LIVE REVIEW + PHOTOS: Queens of the Stone Age, The Kills in Boston, MA (06.10.25)
Desert rock band Queens of the Stone Age launched the 2025 leg of their lengthy End is Nero tour right here in Boston last night. The tour began in 2023 in Michigan and has made several stops in New England, including a 2023 appearance at Boston Calling and headline shows in Connecticut and Maine that same year. They haven’t played a proper headline show in Boston since 2017, with their only other appearance coming at the 2018 edition of Boston Calling.
The End is Nero tour was launched to promote the group’s 2023 studio album In Times New Roman…, a record that debuted at No. 9 on the Billboard 200. It was recorded at Josh Homme’s studio in Burbank, CA, with the mixing being handled by Mark Rankin. Before the record’s release, Homme spoke to British music magazine NME, saying, “I think when you’re dealing with the extreme ups and downs of life, you don’t stop and go: ‘I should really make a record.’ Those things don’t exist in that moment. If your roof is flooding, you don’t say: ‘We should make a record about this!’ You have to stop yourself drowning in a flood. We recorded it probably two and a half years ago, but it just sat there, waiting to be finished. I didn’t sing it until last November. I wasn’t done living. Honestly, I was probably afraid. I wasn’t ready. You need the flood to be over, and then you can decide whether you can accept the flood. I think with this being a record about acceptance, you need to actually get there yourself.”
Last night’s setlist was an expedition of the band’s catalog, touching on six of their eight studio albums. They opened the show with “Keep Your Eyes Peeled,” a song the group hasn’t played live since 2018. It’s a deep cut off the album …Like Clockwork, that the band has only played a handful of times since the release of that album. Immediately contrasting that, they played “No One Knows,” perhaps the most universally known Queens of the Stone Age song. The song was nominated for a Grammy in 2003 and reached the top of the alt-rock charts that year.
One of the hallmarks of any Queens of the Stone Age concert is the impeccable live sound and attention to detail of the audio presentation. In 2023, when they performed at Boston Calling, they were slated on the now departed Red Stage, a stage known for its sound issues. It was unanimous among attendees that they had the best-sounding set of the weekend, even if you were to ask people who were there for artists of another genre.
Most of the remaining setlist played out as expected, save for the song “Suture Up Your Future,” a song that was performed in front of a live audience for the first time since 2008. The song was performed once last year during the group’s acoustic set, which was filmed in the Paris Catacombs and released as a live album; however, there was no audience for that performance. The penultimate song of the show, “A Song for the Deaf,” was also a rarity, being performed for the first time since 2018.
For being the band’s first performance in eleven months, QotSA was remarkably in mid-tour form, playing as a well-oiled machine. They followed up Tuesday’s show with an encore performance on Wednesday night, playing a very different set to treat fans who chose to attend both shows.
Photos – Queens of the Stone Age, The Kills at MGM Music Hall in Boston, MA on June 10th:
