Queen Queen

Like any patchy but promising debut from a classic rock group, it's often easy to underrate Queen's eponymous 1973 debut, since it has no more than one well-known anthem and plays more like a collection of ideas than a cohesive album. But what ideas! Almost every one of Queen's signatures are already present, from Freddie Mercury's operatic harmonies to Brian May's rich, orchestral guitar overdubs and the suite-like structures of "Great King Rat." That rich, florid feel could be characterized as glam, but even in these early days that appellation didn't quite fit Queen, since they were at once too heavy and arty to be glam and – ironically enough, considering their legendary excess – they were hardly trashy enough to be glam.

Queen were never adverse to commercialism - after all, Freddie Mercury made sure that he recorded a full album's worth of vocal tracks on his deathbed, so his colleagues could record a posthumous album. It should come as no surprise, then, that just two years after the release of that posthumous record, the surviving members went back into the vaults to assemble Rocks. As the title suggests, Rocks captures Queen at their most rockin', or, to be more accurate, their heaviest. Despite its breakneck conclusion, "Bohemian Rhapsody" is not here, but "Seven Seas of Rhye," "Stone Cold Crazy," "We Will Rock You," "Sheer Heart Attack," "Fat Bottomed Girls," "I Want It All" and "I'm In Love with My Car" are, along with several underappreciated album tracks, new remixes of "Tie Your Mother Down" and "I Can't Live with You," and "No One Like You," a tribute to Mercury recorded by the surviving members of Queen.

In one regard, Queen II does indeed provide more of the same thing as on the band's debut. Certainly, of all the other albums in Queen's catalog it bears the closest resemblance to its immediate predecessor, particularly in its lean, hard attack and in how it has only one song that is well-known to listeners outside of their hardcore cult: in this case, it's "Seven Seas of Rhye," which is itself more elliptical than "Keep Yourself Alive," the big song from the debut…

In one regard, Queen II does indeed provide more of the same thing as on the band's debut. Certainly, of all the other albums in Queen's catalog it bears the closest resemblance to its immediate predecessor, particularly in its lean, hard attack and in how it has only one song that is well-known to listeners outside of their hardcore cult: in this case, it's "Seven Seas of Rhye," which is itself more elliptical than "Keep Yourself Alive," the big song from the debut. But these similarities are superficial and Queen II is a very different beast than its predecessor, an album that is richer, darker, and weirder, an album that finds Queen growing as a band by leaps and bounds.

The soundtrack to the 2018 Queen biopic Bohemian Rhapsody offers a fittingly cinematic portrait of the iconic rock band, built around a handful of the group's most well-known songs, including live versions and several tracks reworked specifically for the film. As a souvenir of the movie, the soundtrack works especially well. Opening with guitarist Brian May's arrangement of the "20th Century Fox Fanfare," and showcasing his distinctive searing guitar leads, it perfectly sets the tone for telling Queen and Freddie Mercury's story on the big screen. Here we get such beloved classics as "Somebody to Love," "Killer Queen," "Another One Bites the Dust," and "Under Pressure."

Like any patchy but promising debut from a classic rock group, it's often easy to underrate Queen's eponymous 1973 debut, since it has no more than one well-known anthem and plays more like a collection of ideas than a cohesive album…

If Day at the Races was a sleek, streamlined album, its 1977 successor, News of the World, was its polar opposite, an explosion of styles that didn't seem to hold to any particular center. It's front-loaded with two of Queen's biggest anthems – the stomping, stadium-filling chant "We Will Rock You" and its triumphant companion, "We Are the Champions" – which are quickly followed by the ferocious "Sheer Heart Attack," a frenzied rocker that hits harder than anything on the album that shares its name (a remarkable achievement in itself). Three songs, three quick shifts in mood, but that's hardly the end of it.

Few bands embodied the pure excess of the '70s like Queen. Embracing the exaggerated pomp of progressive rock and heavy metal, as well as vaudevillian music hall, the British quartet delved deeply into camp and bombast, creating a huge, mock-operatic sound with layered guitars and overdubbed vocals. Queen's music was a bizarre yet highly accessible fusion of the macho and the fey. For years, their albums boasted the motto "no synthesizers were used on this record," signaling their allegiance with the legions of post-Led Zeppelin hard rock bands. In The Many Faces of Queen we will delve into the inner world of the legendary British foursome including their early recordings, collaborations and their fantastic repertoire. With remastered sound and fantastic artwork, The Many Faces Of Queen is an essential addition to your rock music collection. Also, remember that the album is not available on any streaming platform.