Queensryche

Queensrÿche () is an American progressive metal band. It formed in 1980 in Bellevue, Washington, and first went by Cross+Fire and then by the Mob before settling on its current name in 1982. The band has released 16 studio albums, one EP, and several DVDs, and continues to tour and record. The original lineup consisted of guitarists Michael Wilton and Chris DeGarmo, drummer Scott Rockenfield and bassist Eddie Jackson. Lead vocalist Geoff Tate was recruited in 1982 to round out the band.Queensrÿche has sold more than 20 million albums worldwide, including more than six million in the United States. A leader of the progressive metal scene of the mid-to-late 1980s, the band is often referred to as one of the genre's "Big Three", along with Dream Theater and Fates Warning. The band has received three Grammy Award nominations for songs from the albums. In 1998, drummer Rockenfield received an individual Grammy nomination. In 2016, the staff of Loudwire named them the 28th-best metal band of all time.Queensrÿche self-released its eponymous EP in 1982, and it earned them a following outside of their home state of Washington, as well as a record deal with EMI Records, who reissued the EP the following year. Queensrÿche's popularity grew through the 1980s with their first three studio albums, The Warning (1984), Rage for Order (1986) and Operation: Mindcrime (1988), the latter of which is widely considered among the greatest heavy metal concept albums. Their fourth album, Empire (1990), was also very successful and included one of the band's biggest hits "Silent Lucidity". That album, along with Operation: Mindcrime, cemented Queensrÿche's status as one of the most successful American heavy metal bands. After some turmoil between its band members in the 1990s, DeGarmo left the band in 1998 for personal reasons, returning briefly to write and record their eighth studio album Tribe (2003). Over the years, his replacements have been Kelly Gray, Mike Stone, and Parker Lundgren.

Biography summary from English Wikipedia, photograph via Wikimedia Commons.