Adam Lambert – Well Eye Never

Queen Album Review – A Kind Of Magic

By the mid-1980s, it seemed as if Queen weren’t on top of their game any more. Their 1984 album The Works had sold well and they were still attracting big crowds to their shows, yet something was missing. The band were tired of the endless cycle of recording and touring – particularly Freddie, who went off to make his own solo album, Mr. Bad Guy – and they weren’t dominating the music scene in the way they used to.

It felt like the band had passed their peak, and they were just sailing along without making much of a splash. But then fate smiled upon them and presented them with the crest of a huge wave in the form of Live Aid in 1985. Their barnstorming 20-minute set of classic hits, regarded by many as the best rock set of all time, delighted existing fans and drew in many new followers who had little to no awareness of them. And most importantly, it re-lit the fire within the group, reminding them what they were capable of and why they were loved.

They capitalised on that success by releasing the song One Vision in November 1985, and then a couple more songs the following March, before blessing the world with their latest album, A Kind Of Magic, in June 1986, which also served as the soundtrack to Highlander. It deservedly shot straight into the UK charts at number 1, and stayed in the top 10 for 16 weeks, out of a total 30 weeks in the top 40.

It was their first chart-topping album since The Game in 1980 and Greatest Hits in 1981, and their final 3 studio albums with Freddie that followed all reached number 1 as well. This was therefore the start of their revival – although, as the Magic tour would be their last set of concerts together, it was also the beginning of the end in a sad way, which Freddie was privately aware of.

So to celebrate the 40th anniversary of this classic album and Freddie’s final ever concert, I’m going to dig through each of the tracks here, looking at music videos, alternate versions, live performances, covers and so on. And don’t forget you can find lots of videos in the playlists that I’ve linked to beneath the table of contents as well. I hope you enjoy!

Double page spread from the booklet with Queen's album A Kind Of Magic. It shows a dazzling, colourful array of cartoon imagery against a black background littered with tiny colourful stars and other objects. The large cartoon imagery across both pages includes representations of all 4 band members, some dancers, a microphone, two bowls of water that each contain a fish, another fish flying around with a wide open mouth that gives it a shocked expression, a rabbit jumping out of a top hat while a frog appears to be diving towards it, a cauldron, a lamp with a large genie that has emerged from it, and a blue book with the word Magic on the cover.

Queen Album Review – The Works

Following the poor reception to Hot Space in 1982, which had focused too heavily on funk and disco sounds, Queen took the hint and brought more rock elements back into the mix for their 1984 album The Works. It also helped that they had taken a break in between those releases, focusing on solo work instead, so they came back refreshed as a group.

The result is a combination of 70s and 80s styles that is much more interesting, and it gave us huge hits like Radio Ga Ga, I Want To Break Free and Hammer To Fall, although the video for one of those songs didn’t go down well in America.

In the UK, the album jumped straight into the charts at number 2 for a week, and while it never managed to reach the top spot, it did return to the second place position 3 months later for a fortnight. It spent 57 consecutive weeks in the top 100 initially (25 of which were top 10), but then kept returning for a little while every so often. So in total it was in the chart for 94 weeks, which is the longest for any Queen album. It’s also their only album from which all of the songs were released as either A or B-side tracks on singles.

So for the latest in my series of Queen album reviews, here’s a look at each of the tracks, along with alternate versions, live performances, covers and more. I hope you enjoy!

Queen Album Review – Hot Space

We’re really Under Pressure from this latest heatwave, so it would help if someone could take Action This Day to Put Out The Fire in order for me to be a Cool Cat again. Then I can start Calling All Girls to pass on The Words Of Love and emphasise my Body Language as a Dancer. I’ll prove that I’m a Soul Brother who knows that Life Is Real, I have the Staying Power and I won’t take any Back Chat.

Yes, that’s right. For this next post in my series of Queen reviews, we come to an album that proved to be quite controversial – Hot Space. It was hardly unusual for Queen to be experimental, but this foray into funk, disco and R&B, with a heavy focus on synth sounds (although there were still rock elements as well), was too much of a change from their traditional style. Even within the band there were arguments as they put it together.

The reaction from their fanbase wasn’t lost on them either, as Freddie remarked during a show in Milton Keynes: “Now, most of you know that we’ve got some new sounds out in the last week. And for what it’s worth, we’re gonna do a few songs in the funk/black category – whatever you call it. That doesn’t mean we’ve lost our rock ‘n’ roll feel, ok? I mean, it’s only a bloody record, people get so excited about these things. We just want to try out a few sounds.”

It is fair to say that Hot Space is their weakest studio album as a result (if we don’t count the soundtrack score for Flash Gordon that preceded it). However, it’s not awful either, and there is some good stuff on it, especially Life Is Real, Las Palabras De Amor and Under Pressure, as they’re closer to Queen’s usual style. It also peaked at number 4 in the UK chart, altogether spending 3 weeks in the top 10 and 13 weeks in the top 40, which is fairly good. And when they performed some of the tracks live, they were interpreted in a more heavy rock style that made them sound better, because of the instruments the band used on stage.

