Queens of The Stone Age: “This album sounds as brutal as it feels to be alive right now”

Josh Homme puts his leopard-print-clad foot down and accelerates up the Pacific Coast Highway in a cloud of burning rubber. We’re in his 1967 silver Chevrolet Camaro, the only car the Queens of the Stone Age frontman has ever owned. The vehicle has been the 50-year-old’s constant companion since he was 14 and was once, for a brief time in the Nineties, his only home. Barely audible above the roar of the engine, Chet Baker is singing ‘I Fall In Love Too Easily’. The ocean is to our left, so we turn right, up into the Malibu hills, towards a quiet spot looking out over the water that Homme describes, grinning through his shaggy white goatee, as “make-out point”.

It is six years since Queens of the Stone Age last released an album, and they have been six of the hardest years of Homme’s life. In 2019 he separated from his wife, Distillers frontwoman Brody Dalle, after nearly 14 years of marriage. Their divorce, finalised earlier this year, was made all the messier by accusations of violence, restraining orders on both sides and a lengthy tug-of-war over their kids. In March, Homme was awarded sole legal custody of all three children, and Homme shared a full statement regarding the legal battle.

Homme’s world has also been upended by the deaths of some of his closest friends. In 2022, in the space of two months, Homme lost former bandmate Mark Lanegan, Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins and his best friend, the Treme actor Rio Hackford. In total he has grieved eleven deaths in the last seven years, including another well-known drinking buddy in chef and travel journalist Anthony Bourdain.

After a self-imposed period of exile and mourning, Homme returns this week with the eighth Queens of the Stone Age record ‘In Times New Roman’. Leaning against the hood of his car, with nothing but the ocean in front of him, Homme tells NME how learning the art of acceptance shaped the album’s raw and unvarnished sound.

NME: Between the divorce, the passing of close friends and the pandemic, there’s been considerable change since Queens of the Stone Age last put a record out. When did you start thinking about making music again?

Homme: “I mean, the world was all fucked up, and my world was all fucked up, and everyone’s world was all fucked up, so making a record wasn’t that big of a priority.”

NME: Were there times when you thought you might not make another album?

Homme: “Kinda. I think when you’re dealing with the extreme ups and downs of life, you don’t stop and go: ‘I should really make a record.’ Those things don’t exist in that moment. If your roof is flooding, you don’t say: ‘We should make a record about this!’ You have to stop yourself drowning in a flood. We recorded it probably two-and-a-half years ago, but it just sat there waiting to be finished. I didn’t sing it until last November. I wasn’t done living. Honestly, I was probably afraid. I wasn’t ready. You need the flood to be over, and then you can decide whether you can accept the flood. I think with this being a record about acceptance, you need to actually get there yourself.”

NME: This record feels as direct and as personal as anything you’ve ever written, is that fair?

Homme: “Yeah, of course. That’s what this is. You start dropping the armour that protects you from your insecurities, and once you drop a piece of that armour you can’t put it back on. I think on this journey of Queens of the Stone Age, there’s no armour left. It’s only about walking deeper into the darkness. That’s the way it should be. Kowtowing to my own insecurities or fears at my age is not a good look. It should be more vulnerable, not less. I also think that a lot of people are making these tuned, to-the-click records that are trying to blend in with pop music. ‘We’re rock, but we’re kind of pop too, are you okay with that?’ We wanted to be like: ‘No, we’re going to make something that sounds as brutal as it feels to be alive right now.’”

NME: The title ‘In Times New Roman’ comes from closing track ‘Straight Jacket Fitting’, which alludes to similarities between modern-day America and the fall of Rome…

Homme: “There are so many reasons that it’s funny to me too. The most boring font being named after one of the greatest empires of all time! The place that brought you the vomitorium, the orgy and the vomitorium in the orgy! I also think it’s OK to acknowledge that Rome is burning and the Titanic is sinking. I don’t see a problem with that. In dealing with the concept of acceptance, you have to acknowledge reality. You can’t be kidding yourself.”

NME: On ‘Paper Machete’ you sing about your separation from your wife. Did it feel exposing to write about a topic that’s clearly still so raw?

Homme: “I’m supposed to write about my life. It’s supposed to be real and honest. Am I supposed to write about the mating call of the upchuck swallow? All it’s really supposed to be is as real, honest and vulnerable as it can be, because that’s my job. How many songs have been written about break-ups, or get-togethers? That’s what they’re for, right? ‘One is the loneliest number…’ It goes on and on. So I don’t worry about that. What would be the possible worry about speaking from an honest spot in yourself?”

NME: By ‘Negative Space’ is it fair to say you’ve found a measure of acceptance, whether that’s in terms of your divorce or grief?

Homme: “I was thinking about the nature of oblivion. You wanna hear a depressing thought? If you were cut loose from your spaceship, and you’re in a space suit, there’s nothing to stop you. You’d see Earth as you’re gently turning, until you’re like: ‘Fuck, I can’t see it anymore.’ And it’s just… [spreads his arms towards the cliff’s edge, gesturing at the vastness of eternity] …that. I’ve dealt with a lot of situations in the last seven years where it doesn’t matter whether you like it or not, it’s happening. In a way, that’s oblivion. The first breath you take after you’re like: ‘There’s nothing I can do now.’ I think writing about that has value. To me, it has value.”

