Published on Feb 3, 1997
Every once in a great while you stumble across an album that you
feel is truly one of the best ever recorded. My tastes in music are
usually more eclectic than most, so I usually keep these opinions
to myself to avoid senseless bar room discussions that cannot ever
have any true resolution. In the case of
Operation: Mindcrime, however, I’ll pull out all the stops,
and offer my greatest praises for an album that was largely
unnoticed by the mainstream.
Operation: Mindcrime is a concept album, masterfully written
so that it achieves novel-like story development and in only a
couple of hundred words. The story revolves around Nikki, a drug
addict who gets mixed up in a crime syndicate and is recruited to
murder a priest and a destitute named Mary. The priest had rescued
Mary from the streets while she was a prostitute, and had been
forcing her to grant sexual favors to him in repayment of his good
will. Nikki murders the priest, but winds up falling in love with
Mary, and finds it difficult to complete his orders.
Eventually, under pressure from the syndicate, he returns to
complete his assignment to murder Mary. We eventually find Mary
dead, but mystery surrounds her death. Was it suicide, or did Nikki
murder her?
Behind this wicked tale is masterfully composed music with a
metal flair. When you listen to this album, your mind fills with
movie like images from the story, while the music thunders along in
the background like a good movie score. At album’s end, you are
left with a chilling feeling that sticks for a while. The music
remains resident longer. It’s an album that you can listen to a
hundred times over and still pick up something new every time.
Operation: Mindcrime was a relative bomb on the charts,
peaking at #50 in 1988. Their follow up,
Empire (1990) was a typical compilation of rockers and
ballads that went double platinum, thanks to MTV’s near constant
airplay of “Silent Lucidity.”
Typically, concept albums are not big sellers. Record labels
stipulate that the rock audience isn’t interested in albums that
are complicated musically, or lyrically. Because of this, albums
like
Operation: Mindcrime usually don’t receive much promotion
and languish on the charts while brainless Sammy Hagar-penned Van
Halen tunes rattle the top 10. If you’re into rock music with a
harder edge, and like a good story, give
Operation: Mindcrime a whirl. The music will blow you away.
The story will bring you back time and time again.