Queen - A Day at the Races (1976)

Tracklist:
1. Tie Your Mother Down
2. You Take My Breath Away
3. Long Away
4. The Millionaire Waltz
5. You and I
6. Somebody to Love
7. White Man
8. Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy
9. Drowse
10. Teo Torriate (Let Us Cling Together)


I like the races – 9/10

The fifth album of rock legends Queen, A Day at the Races, is a bit of a departure from their old-school style. Where every album from Queen II to A Night at the Opera was a bit more bombastic and featured clear progressive influences, ADATR is a bit more straightforward and features more gentle songs. It’s also the first of the second wave of types of Queen-albums in terms of musical style. This doesn’t exclude similarities with previous efforts, but it’s certainly different.

This release does not highlight the idea of a change immediately with the hard rocking “Tie Your Mother Down” as the first track. A great hard rock riff with clear high-pitched vocals by Mercury is undoubtedly Queen in the vein of “Death on Two Legs” or “Ogre Battle”. To this day the song is a preferred classic and always was a good stage song. A song like “White Man” also pretends we’re still in 1975 with its classic hard rock and Queen trademark effects. The change is more in the other tracks such as “You Take My Breath Away” or “The Millionaire Waltz”. Both are much more displaying a pop atmosphere, being silent ballads, and rely more on the lead vocals and piano than on the guitars and choirs. “Long Away” is a May-styled acoustic rock track in the vein of “’39” and “Some Day One Day”, but blends in quite nicely with the new-style songs. “The Millionaire Waltz” is a catchy waltz-styled pop track with an unnecessary yet enjoyable rock part in the middle. The highlight is undoubtedly May’s great solo. Another new-styled track is the Deacon-penned “You and I”, which is a swinging song.

Possibly an attempt at topping “Bohemian Rhapsody” is “Somebody to Love”, with hints at some gospel-influences with its use of the Queen choir. It’s very piano-based and quite epic, understandably one of their bigger hits. While Queen introduced sloppy funny songs with Sheer Heart Attack’s “Bring Back That Leroy Brown” they managed to put one on A Night at the Opera that actually was enjoyable, and they did it again here with “Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy”. The song has a light touch to it and a swift, slightly funny, atmosphere throughout, yet manages to be musically challenging, which is the innovative aspect of this track. Again the choirs are heavy on this track, but choirs will always be a part of Queen, since they have three vocalists and all want to and deserve to sing. They always take good advantage of it. Roger Taylor wrote a track as well with “Drowse” but somehow is slightly beside the mark with this one. It’s an unnoted track that just passes by without being really noticed. The theme is semi-catchy and all, but shows much similarity with unintended lullabies, yet is beautiful, in a way. The thing is, this is the first time we hear Taylor sing a ballad, and I like it, but I prefer him on the rock songs like “I’m in Love with my Car”. The conclusion to A Day at the Races is splendid in the epic shape of “Teo Torriate (Let Us Cling Together)”, with a chorus sung in Japanese. It’s one of the best album closers by Queen and is epic throughout, with solely piano and vocals in the verses, accompanied by some rare bass lines and then the epic chorus begins, first in English, later in Japanese.

The biggest change is less progressive influences. Though the experimenting is far from over, there is no “The Prophet’s Song” or “The March of the Black Queen” here, nor anything like it. This does not lessen the album quality; they replaced one good aspect with another and thus give us something different to chew on, which is a very good decision for any band to do. A Day at the Races turned out to be one of my favorite Queen albums, and even beats the somewhat unstable Opera-album. If people would ask, I would definitely recommend A Day at the Races.

Strongest tracks: “Long Away”, “You and I”, “Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy” and “Teo Torriate”.

Kayak - The Last Encore (1976)

Tracklist:
1. Back to the Front
2. Nothingness
3. Love of a Victim
4. Land on the Water
5. The Last Encore
6. Do You Care
7. Still My Heart Cries For You
8. Relics From a Distant Age
9. Love Me Tonight/Get on Board
10. Evocation
11. Raid Your Own House
12. Well Done

The Very Last Encore – 9/10

After the already great Royal Bed Bouncer, Kayak continued in the same vein and released The Last Encore. The ties with debut See See the Sun are now fully disconnected and this album is more of the best side of Royal Bed Bouncer. Though this album did not contain a single to climb many charts, I find it to be Kayak’s finest album, even though some come very close. Unfortunately, this is the last album to feature this lineup and the last album before the reunion in 1999 to feature fellow composer and occasional vocalist Pim Koopman, leaving solely Scherpenzeel to fulfill that task on later albums. But here, we can fully enjoy the golden combination of composing talents, Werner’s unique voice, Slager’s shiver-sending guitar solos and brilliant songwriting one more time.

When I heard this album for the first time I hated it. I thought it to be the worst Kayak album ever and was ready to put it in the sideboard to let dust cover it, but something unexplainable was drawing me back to the album and eventually I fell in love with it. This album’s hooks reveal themselves only to those who can show patience for the music, because that’s what it needs. “Back to the Front” for example sounds so odd at first glance. Some piano chord is being played in fast staccato with Werner’s always odd voice singing lots of words in a monotonous melody. Eventually when the song really starts we get to recognize music there, but it’s not the catchiest music ever, yet once you found the hook, you’re hooked and can’t slip off the hook! Whether the song is a fast-paced rocker like “Love of a Victim” or “Still my Heart Cries for You”, or a sensitive ballad like “Evocation” or “Nothingness”, or an epic anthem like “The Last Encore” or “Land on the Water”, every song is in every aspect topnotch. Slager gives us less of his more complex solos but instead plays subtle, appropriate gentle solos with perhaps more musical value.

There is however one thing that restrains me from giving this album the perfect rating. There is one little abomination is the shape of “Love Me Tonight/Get on Board”, which is just awful. It’s easily the worst song Kayak ever recorded or dared to put on an album. It begins as some 1950s piano recording with some weird voice in the effect of an old 1940s microphone singing a stupid tune from a 1930s movie. The second part is some fanfare-inspired march-like thing, which is drenched in the same dated sound. Luckily this track doesn’t last for three minutes, but it still breaks up the album. And then there is “Raid Your Own House”, which is a nice song, on par with the rest of the album, apart from its bridge, which sounds so un-be-lie-va-bly uninspired. Apart from these little complaints the good side of the album overshadows this by far and modern technology allows us to skip certain songs without too much trouble, so we can still name The Last Encore the best Kayak album, even without the abomination.

In short, The Last Encore picks up where Royal Bed Bouncer had left and again raised the bar for its follow-up. I would recommend this to possibly future Kayak fans anytime.

Strongest tracks: “Land on the Water”, “The Last Encore”, “Do You Care” and “Relics from a Distant Age”.
Weakest track: “Love Me Tonight/Get on Board”.

Queen - A Night at the Opera (1975)

Tracklist
1. Death on Two Legs
2. Lazing on a Sunday Afternoon
3. I'm in Love with my Car
4. You're My Best Friend
5. '39
6. Sweet Lady
7. Seaside Rendezvous
8. The Prophet's Song
9. Love of my Life
10. Good Company
11. Bohemian Rhapsody
12. God Save the Queen

Easy Come, Easy Go – 7,5/10

And in the year of 1975 it was there: the big album that was their first big hit all over the world. Who does not know this album? It contains two of Queen’s biggest hits ever, which were permanent live tracks back in their touring days. Mostly when I encounter such an album I review it with a rather skeptical approach, planning to break it down piece by piece, but if I’d do that to A Night at the Opera, I would just be lying, for this is truly a great album. Not as great as some others, but certainly one that could possibly deserve all the praise it got.

A Night at the Opera is a very diverse album. Where we have raw rock track like “Death on Two Legs” and “Sweet Lady”, there are these goody-goody happy songs like “Lazing on a Sunday Afternoon” or “Seaside Rendezvous”; and where there is a “Killer Queen”-equivalent in “You’re My Best Friend”, there are true epics in “The Prophet’s Song” and “Bohemian Rhapsody”, all the way up to sweet and touching ballad “Love of my Life”, and everything in between. Though it doesn’t differ so much from Sheer Heart Attack in terms of musical style, even though it might slightly more varied and polished, the biggest difference is in the balance. Where SHA still contained mostly hard rock tracks with a few poppy tracks and funny things in between, ANATO tends to have less hard rock tracks and more of those poppy and funny tracks. This is not necessarily for the bad, especially since the album is not torn apart near the end now, but is a bit fragile throughout, which, how odd it may sound, fits better as an album. The funny poppy songs are more spread, the rockers are equally distributed and the sing along anthems turn up every now and then, thus making Queen’s most praised album a diverse one.

The quality of the tracks, however, is a bit diminished. If you noticed how I disliked “Bring Back That Leroy Brown” is my Sheer Heart Attack review, you can imagine songs like “Seaside Rendezvous” and “Good Company” won’t do well either. These songs rely on funny atmospheres with often staccato rhythms and these funny lyrics. Songs like these are funny, but I don’t want my music to be funny; that doesn’t make good LISTENING material, which is what music is all about in my opinion. “Lazing On a Sunday Afternoon” is, though short and also funny, also nice to listen to as a nice extra. Strong rock tracks like “Death on Two Legs” or “I’m in Love with my Car” truly make the album shine, especially the latter, which is sung by our dearest Roger Taylor. Brian May also gives a good vocal performance on the anthemic “’39”, a sung driven mostly by acoustic guitar and a great vocal melody. Rocker “Sweet Lady” contains the odd change of rhythms in the chorus, but is a good song itself. Then there’s “The Prophet Song”, a song with a real epic character and one problem. That problem is the overlong break in which Freddie is just singing and chanting and multi-tracking his voice numerous times and lastly dubbing it in numerous of effects, thus stretching the song past the eighth minute. The rest of the song is downright great, great composition, great guitars and stunning, epic melodies, but the break should’ve been a guitar solo, not a voice solo.

Then come the big hits. “Love of my Life” is undeniably a beautiful ballad and worthy a recognition as one of Queen’s greatest songs. Mostly relying on piano, it is a very sensitive song. After the skip-worthy “Good Company” we have Queen’s biggest hit ever: “Bohemian Rhapsody”. Even though I’m mostly not keen on hits, this song is undeniably a brilliant song. A description it would not need, though I can say it begins as a piano ballad, then falls into the opera-ish part, then rocks your socks off, and concludes as the ballad it always was, ending with a gong. I suppose the “God Save the Queen” arrangements by May are very nice, but absolutely not necessary. They’re merely a satisfying ending to the epic “Bohemian Rhapsody”.

In short, A Night at the Opera is a good album, but features a little too much chit-chat to become truly magnificent in my eyes. It’s a very diverse album and I would definitely recommend it to people who are new to Queen, even if it’s only for “Bohemian Rhapsody”.

Strongest tracks: “Bohemian Rhapsody”, “I’m in Love with my Car” and “’39”.
Weakest tracks: “Seaside Rendezvous”, “Good Company” and the middle part of “The Prophet’s Song”.

Kayak - Royal Bed Bouncer (1975)

Tracklist:
1. Royal Bed Bouncer
2. Life of Gold
3. (You're So) Bizarre
4. Bury the World
5. Chance for a Lifetime
6. If This Is Your Welcome
7. Moments of Joy
8. Patricia Anglaia
9. Said No Word
10. My Heart Never Changed
11. Alibi [*]
12. Mountain Too Rough [*]
13. Woe and Alas [*]
14. Mouldy Wood [*]
15. Lovely Luna [*]
16. Forever Is A Lonely Thought [*]
17. Still Try to Write a Book [*]
18. Give it a Name [*]
19. Bulldozer (demo) [*]

Let the Classics Roll – 9/10

Royal Bed Bouncer... an album considered Kayak’s best by many, and it’s certainly one of their finest moments. Where the first two albums were mostly a search for the proper Kayak sound you could say this is where they found it. Though Koopman’s compositions are extremely few here, Scherpenzeel dominates the album with the most pleasant of tunes; Slager gives us some of his best guitar solos here and Werner’s odd raw voice sounds in better shape then ever. They also replaced bassist Cees van Leeuwen with Bert Veldkamp, but I haven’t noticed anything specific in playing style of both. Anyhow, what I’m trying to say is: the band is in top form.

The compositions are so very subtle and sweet, even though sometimes very fast-paced like on “Royal Bed Bouncer” and “Chance for a Lifetime”. There is enough variation between tempos, tones and moods, yet all of it is very soothing to the ear, which is Kayak’s unique sound. Though the tone gets a little on the happy side with themes like “Royal Bed Bouncer” and “(You’re So) Bizarre”, the quality is increasingly better than on both Kayak II and See See the Sun. An album like this one is the power behind Kayak and it’s something no other band can mimic or copy. It seems they’ve found a way to have short songs and in the meantime be progressive and brilliant as well. And of course this album contains the classics “Life of Gold”, “Chance for a Lifetime”, “If This Is Your Welcome” and “Moments of Joy”. If you like Kayak, there is no way you can turn this album down.

Some of the highlights I will describe. “Life of Gold” is a very gentle ballad with emotional vocals by Werner and a great sensitive guitar solo by Slager. It’s mostly piano based and has this great epic feel to it. “(You’re So) Bizarre” is a more happy song with odd vocal melodies and rhythms, but that’s exactly what makes it great. “Bury the World” is one of the best Kayak tracks ever, being the only one featuring Koopman and Werner sharing lead vocals, while at the meantime the backing music is stunning. It flows over to the fast “Chance for a Lifetime”, a fast song about building a spaceship, but aside from the cheese it’s a good song, with a terrifically melodic break. “Moments of Joy” was the first Kayak song I ever heard in my life, and it’s a great piano ballad with great melodies again flowing into your ears. “If This Is Your Welcome” mostly shines in the instrumental part, having whining guitars combined with a solid piano-rock accompaniment. Koopman is doing a great job on the drums here as well. The CD release of the album has come with a fierce amount of bonus tracks, mostly consisting of tracks from the first two LPs and their b-sides. Why the hell those are on this album is beyond me. I would’ve lived if they just included “Bulldozer” on it, which is a great blues-driven instrumental and a great bonus to an already great album. It kind of reminds me of the pre-Kayak single “Fluffy” in a way...

All in all, Royal Bed Bouncer is the way to go if you start with listening Kayak. I think I am not unfair at all if I say this lineup is the strongest Kayak lineup ever to have existed. A shame they only recorded two albums. Anyhow, this album is a must-have for any Kayak-fan.

Strongest tracks: “Life of Gold”, “Bury the World” and “Moments of Joy”.
Weak tracks: none!

Queen - Sheer Heart Attack (1974)

Tracklist:
1. Brighton Rock
2. Killer Queen
3. Tenement Funster
4. Flick of the Wrist
5. Lily of the Valley
6. Now I'm Here
7. In the Lap of the Gods
8. Stone Cold Crazy
9. Dear Friends
10. Misfire
11. Bring Back That Leroy Brown
12. She Makes Me (Stormtrooper in Stilettos)
13. In the Lap of the Gods... Revisited

Slowly Breaking Through – 8/10

With Queen II they slowly came into the picture, but Sheer Heart Attack opened the world for them with grand hit “Killer Queen”. This album was in style quite groundbreaking though quite similar to Queen II, featuring trademark hard rock songs combined with a proggy touch. The thing, however, that separated Sheer Heart Attack from its predecessors is the more poppy touch to some songs like “Bring Back That Leroy Brown” and “Misfire”. Though I’d rather have them stay in the hard rock scene I can’t blame them for choosing the big pop audience on later releases.

The album begins very powerfully with the powerful hard rock riff of “Brighton Rock” combined with Mercury’s falsetto vocals. Yet it is already a lot more accessible than Queen II material. Second track “Killer Queen” scored a big hit for the lads from Great Britain, and it’s understandable why. The song has a lot less of the heaviness, but no less of the catchiness and brilliantness of the melodies. Add a great guitar solo by May to that and you have a terrific song. The beauty of this album is the diversity of it. Where we had the two very different opening tracks, tracks three, four and five are this album’s magnum opus. Basically it’s a long song divided into three parts. The first is the Taylor-sung “Tenement Funster”, which is less heavy than it would’ve been on Queen II, but adds a great relaxing song to the album and is definitely one of early Queen’s highlights. Taylor has got such a powerful raw voice and it gives great contrast with May’s sweeter voice and Mercury’s clear voice. Part two is “Flick of the Wrist” and is a mysterious track with a fast-paced chorus, but contains more of those catchy melodies. Then the opus ends with the gentle “Lily of the Valley”. Live classic rocker “Now I’m Here” and metal song “Stone Cold Crazy” are two more highlights with great catchy riffs.

