Originally released in 1999 on Atlantic, Q2K both captures Queensryche as a mature musical machine in its prime, and finds them breaking new ground after a personnel change. The trouble is (to me, at least!), without Chris DeGarmo, QR became an ordinary hard rock band. Actually, extremely ordinary! I really can't even get through this album. DeGarmo seemed to be the guiding force behind QR's best work and without him, there seems to be no direction - nothing holding the songs together and nothing feeling very passionate. The music is played well and Tate sounds fine, but this does not stand up to their best work (Promised Land, Empire, or Mindcrime). Listening to this album will only make you want to shut it off, grab one of their classics, and remind yourself why you liked them so much in the first place. Mind you, given the fact Q2K was out of print, it's great that this remastered version has been released - though it is likely it didn't really need to be remastered, as pointed out above! The bonus tracks are quite good, and I'm frankly astonished half of them weren't included on the original release! It would have benefited from their inclusion surely.