Troy Van Leeuwen on three decades of Queens of the Stone Age

“Every record has to break ground for us”: Troy Van Leeuwen on three decades of Queens of the Stone Age

Photo: Andreas Neumann

Words by David James Young

Troy Van Leeuwen is back from the catacombs – metaphorically, at least, this time.

The guitarist and right-hand man of Queens of the Stone Age for nearly 25 years is reflecting on the band’s run of acoustic, orchestral shows revisiting their Alive in the Catacombs film and EP from last year.

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These shows saw the band – normally one of the loudest, most muscular rock bands on the live circuit – completely transforming their catalogue to create something whispered, sinister and mesmerising. It’s something Van Leeuwen has thought a lot about – especially as he now prepares to starkly contrast these shows with a back-half of 2026 touring going back to the band’s electric ways.

“With a show like that, there’s this fine line of delicacy,” he says. “When you’re doing loud shows, there’s room for mistakes hidden in the sheer volume of everything. When you’re doing a Catacombs show, you’re trying to fit in with violins and horns, so you can’t be too loud, but then you also have to find those moments where it does really roar. The audience are quiet, so it’s an exercise in how subtle you can get and how you can get the dynamics to go up and down. Some of the songs have a really different feel, like ‘Villains of Circumstance’ and ‘I Never Came’. They’re way more emotionally intense, so the whole thing puts you in a different state of mind.”

Touring with Queens of the Stone Age this year has led to Van Leeuwen pulling out a personal favourite from his collection to play for the first time in nearly 20 years: a Yamaha AES 1500. He originally began playing it during his time in A Perfect Circle, and would later revisit it for QOTSA’s 2005 album Lullabies to Paralyze.

“I was talking to Yamaha at the time about a signature model [what would become the Yamaha SA503 TVL],” says Van Leeuwen. “We ended up creating something similar to a [Gibson ES-] 335, but with a third pickup in the middle. In the process of doing some of the prototypes, they also made me an AES 1500 with the middle pickup – and that’s what I’ve been playing on the Catacombs tour.”

So why exactly did it exit his regular rotation?

“I broke the neck on an Australian tour,” he confesses. “This must have been in 2007 or something. All I remember is that it came home in two pieces! It got fixed, but it’s stayed in the case ever since.”

The 1500 makes an appearance on the band’s recently released comeback single ‘Easy Street’, which marked their first new music in three years. A dramatic departure from their down-tuned, desert-dwelling take on heavy rock, the song is a largely acoustic exploration with dreamy harmonies and some spacey synth pads for good measure.

Van Leeuwen views the song as the potential of the Catacombs run turned into something tangible: “It’s an experience that opened up our eyes to doing more stuff like this,” he says.

“Over the last five years, we’ve kind of been emboldened by having orchestration and some acoustic instruments. It doesn’t have to be light, and it’s not all happy – actually, it makes you more vulnerable, and that could be dangerous for some reason. I think we’ve been working on this idea to like get more into that realm of expression than just brutality.

We’ve been experimenting with ballads since [2013’s] …Like Clockwork – I remember writing ‘Vampire of Time and Memory’ really not being sure how people would react to it. Luckily, our audience is pretty fucking hip and willing to go down the rabbit hole with us.”

Photo: Andreas Neumann

2026 officially marks 30 years since Josh Homme formed Queens of the Stone Age, following the demise of Kyuss the year before. Van Leeuwen joined the band on the tour for 2002’s Songs for the Deaf and has played on every album since, making him the longest-tenured member behind Homme himself. As such, he views the band’s legacy now as largely in tandem with his own.

“There’s been a nice period of aging,” he says. “We’re not nostalgic, we’re more interested in what’s happening lately, but we continue to play the songs every night and the reactions are always interesting. More and more people have been coming out and saying [2007’s] Era Vulgaris is their favourite record of ours lately, and it really didn’t seem like it was for a lot of people at the time. It was a very experimental record for us, but that’s also kind of the routine – every record has to be different, and it’s got to break ground for us.”

In December, Van Leeuwen will return to Australia alongside the rest of QOTSA for their first run of arenas down under since their double-header with Nine Inch Nails back in 2014.

They’re bringing fellow countrymen Primus along for the ride, as well as Australia’s own Tropical Fuck Storm for a night of loud, weird rock & roll. Van Leeuwen first toured Australia with the band in the summer of 2003, performing at that year’s Big Day Out – which resulted in some hilariously iconic shots reflecting the line-up’s fashion choices at the time.

“There we are, opposite sides of the stage,” he recalls with a laugh. “Nick [Oliveri], playing a Dan Armstrong bass – which is see-through – with no clothes on. Me, in my full suit and tie, sweating through my entire outfit.

One of the highlights of the Catacombs tour, actually, was seeing all these other people sweating it out in suits. Now they all know my pain!”