Geoff Tate

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Geoff Tate bigraphy, stories - American singer

Geoff Tate : biography

January 14, 1959 –

Geoff Tate (born Jeffrey Wayne Tate, January 14, 1959; he later changed his first name to Geoffery or Geoffrey) (Pp. 11, 48). is an American singer and musician, who rose to fame in the 1980s with the progressive metal band, Queensrÿche. Tate is ranked fourteenth on Hit Parader’s list of the 100 Greatest Metal Vocalists of All Time. He was voted #2 on That Metal Show’s top 5 hard rock vocalists of the 80’s, and in 2012 received the Vegas Rocks Magazine Award for "Voice in Progressive Heavy Metal’.

Discography

Queensrÿche

Solo

  • Geoff Tate – June 25, 2002
  • Kings & Thieves – November 6, 2012

Contributions

  • Butchering The Beatles: A Headbashing Tribute – vocals on "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds"
  • A World With Heroes – vocals on "The Oath"

Compilations

  • Sin-Atra – 2011

Controversy

Since 2012, Geoff Tate has attracted a significant amount of controversy and criticism, mostly in part to the circumstances surrounding and following the split with Queensrÿche (when his bandmates, guitarist Michael Wilton, bassist Eddie Jackson and drummer Scott Rockenfield fired him from the band and replaced him with then-Crimson Glory vocalist Todd La Torre) and his control over the band during the 1997-2012 period, according to court documents from his former bandmates.

Tate attracted negative attention for spitting on and physically assaulting Wilton and Rockenfield before and during a show in São Paulo, Brazil, on April 14, 2012.. Blabbermouth.net. Retrieved on 2012-09-16. Then, during a later show the Rocklahoma Festival on May 26. Tate commented to an unresponsive crowd "You guys suck", which his bandmates, as well as fans, felt was an insult, but Tate would later defend his actions by stating in a court declaration "I was not insulting the audience. I was trying to motivate or excite them." He finds that this was used against him in the lawsuit: "It’s just something that the other guys [in the band] and their team of people are trying to twist into a ‘Geoff doesn’t respect the fans’ type of thing." He elaborated on that in an interview, saying: "I say that stuff all the time, you know. It’s part of being a front man, you know. You got to motivate the audience, you know. And I say things to get people motivated. I think… I say things to push people’s buttons to get them to react. It’s part of a performance. But if you’re in a lawsuit, of course, these things get taken out of context and put into a new format. I guess the objective is to make me look like I don’t care about the fans. Which is unfortunate."

Tate has also generated controversy and has become the subject of ridicule following remarkable statements in interviews, among others making rather direct statements about his sexuality. In one interview with Classic Rock, Tate says that the theme for the song "Say U Luv It" from the album Kings & Thieves is: "Kinky sex", elaborating by saying "I’m more interested in sex now than I was in my 20s. In my 20s and 30s I was more interested in pushing my career, more concentrated on accomplishment. Now, all I wanna do is fuck! Luckily my wife is up for it – she’s at a wonderful age too.’"

Geoff Tate’s version of Queensrÿche has also generated controversy due to the artwork of their album, Frequency Unknown. The abbreviation "F.U." is emphasized on the front cover, and is often used in English as a synonym for the profane expression "Fuck you". Tate, however, when asked about the meaning behind the artwork in an interview, responded with "Oh gosh, people read so much into everything. It’s kind of funny, isn’t it?" Todd La Torre, the frontman of the other currently existing version of Queensrÿche, has criticised the artwork, saying "It’s below the belt. To me, it’s not what Queensrÿche was about. Queensrÿche wasn’t about the cheap shots. Queensrÿche was always more respectful and intelligent of that (…) and so when one talks about devaluing the name or the brand of Queensrÿche, it’s so obvious that when you’re putting a fist with an ‘FU’ in a clever way to say that’s Frequency Unknown, but we know what it’s really likely to be standing for, (…) that doesn’t add credibility or respect to the name and brand of Queensrÿche."