Valium, Vicodin, Marijuana, Ecstasy and Alcohol.
Unlike previous QOTSA LP’s, this one has such diversity that, after the first nine tracks, it’s difficult to know where you stand. What is clear is that the making of the record has been a bit of a journey; even the title is an ironic declaration of its tumultuous origins. What we haven’t been given is any indication of what the future holds for Queens of the Stone Age, and the title-track finale doesn’t exactly clarify that. In a perfect example of exactly what crooning is, Homme sings that “it’s all downhill from here”. Take it either way: downhill on a no holds barred free-fall to funville, or downhill to bad times. Who knows. For now, all we can go on is …Like Clockwork, but that’s alright by me.
