While Tate continued working on an upcoming solo album, Kings &

While Tate continued working on an upcoming solo album, Kings & Thieves , and a subsequent tour, Queensrÿche’s other band members started the side project that eventually became Rising West. Wilton explained that: “Originally this was deemed as a side project, because we were told by our management that we were not going to do anything for the next year so hey, we have to survive.” Still in search of a frontman for the at-the-time unnamed project, the group considered Wilton’s recommendation of Todd La Torre , the then-frontman of Crimson Glory , whom he had met several months prior at the NAMM Show in January 2012. Their encounter had resulted in a songwriting collaboration on, among others, a song named “Don’t Look Back”, which in 2013 would make its way onto Queensrÿche’s self-titled album. The band heard some of La Torre’s demos on YouTube, and took a leap of faith by booking and announcing two shows at Seattle’s Hard Rock Cafe on June 8 and 9, 2012, even before La Torre met the band members. The project would initially be called “West”, which stood for the four principal members of the band: ” W ilton, E ddie, S cott and T odd”, but was later renamed “Rising West” at the suggestion of Jackson. The band was enthusiastic about this addition to the original name, because “Rising West” reflected the feeling that the project was “something really fresh” for everyone involved; it additionally referred to the band members coming out of the West Coast , seemed better as a band name than simply “West”, and [in deemphasizing the WEST acronym] acknowledged that Parker Lundgren [whose name was not part of the acronym] would also be participating in the project. The shows were publicly announced on May 29, 2012, revealing that they would focus on Queensrÿche’s older work. Both shows sold out in 48 hours, among others to fans from Japan, Australia and New Zealand. When the band flew La Torre in from Florida to Seattle nine days before the show to rehearse at Rockenfield’s house, they hadn’t played a note together, nor did they know whether it would work. Although La Torre was a big fan of Queensrÿche’s older albums, he was not very familiar with the songs on Promised Land and they had only limited time to prepare for the shows; the band focused on the material from the Queensrÿche EP to the band’s fourth studio album, Empire , which are generally considered the band’s heaviest releases , and according to La Torre: “are the songs and the time period that most represented the core sound of what Queensryche material was about”. Their first rehearsal together went very smoothly, according to Wilton: “we blasted through 18 to 20 songs and everybody was amazed from the professionality, the musicianship and tone of Todd’s voice.” Rockenfield was immediately reassured: “the second we played “Queen of the Reich”, it was all over.” Even after the enthusiastic response during these initial shows, the fledgling band still remained unsigned in the days that immediately followed. They already had been approached by Glen Parrish of PGM Management after their show on June 9, 2012, who offered to become their band manager. According to Wilton, Parrish had told the management company in Los Angeles: “I have something very hot here and we should grab these guys before someone else does”. After band negotiations with “at least 3 or 4 record labels”, Parrish chose to sign the group, now billing themselves as Queensrÿche, with Century Media .