STACK NZ Oct #67

MUSIC

FEATURE

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melodrama and excesses. Freddie was having fun with his fame. “Boredom is the biggest disease in the world,” he said. “Sometimes I think there must be more to life than rushing around the world like a mad thing . . . but I’m an entertainer. It’s in the blood... I am just a trouper, dear. Give me a stage.” By this time they were commanding huge stages and so the follow-up album News of the World (1977) reflected that in their two massive crowd pleasers We Will Rock You and We Are the Champions , both of which were reviled the Britain’s punk-obsessed music press at the time. The patchy Jazz (1978) is the least loved album in Queen’s mature career, but they returned to form (and the singles charts) with The Game (80) and the hits Another One Bites the Dust , written by bassist John Deacon, and Crazy Little Thing Called Love . Flash Gordon (1980) was the soundtrack to the film of the same name and is mostly instrumentals, so not for the casual Queen listener. Nor is Hot Space (notable for the duet with Bowie on Under Pressure but not much else). From there on through The Works (1984, with I Want to Break Free , and Radio Gaga written by drummer Roger Taylor), A Kind of Magic (1986) and The Miracle (1989) they sounded like a good band in a holding pattern. Mercury was in the early stages of Aids-related illnesses and their final album with him was the uneventful Innuendo (released in early 1991, nine months before Mercury’s death). The final song on the album, written largely by Brian May is The Show Must Go On . And, when it came to Queen reissues and repackaging, it most certainly did. Still is.

QUEEN FOR A DAY... 70s are very much influenced by fey prog-rock so are best not returned to if you really like where they went after that. Sheer Heart Attack (1974) is where they start to get interesting for mainstream listeners. The album included the hit Killer Queen (which won them their first Ivor Novello songwriting in the world, but here they come again, this time on remastered 180gm vinyl pressings. All their studio albums (and Made in Heaven ) beautifully re-presented in a massive box or available individually. For those of the CD or download generations just getting into vinyl, ... or a lifetime. Graham Reid revisits the world champions of pomp rock. If that doesn’t fit on one line, try dropping ‘world’... M any years ago a friend worked for a major international record company. At the time with the downturn in CD sales and the constantly shifting ground of the internet, things were getting tougher. One day over lunch in early

November we were talking about this in somewhat glum terms. But, I said, at least they had a license to print money in the run-up to Christmas. He looked at me puzzled. I said, “Queen”. Even he laughed at that. And it was true. In their Freddie Mercury- lifetime Queen released 14 studio albums (the posthumous studio construction Made in Heaven was released four years after Mercury’s death in November 1991). But they’ve released the same number of compilations, many of them in October and November. And of course box sets, live albums and DVDs. Even as late as November last year a “new” Queen album appeared, Queen Rocks , which mostly picked up material recorded in the 80s with Mercury’s vocals put in new settings by the remaining band members and producer William Orbit. There’s no shortage of Queen

this is a formidable catalogue, so let’s trip lightly through it because Queen were often a great deal of melodramatic fun. Few would dare even try something as silly and ambitious as Bohemian Rhapsody , let alone follow it up with retro-rock singles ( You’re My Best Friend, Tie Your Mother Down ). Or release a song entitled Fat Bottomed Girls (unless you were Spinal Tap, and sometimes they were that too, gloriously full of self-parody). Queen’s first two albums ( Queen I and Queen II ) of the early

award) and marked a move into more concise pop-rock. A Night at the Opera (1975) and A Day at the Races (1976) — both named after Marx Brothers films — is where the story really begins; the former includes Bohemian Rhapsody and You’re My Best Friend , the latter Tie Your Mother Down and Somebody to Love . That Marx Brothers reference is important because after their earnest start Mercury stopped taking himself quite so seriously and their albums became manifestations of his flamboyancy,

For more reviews, overviews and interviews by Graham Reid see: elsewhere.co.nz

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OCTOBER 2015

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