Fucking Queen. For all their reported bombast, pomp, and tendency to overshoot and double-slaughter any semblances of good taste, everything you've heard about them is still true. They're one of the few phenomena who deliver on the hype, regardless of how you approach them. Hate or love proggy album suites? Doesn't matter, Queen will make you feel good about your choice. Can't stand operatic drama, or can't get enough unitard-clad frontmen? Love to hate prime 1970s hard rock with arena sheen? Welcome to the greatest/most horrible band of the 20th century. They did and wanted it all. Yet, so much of Queen's music is still under-recognized even by people who know and love the hits.
Freddie Mercury (born Farrokh Bulsara on the British colony of Zanzibar, East Africa), guitarist Brian May, drummer Roger Taylor, and bassist John Deacon comprised one of the most successful, effective, and productive bands of the rock era-- indeed, by some estimates, the most successful rock band of all time (having spent more time atop the UK album charts than any other act). And how did they do this? With: a gay male lead singer who specialized in operatic vocals and classically classed piano playing; an insanely talented lead guitarist who may actually have been more valuable as a songwriter or quasi-orchestral arranger of his instrument; a drummer who not only possessed the highest vocal register in the band (and this is Queen we're talking [#script:http://pitchfork.com/media/backend/js/tiny_mce/themes/advanced/langs/en.js]|||||| about), but also arguably the greatest songwriting range; a non-singing bassist who managed to pen one of the greatest karaoke anthems of all time, "Another One Bites the Dust". Like the Beatles, Queen capitalized on major group synergy, and as a result, forged a career that was as varied and resourceful as any act in rock.
Queen formed in late 1970, when Mercury (late of art school) joined up with May and Taylor (late of the Cream-ish band Smile). Deacon joined the following year, and the newly dubbed Queen played shows, rehearsed, and recorded their self-titled debut. Though they had to wait a couple of years for a release, Queen is quite clearly the work of an assured group of young men. May's album opener "Keep Yourself Alive" was an early anthem and showcase for his multi-tracked guitar. It didn't really have the operatic flair of the band's later hits, but it was catchy, well-produced, and just ridiculously easy to fist-pump along to in concert. Mercury-penned songs like "Great King Rat" and "My Fairy King" offered ample evidence where Queen's more precocious interests lie, though even then, the songs rocked way harder than their titles let on. Indeed, a song like "Son and Daughter" is like the lovechild of Black Sabbath and Ziggy Stardust, taking the most potent attributes of both, and refusing to tone down anything in favor of a harmonious mix. And they were just getting started.
Queen II-- the first of two albums they released in 1974-- was the mini-breakthrough. Part of this was due to diving with abandon into recording experimentation, particularly the elaborate vocal and guitar overdubs that would soon become the band's trademarks. May wrote most of the music for the album's "Side White": the stately (if modest by Queen standards) guitar prelude "Procession" leads directly into the still-statelier would-be rock anthem "Father to Son". Sounding like a hippie-era group sing-along crammed face-first into murky, early-70s proto-metal, it's another good example of Queen's penchant for at least attempting to unite disparate musical worlds-- even if the end result was more than a bit bloated.
However, Mercury's "Side Black" was the masterstroke, and the first real evidence of the double-decker Fabergé egg that would become Queen's career on record. "Ogre Battle" (a live holdover from the time of the first record) begins with a long, ominous fade into screeching vocal harmonies and flailing, backwards drums and guitars. The song busts and tumbles its way into the "The Fairy Feller's Master-Stroke", a dry run for the kind of music-hall rock they'd perfect with the next album's "Killer Queen", and which should probably win a few awards as the world's most apt Queen song title. "Nevermore" is a piano and vocal ballad that nicely introduces the album's central epic (and direct "Bohemian Rhapsody" precursor) "The March of the Black Queen". And the people noticed: The album produced a UK hit with a remake of the up-tempo gallop "Seven Seas of Rhye" from the debut. Dizzying, overstuffed, and unflinching, Queen II is a die-hard fan favorite, and arguably the band's most underrated record.
Sheer Heart Attack (also 1974) not only improves on every aspect of their sound suggested by the first two records, but delivers some of the finest music of their career. First off, the band had mastered the recording studio. Tracks like the hit "Killer Queen", "In the Lap of the Gods", and the hyper-vaudeville "Bring Back That Leroy Brown" simply could not have appeared on previous records due to the complexity of the arrangements, and the amazing job by the band and producer Roy Thomas Baker in getting umpteen dozens of overdubs and edits to sound like cohesive recordings. And they rocked! "Stone Cold Crazy" predates speed-metal (and was eventually covered by Metallica), "Brighton Rock" was May's theretofore best guitar showcase, and for heaven's sake, "In the Lap of the Gods... Revisited" ends the album with an explosion. Even Taylor's "Tenement Funster" (sample lyric: "My new purple shoes been amazing the people next door") and Deacon's bouncy "Misfire" bring good things to the table. This is the band at the height of its powers.
After "Killer Queen" and Sheer Heart Attack, there was no looking back. 1975's A Night at the Opera was reportedly the most expensive album ever produced at the time, and even if the only thing you knew about it was that it contained "Bohemian Rhapsody", you'd have a pretty good idea of the kind of record to expect. Yet the fun hardly stopped there: "Death on Two Legs (Dedicated to...)" was a heavy, hilarious kiss-off from Mercury to their former manager; "Lazing on a Sunday Afternoon" and "Seaside Rendezvous" were further entries into the band's vaudeville-rock canon; "You're My Best Friend" was Deacon's first big hit for Queen, while Taylor's "I'm in Love With My Car" was another good, slyly funny rocker. And if you're still in need of fireworks, May's "The Prophet's Song" features an amazing solo-through-delay vocal performance from Mercury that eventually transforms into a call-response choir, and further still into one of May's best guitar solos. No punches pulled, no expense spared: A Night at the Opera was Queen at the top of the mountain.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, 1976's A Day at the Races feels a bit retread. Even down to its Marx Brothers-derived title, the album doesn't retain the same quantum-leap progression from its predecessor as the ones had before. Indeed "The Millionaire Waltz" borrows liberally from "Bohemian Rhapsody"; classical piano playing, massive vocal overdubs, and a big rock breakdown-- but without much of the surprise or humor. Rather, the best tracks here are the ones where Queen is willing to go outside of their already established template: "You Take My Breath Away" is one of Mercury's best ballads, sung without a trace of irony or camp, and a good example of the band's perhaps underrated abilities as songwriters. "Somebody to Love" was the record's biggest hit, and positions Mercury as the gospel church soloist amidst walls of choral backdrop (i.e. him, May, and Taylor). Taylor's "Drowse" is a hazily burnt (dare I say "chill"?) piece of psychedelia that sounds unlike anything else in Queen's catalog-- and is yet another reminder of the power in the band's democratic songwriting ethos.
As much as any band, Queen commands the best audio quality money can buy, and these remasters sound great. There are lots of new bonus tracks, live versions, and B-sides-- none of which are required listening but-- particularly in the cases of the a cappella vocal tracks for "Bohemian Rhapsody" and "Bring Back That Leroy Brown"-- are good fun for fans. Furthermore, the Deep Cuts: 1973-1976 disc is an admirable attempt to introduce some of Queen's non-hit album tracks to folks otherwise familiar only with the band's UK #1s (all 18 of them)-- though it contains nothing previously unreleased. Still, bang for the buck has always been one of Queen's strong points: Jump in, be prepared for anything, and most of all, check your modesty at the door.