So here’s my personal review of each of the tracks, along with alternate versions, live performances, covers and more. I hope you enjoy!

An artistic image showing images of the 4 members of Queen against a black background. Each is facing forward with light hitting their face from the left side of the image, leaving the other side of each face in shadow, blending into the black behind them. Each face is shown in a different colour, with John in red, Brian in blue, Freddie in yellow and Roger in green.

Queen Album Review – Flash Gordon

Following on from my recent review of Queen’s first album of the 1980s, The Game, their next release was something very different, providing their first ever soundtrack for the sci-fi movie Flash Gordon.

It only has a couple of songs and a bunch of instrumentals, and therefore wasn’t as successful as their normal studio albums. But it did peak at number 10 in the UK albums chart, for 1 week out of its total 9 in the top 40, which is respectable.

A photo of Freddie Mercury singing into a microphone, while wearing a white t-shirt with the word Flash in large red letters on it. The photo is from the booklet with the Flash Gordon album, with a yellow streak of lightning above him.

A photo of Brian May playing guitar from the booklet with the Flash Gordon album, with a yellow streak of lightning above him.

I do have the album in my collection for completeness, but I rarely listen to it, partly because it isn’t anywhere near as good as their other stuff, but also because I’ve never actually watched the film before – until now. Given my love of Queen I always knew I ought to see it one day, but I didn’t think I’d be very interested in it from the clips I’d seen.

And to be honest, having now viewed it properly for the purposes of this review, my assumption was correct. I appreciate it’s a cult classic that is basically the comic strip brought to life, and Queen’s music does give it a boost. And chances are it’s a case of “you had to be there”, as I wasn’t born when it was released, whereas a lot of fans grew up with it. But unlike other surreal, low-budget masterpieces like The Rocky Horror Picture Show that I love, this movie simply doesn’t grab me. It just feels very dated with a nonsensical plot, poor performances (except perhaps for Brian Blessed and Max von Sydow), cringeworthy dialogue and substandard special effects even for its time. For some people its flaws are a big part of its charm, meaning it’s so bad it’s good, but I just can’t get on board with it. It just feels like some strange fever dream! Still, I’m glad I gave it a go, so I have a better frame of reference at least.

So this post is just going to be a quick run-through of Queen’s music on the album, along with some live versions, remixes and covers, as I have nothing else to say about the film itself. And that means it’s going to be short compared to my other Queen reviews, but I hope you find it interesting nonetheless.

Queen Album Review – The Game

Way back in lockdown, to fill some of the time, I wrote in-depth reviews of the 1970s studio albums by Queen, my favourite band, which took me from their self-titled debut up to the Jazz album. And they’re about to release a new deluxe edition of Queen II, which I’m looking forward to downloading and reviewing, just like I did for their Queen I box set.

However, it’s long been my intention to review the rest of their albums as well, and now I’ve got more time on my hands, I’m going to delve back into them at long last.

So we’ll kick off the 80s with The Game, the album that produced Queen’s best-selling single of all time, and the only two number 1 hits they ever had in America (where it was also their only number 1 album, selling over 4 million copies). The Game also reached number 1 in the UK for 2 weeks, and stayed in the top 40 for 15 weeks altogether. Overall it sold over 12 million copies worldwide.

Freddie Mercury, sporting a moustache and wearing a black leather jacket over a red top, leaning back against a railing overlooking a snowy landscape with trees and a couple of buildings.

Brian May, with his hands in his light brown jacket pockets, leaning back against a railing overlooking a snowy landscape with trees and a couple of buildings.

It’s also the first Queen album to feature a synthesizer (an Oberheim OBX), with their previous releases proudly stating that they never used them. Plus they had a new producer (Reinhold Mack, known simply as Mack), and they recorded the songs in a new location, at Musicland Studios in Munich. It therefore marked a new period of experimentation for the band, as they were persuaded to shift towards a more pop-friendly sound, although still infused with rock of course and it still sounds unmistakably like Queen.

It wasn’t always easy, with arguments in the studio as the band members were keen to be represented fairly on the record. But ultimately they were able to reach suitable compromises and produce another decent album with several great tracks. And as shown by the chart positions above, it enabled them to maintain their popularity in an era where other rock veterans were struggling, and even have their peak of success in the USA. The music scene was changing significantly in the 80s, but Queen were still very much in the game and still winning, at least for now.

So here are my reviews of all the songs, along with alternate versions, music videos, live performances, and a small selection of the many covers and remixes out there. I hope you enjoy!

Christmas 2023 Favourites – Part 2

Happy New Year! I hope you had a great Christmas, and that you have a prosperous year ahead as well.

This is the second, bumper part of my festive Favourites, as the first part covered the month of November, where I had a free Christmas meal, explored a trail of snowmen sculptures and saw some of London’s displays, among other activities.