There’s some material I’d rather not have, though. “Dear Friends” is a short ballad interlude, followed by another short interlude “Misfire”, a happy pop song, and that one is followed by yet another interlude “Bring Back That Leroy Brown”. These three shorts songs are not truly awful tracks, with the exception of “Bring Back...”, but totally kill the power of the album. This “Bring Back...” song is a want-to-be-funny type of song that Queen will make more of in the 70s, and those are quite annoying. But all these short songs don’t add to the album, they just stop it. And then they are followed by “She Makes Me” to make the remainder of the listeners fall asleep right away. It’s a very gentle ballad, sung by May, and consists mainly of this acoustic chord-riff, which in itself is not bad, but the execution of it serves better as a lullaby than anything else. Luckily we have a very satisfying end to the album with “In the Lap of the Gods... Revisited”. The first version is an odd but good song with odd low vocals by Mercury, but the revisited version is nothing alike. This is a gentle song with an epic feel to it and a massive stadium chorus which would make a good live classic and bares some resemblance to the later “We are the Champions”, but is way better than that overrated hit.

To end this relatively short review, I can say Sheer Heart Attack is a great album, with unfortunately an emergency stop somewhere in the middle. It is possible to overlook those songs though, and thus enjoy the good side of the album. I’d highly recommend this album to anyone who wants something of Queen, though if you’re keen on hits, you may want to wait for later albums.

Strongest tracks: “Killer Queen”, “Tenement Funster” and “In the Lap of the Gods...Revisited”.
Weakest tracks: “Bring Back That Leroy Brown” and “She Makes Me”.

Kayak - Kayak II (1974)

Tracklist:
1. Alibi
2. Wintertime
3. Mountain Too Rough
4. They Get to Know Me
5. Serenades
6. Woe and Alas
7. Mireille
8. Trust in the Machine
9. His Master's Noise
10. We Are Not Amused [*]



It’s becoming serious now – 6,5/10

Having released such an odd debut album with See See the Sun, Kayak wanted to develop a less playful sound and be more serious and so they released their second LP without a title. They also had a great hit with “Wintertime” and they also had lengthy songs, just like on their previous album, yet there is a huge difference. This album is way less catchy at first glance and it sounds way better organized, though they are still needing to discover their new sound to the full. Though the album is filled with great tunes, it has some true moments that really sound uninspired. That’s a shame, because that is the downfall of this release.

Where See See the Sun was more of a playful release and very much trying to be progressive, Kayak II is a mere shadow of that. This is still being progressive in the good ol’ way of odd rhythms and time signatures combined with decent length, but Kayak is going for a change here. As we see on later albums, they are developing a short progressive pop style featuring short length prog songs with a more serious approach. Kayak II, however, is not yet fully dubbed into this new Kayak sound and therefore is an interesting record. Though this album features quite straightforward rock attempts with “Alibi” and “Serenades”, long epics like “They Get to Know Me” and “Trust in the Machine” are clear remains of the previous album. Gentle ballads like “Mountain Too Rough” and “His Master’s Noise” certainly remind of the upcoming “Royal Bed Bouncer” and “The Last Encore” releases with their refined and extremely catchy vocal melodies. However, tracks like “Woe and Alas” are mediocre at best with their odd and not-catchy tunes. But since both tunes flow along with the album, I guess we can forgive Kayak this.

Where Kayak lose themselves is the silent parts. Though some are good to listen to, such as the verses of “They Get to Know Me”, the break is downright boring with its silent arpeggios by some synth-ish instrument. It takes quite some time before it evolves into the good not great guitar solos at the back. No wonder that song lasts for nine minutes! “Trust in the Machine”, though ‘merely’ six minutes, suffers from the same mistakes. Though the song itself is up-beat and quite cheerful, they fill the break with machine-like sounds. You might say, wonderfully progressive, but I’d say just cut the crap and give us some more music. That song also ends with good not great guitar solos, which seems like a pre-Bouncer Kayak formula for lengthy songs. The addition of b-side “We Are Not Amused” to the CD is not a bad idea from a collector’s point of view, but from the listeners point of view it is. This track is shamefully cheerful and a bit of a nuisance because of its massively annoying chorus with its stadium chants.

I bet you’d like to read some positivity about this album now, wouldn’t you? As I said, “Mountain Too Rough” is beautiful and features the best side of both Scherpenzeel’s piano and Werner’s vocals. Songs like this one are Kayak’s strength: great piano ballads with great melodies and not showing off by making it extra lengthy, but playing them very subtly to sooth the listener’s ear. “They Get to Know Me” is actually a nice song, apart from the break. It has a good riff, enjoyable silent verses and a very swinging solo part before the break, neatly varying the synth solos with the guitar solos on a great piano accompaniment. And furthermore we have the Koopman-sung “His Master’s Noise”, which is a very short but delightful ballad in the style of “Mountain”.

