Rob Halford's role on Queens of the Stone Age song revealed
He collaborated with the band in 2000
Former Queens of the Stone Age bassist Nick Oliveri has revealed how Rob Halford’s little-known guest spot on their debauched 2000 song 'Feel Good Hit of the Summer’ came together.
Having exited Judas Priest some eight years earlier, Rob Halford was recording his debut album ‘Resurrection’ with his eponymous band Halford at Sound City Studios in Los Angeles shortly after the turn of the millennium when he befriended Queens of the Stone Age in the neighbouring studio.
QOTSA producer Chris Goss personally invited Halford to lend his idiosyncratic vocals to ‘Feel Good Hit of the Summer’, the opening track on the band’s critically lauded second album ‘Rated R’, and The Metal God duly obliged.
In a new interview with songfacts, ex-QOTSA bassist Nick Oliveri revealed that Rob Halford recorded more vocals for the track than appeared on the final version.
Reflecting upon the ‘Rated R’ recording sessions 22 years ago, Oliveri said: “I remember being in there and Rob Halford being super cool to us. I'm an old fan of Judas Priest, I just love that stuff. It's good rock and roll. Their early stuff is really, really great. Chris Goss, too.
“One of my favourite memories was when Chris asked Rob if he'd sing on ‘Feel Good Hit Of The Summer.’ He's not really featured in there, but I have mixes of CDs from every day. We recorded all those sessions from ‘Songs For The Deaf’ and ‘Rated R.’ I took a CD home every day to see where we were, because whole different words would come for a song, guitar parts, piano, you name it.
“So I have all these different versions of these songs on CDs in my house in a box somewhere. And one of them is with Rob Halford being more featured with "COCAINE!" – with the Rob Halford-style singing.
“Josh (Homme) didn't want to put that in there. He wanted what he called ‘the more sinister Rob’ for the ‘Nicotine, Valium, Vicodin, marijuana, ecstasy and alcohol’ parts. But I liked the ‘Cocaine’ parts with the high-pitched singing.”
Oliveri continued: “Stuff like that was very memorable for me – Rob Halford coming in. We asked him, ‘Hey, what do you want to be credited as?’ He goes, ‘Just put down 'vocals by the Metal God,'’ and he walked out!”
Nick Oliveri was fired from Queens of the Stone Age in 2004 and he’s currently a member of Stöner alongside Brant Bjork.
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