Rock Report
ROCK REPORT 12-15-11

Not much is known about the current status of Queens of the Stone Age's first new
album since 2007′s 'Era Vulgaris,' but there have been a few mentions of the currently
in-the-works project. While the band initially said the album would be further in the
direction of 'Era Vulgaris,' Homme later told The Guardian that rehearsing the debut
album had influenced the writing process:

"Doing the rehearsals for the first record is really defining the new one. It's been turning
the new record into something else. What we were doing was kind of bluesy, and now
it's turned into this trancey, broken thing. The robots are back!"

Outside of that there has not been much said of the album that was believed to be out
by the end of 2011. According to frequent collaborator Alain Johannes, the band is
keeping a pretty tight lid on the "super top secret" album — which he is involved with in
at least a production capacity.


Shinedown will follow up their massive hit record ‘The Sound of Madness’ with what’s
expected to be one of the biggest rock albums of the year, and depending on its
direction — possibly one of the biggest albums released in any genre.

It may not seem like it, but it’s been almost four years since the release of the platinum-
selling album ‘The Sound of Madness’ — the fact that they’ve had a single in heavy
rotation at rock radio consistently since a month prior to the album’s release has made
it feel like they’ve never left. Their landmark record got an extension on its success with
last year’s deluxe edition that included the radio hit ‘Diamond Eyes (Boom-Lay Boom-
Lay Boom)’ — a song originally recorded for ‘The Expendables’ soundtrack that ended
up being one of the most played rock songs of 2011.

The band began recording their fourth record in August so it is likely that the new
material will surface sometime in 2012 — but not definite. Guitarist Zach Myers said
their previous record took 24 months to write, and that Smith will remove clocks and
calendars from the studio while recording because he doesn’t like to put a time limit on
creativity.