Queens of the Stone Age, O2 Arena, gig review: Singular hard rock pariahs deftly blend style and substance

Sign up to Roisin O’Connor’s free weekly newsletter Now Hear This for the inside track on all things music Get our Now Hear This email for free Get our Now Hear This email for free SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. open image in gallery Queens of the Staone Age's Dean Fertita, Josh Homme and Michael Schuman at The O2 Arena ‘The Lost Art of Keeping a Secret” has, somewhat bizarrely, been relegated to intermittent performances on this tour, so it’s wonderful to see a superb rendition of one of the band’s most-enduring songs tossed back into the set. Despite this, Homme’s undeniably grown in confidence as a frontman and his charisma just about manages to carry the show on his shoulders alone, even if his stage patter sometimes comes across as the ramblings of a man who’s consumed the rock n” roll cocktail listed in their turn of the millennium anthem “Feel Good Hit of the Summer” He’s undeniably a pariah of cool though, nonchalantly smoking between songs and soaking in the roars of approval from an almost 18,000 strong crowd. open image in gallery Queens of the Stone Age's Josh Homme It’s particularly noteworthy how well songs from …Like Clockwork come across, the album that launched them into venues of this size in the first place. That way everybody’s happy and it’s more of a party.” Mildly archaic gender assumptions aside, Queens of the Stone Age straddle that line perfectly and it’s wonderful to see them finally get their dues.