In short, this album has its moments and is a necessity for Kayak’s development, but it’s not yet incredibly stunning or anything like that. There are sure some great tracks on here, but nothing I’d consider Kayak’s best, except maybe for “Mountain”. If you can get hold of this CD, I would only recommend you to do so if you are a collector.

Strongest tracks: “Mountain Too Rough”, “They Get to Know Me” and “Trust in the Machine”.
Weakest tracks: “Woe and Alas” and “We Are Not Amused”.

Queen - Queen II (1974)

Tracklist:
1. Procession
2. Father to Son
3. White Queen (As it Began)
4. Some Day One Day
5. The Loser in the End
6. Ogre Battle
7. The Fairy Feller's Master Stroke
8. Nevermore
9. The March of the Black Queen
10. Funny How Love Is
11. Seven Seas of Rhye



The Early Masterpiece – 9,5/10

After getting to know the band with their first LP, they strike relentlessly with their second self-titled album, leaving us no chance not to get into their music. Though the album was pretty underrated at the time of release and didn’t contain any great hit singles, perhaps apart from the full version of “Seven Seas of Rhye”, it’s been looked upon as a true Queen classic now. It’s easily Queen on their most progressive moment, featuring high quality compositions with enough hooks, surprises and geniality to keep you fascinating even after too many spins. Radically spoken, this might be the best Queen album ever.

The album has been nicely divided into two parts. Though lending their names to the old LP sides, Side White and Side Black are true opposites. White contains compositions with a more positive theme and more gentle songs, all but one of which are composed by Brian May. We even get to hear his voice on the acoustic “Some Day One Day”. His voice is a lot sweeter than both Mercury’s and Taylor’s, and is actually quite nice to listen to in a pause between the more present voices of the other two singers. His other compositions are more complex in sound and feature Mercury’s voice (except for the instrumental “Procession”, which is an intro to the album). “Father to Son” is an epic-driven song of quite a length, but it will pass by like any other. From beginning to end it keeps the drive going and the chorus is really epic. The highlight is obviously May’s solo. There’s some trademark Queen multi-tracking with voices in the interplay. In the end it flows over to “White Queen (As it began)”, which is another great piece. It starts off gently with May arpeggiating some chords and with Mercury gently singing with lots of emotion. In the chorus May comes in with his heavy distortion guitar, thus making it a great powerballad, again with a great guitar-solo. Side White ends with the Taylor-sung “The Loser in the End”, a relaxing rock song about children leaving their parents’ homes. Taylor has a great voice for this kind of relaxing rock tracks.

Side Black on the other hand is a lot darker and heavier with more dark fantasy-related themes and solely Mercury-penned tracks. From the heavy but melodic “Ogre Battle” all the way to the full rendition of previous LP’s “Seven Seas of Rhye”, we are bombarded with catchy melodies, pleasant surprises and heavy riffs. A highlight of this side is definitely the fast and raw “Ogre Battle”, which begins with a mirrored heavy riff, first played backwards then flows over into the forward version with most melodic verses. After the last sound of the gong it flows over to “The Fairy Feller’s Master-stroke”, which is our next highlight. This one is considerably less heavy, but faster and very melodic, though it quickly descends into a mid-paced song. The next track “Nevermore” is one I consider to be part of the “Fairy Feller” track, but is a short piano ballad with some great emotional vocals. Then we have “March of the Black Queen”, which is in many ways a sort of prototype of the to-be-written “Bohemian Rhapsody”. Also a real opposite of “White Queen”, “Black Queen” takes us with heavy riffing and march-like melodies and rhythms on a journey of many dark themes, with great performance by all members. Also very well audible are the vocals of Taylor, May and Mercury, all multi-tracked enough times to form a big choir. This track is arguably one of the best tracks Queen ever recorded.

In short, we have a very adventurous and progressive early Queen album with Queen II. They are now more familiar with composing great songs, but have not yet fallen into the tempting trap of the charts. This album is pure Queen and would never be equaled with future releases, although some come really close. This album is a must-have for anyone daring to call him-/herself a Queen fan.

Strongest tracks: “White Queen (As it Began)”, “Ogre Battle”, “The Fairy Feller’s Master-Stroke” and “The March of the Black Queen”.