NME: I’m sure that will resonate with a lot of people who since the outbreak of the pandemic have been through….

Homme: “So much. So much, and I too have been through so much. In a way, I wonder if this record isn’t a record for its time. The brutality. Being honest, and being like: ‘I don’t fucking know.’ I think what we should do is enjoy the moments we have until someone can figure it out, but I’m not even going to try to figure it out. And that’s its own answer too.”

NME: On ‘Made To Parade’ you sing: “Give your best years away/To a bloated corporation/Who’ll work you like a slave/Best think twice”. Another relatable comment on our times?

Homme: “Selling you fear, to make you afraid, to box you in, so you’ll do what other people want – I’ve always despised that so much. Everyone’s selling it so hard now. My old man is always like: ‘I know you’re afraid, what does that have to do with it?’ Being afraid should be the thing that starts you doing something, not the thing that stops you from doing it. You run the gauntlet, but you do come out the other side. As long as you keep going.

“I kind of got obsessed with merry-go-rounds on this. Those keyboard parts. Did the merry really go round? Aren’t you really stuck on some wheel that’s telling you: ‘We’re having fun’, but after a while you’re like: ‘No I want to fucking barf, let’s get off this thing’? There’s a lot of sonic references to merry-go-round shit all over this record.”

NME: The song ends with a euphoric guitar solo…

Homme: “It’s like: ‘Have you made it yet?’ ‘No, but it’s coming!’ That’s acceptance again, too. I romanticise my ideals. Acceptance, forgiveness, truth, fairness, perfection. These are things you strive for, but do you ever really get to them? You just reach as hard as you can. In terms of perfection, now that you can correct all your mistakes and tune everything, it turns out perfection when achieved is boring. It’s safe. It’s of no use, because it’s in the friction of life where… the universe is made from a collision, and the sparks thereafter. Babies are made fucking. It’s borrowing friction, and accepting the friction from life. Looking at the car crash as the beginning of something.”

NME: On ‘Carnavoyeur’ you sing: “We live, we die, we fail, we rise/I’m a vulture so I hear goodbyes”. What is it about vultures that you relate to?

Homme: “I love vultures. I love animals so much. They just do exactly what they’re supposed to do. There’s no guilt or shame or negotiation. They fight to the bitter end. Even with a broken leg, it doesn’t matter. I’ve seen it. I’ve seen an animal take its last breath and fight it all the way. I love that. I think vultures in a way are like the priest that hears your final confession and goes: ‘Shh, shh, it’s OK.’ Then it goes: ‘Boys…’ [gestures as if to beckon in his vulture mates] and then they devour you. That’s what it’s supposed to do. There’s something really beautiful about at the end of life being met and ferried by this thing that’s doing what it’s supposed to do. It’s like: ‘It’s OK, and I’ll also [pats his stomach] make sure you don’t go to waste when you’re gone.’”

NME: You’ve had to grieve so many close friends in the last few years…

Homme: “Eleven, now. Starting with Tony’s death, his suicide. That was a lot, and the Bataclan before that [In 2015, terrorists killed 90 people at the Eagles of Death Metal show in Paris. Homme was not on stage at the time]. Many times now, too many times, the situation has said: ‘Joshua, we don’t care if you like it or wish something else would happen. We’re here.’ Coming to accept those moments… has been… I don’t think I’ve ever learned so much in a short period of time. I still can love everyone, even though they’re gone. I still get to love everybody. I lost my best friend Rio Hackford. He had two little kids. He was 52 years old. I still get to see his kids, and I can explain to them what he was like, you know?”

NME: That sense of acceptance comes through on ‘Emotion Sickness’. Why was that the lead single?

Homme: “It’s a strange single. I don’t pick those, because I don’t care, but I was surprised because it’s such a Frankenstein’s monster of a song. The verse parts are all so grounded, and then the chorus is like taking a hang-glider and running off this cliff. We’ve never done a Crosby, Stills and Nash three-part harmony before. Again, that’s about as much about acceptance as you can get.”

You sing: “People come & go on the breeze/For a whole life? Possibly”

Homme: “I’m admitting I don’t fucking know. Are they going to be there forever? I don’t know. Some will, I guess? Once I realised it was about acceptance it was such a relief. ‘Lullabies to Paralyze’ is the Brothers Grimm fairytales, as a way of explaining things through that sort of eye. With [supergroup Them Crooked] Vultures it was all animals: elephants, lions, vultures, leeches. I get sort of fixated like that. I need to know what it’s about. It has to mean something. When I sang this, it was all by candlelight. Trying stuff and being like: ‘I’m afraid. I’m afraid to write this. I’m terrified.’”

NME: Why?

Homme: “Just because it’s so harsh. So much has gone on. It’s like… how’s this going to go? But then realising: ‘Oh shit, it’s about acceptance, no matter what it is.’ I was so relieved.”

In Times New Roman by Queens of the Stone Age is out on June 16. The band will tour the UK this coming Autumn – see full details.

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