QUEENSRŸCHE Drummer On Split With GEOFF TATE: 'We Decided That It Was Best For Us To Move On'

Screamer Magazine recently conducted an interview with QUEENSRŸCHE lead vocalist Todd LaTorre, guitarists Parker Lundgren and Michael Wilton, bassist Eddie Jackson and drummer Scott Rockenfield prior to the band's November 24 performance at the House Of Blues in West Hollywood, California. A few excerpts from the chat follow below.

On the band's split with singer Geoff Tate and addition of vocalist Todd LaTorre (also of CRIMSON GLORY):

Rockenfield: "Most of it was geared around wanting to do better business and watching what our business has been doing, as well as trying to address some issues that began early in 2012. I mean, things had been building for a while, but in a nutshell, we wanted to address those things and it wasn't accepted very well, and that started a sort of chaotic steam roll of a lot of negative stuff going on, which cultivated in the very end and escalated to what happened in Sao Paulo, Brazil. It had been building for a while, to be honest, and one of those things where we just finally decided to sit down and really address some of these issues and talk about ways we could do better business together, and that required us to have to make some decisions. We wanted to move on with some employees that were working with us and to just address a lot of issues that were on the table for us. And, like I said, once we opened up those conversations, it didn't go very well, and so we had to make some decisions based around that and so that's what we did. We just decided that it was best for us to move on; we didn't see eye to eye anymore on those business decisions, so we wanted to keep doing what QUEENSRŸCHE is good at, which is making music and playing shows for the fans that want to hear what we do. So that's what we did. The timing was good, we moved on, we found Todd, he fit the role. He's got a great personality and all our chemistry together is really great and here we are."
On the legal dispute with Geoff Tate over the rights to the QUEENSRŸCHE name:

Rockenfield: "None of us know what that decision [by the judge] is going to be [in November 2013], and, of course, we're leaving that up to the final deciding factor, but in the interim we're going out as QUEENSRŸCHE, and we're doing everything under the guise of QUEENSRŸCHE, and that's what we have been doing ever since this thing started to steamroll anyway. But you have the longest standing members of the band, QUEENSRŸCHE, since day one even before Geoff joined the band, so for us it's just business as usual."

Wilton: "The ultimate decision, though, is going to be how the fans feel and how the fans react and how this is played out in the marketplace. We're doing pretty good numbers right now and we are the majority of the band, and to be honest, I think the fans are going to be psyched."

Rockenfield: "In the meantime, we're grateful. The support has been huge and the shows are really being accepted great. Todd's involvement with us is being accepted and it's great. So with that, we just roll, ya know we're just rolling and for us it's just business as usual. We start making a new record in December."

On QUEENSRŸCHE's forthcoming studio album:

Rockenfield: "You kind of never know what to expect once you start, and things just kind of take on a life and it just rolls. We're really excited about it; the material is really exciting and we're having a lot of fun with the creation of all the new material, so the next step would be recording; going in and whack it out and make it happen."

Read the entire interview from Screamer Magazine.