Since then, in December and early January, I’ve met friends in both London and Devon, seen four incredible theatre shows, explored a museum I hadn’t been to before, had some lovely meals in restaurants, ate far too much food at home, celebrated the 60th anniversary of Doctor Who, watched lots of comedies on TV, and enjoyed some music as well.

So once again, as with every Christmas, this is a bumper post and video. One of the meals was a free PR invite for my journalist friend Emily to review, but as usual I’m not sponsored or affiliated to write anything here, and all opinions are my own. I hope you enjoy!

July 2022 Favourites

Well, it’s fair to say that this past month will go down in the history books for quite a variety of reasons, some better than others. Boris Johnson’s long overdue resignation has left our government in disarray as they hunt for a new leader, and our record-breaking heatwave in the UK resulted in several fires in London, even if it wasn’t anywhere near as bad as in Europe. But, as is often the case, sport has come along to lift the nation’s spirits, as I’ll mention during this post – we all know what the main headline is there!

As for me, work is very busy, with people wanting to get as many jobs done as they can before my redundancy kicks in next month! I’ve had lots of lovely messages and good wishes from colleagues already, which is very flattering. And thank you so much to all of my other friends and followers for their messages of support as well, including relevant vacancies and volunteering opportunities that people are already starting to bring to my attention, please do keep those coming. I won’t apply for everything that people send me of course, but they’re all giving me food for thought for my future career path.

I still feel quite calm about it all so far, because I have strong foundations from my current job and volunteering work that I can build on – and I’ve had a nice surprise in relation to the latter that I’ll mention next month. Plus I’m fortunate not to have major financial worries at the moment – although I have taken the opportunity to cut back on a few subscriptions that I can live without for a while, as saving a few quid here and there each month soon adds up. It also appears there are one or two paid research opportunities that could be of some benefit.

In any case, my plan is still to have a bit of a well-earned break, in order to sort out some stuff at home, as well as get out and about more as I have various things booked in the next few months. But I’m continuing to keep a close eye out for job and volunteering opportunities as well, as you never know what’ll come up.

Aside from all that though, I have been enjoying my leisure time as usual of course, and you’ll know about the shows I’ve been to see recently if you’ve been keeping up to date with my posts. So here’s my latest roundup of outings, sport, comedy and music that I’ve got into this month. As always, none of it’s sponsored or gifted, and I hope you enjoy!

Parties At The Palace – Part 2

I’m delighted that the Platinum Jubilee was such a success this weekend, with lots of events taking place all over the country, and the weather holding out for the central celebrations in London. If you attended any events during the holiday, I hope you had a good time!

In my previous post I reviewed the Golden & Diamond Jubilee Concerts from 2002 and 2012 respectively. So in this post I’m going to discuss my highlights from this year’s concert, after briefly mentioning some of the other coverage that my mother and I have been tuning into. So I hope you enjoy!

Queen Album Review – Jazz

Following News Of The World, an album of raw energy that spawned the mega-hits We Will Rock You & We Are The Champions, on top of their previous successes, was always going to be a very tall order for Queen. But, as always, they weren’t deterred by that, and opted to explore a variety of musical styles on their 7th album (though not including jazz itself as the title might suggest). And it didn’t do them any harm, as the LP peaked at Number 2 in the UK charts (held off the top spot by the Grease soundtrack), and Number 6 on the US Billboard Chart, going Platinum in both countries.

Overall the album perhaps isn’t as stunning as some of their previous work, but only because of the incredibly high bar they’d set themselves, and it’s still really good in its own right. For a start, it gave us their well-loved songs Fat Bottomed Girls, Bicycle Race and Don’t Stop Me Now, a trio that makes it worth the price of entry alone (although surprisingly the latter wasn’t a big hit to begin with). And the other ten tracks are an enjoyable mixture too, with some relatively obscure gems amongst them as usual.

The heavy criticism it received in the music press at the time was certainly unwarranted, with the band even being described as “fascist” and “creeps” with “polluting ideas” by Rolling Stone reviewer Dave Marsh. But it was often fashionable for music critics to bash the band, and reviewers tended to be thrown off guard whenever Queen tried something different (which was always), not knowing how to react to it and simply not ‘getting it’. Queen’s humour and sense of fun often went over journalists’ heads.

Hindsight has been kinder though, with retrospective reviews often being more favourable, such as Loudersound ranking it as their 4th best album, and Rolling Stone magazine admitting they were wrong. It is now rightly acknowledged that the album is rather underrated, as it’s never had as much attention as some of their earlier work.

And so, as the latest instalment in my series of Queen reviews, this post is my personal run-through of all the tracks on the Jazz album, including the usual mixture of alternate versions, live performances, covers and more. I hope you enjoy!

Science Fiction, Triple Feature – Part 2 – Rocky Horror Soundtracks

Hot patootie, bless my soul, I really love that rock and roll! The legendary songs from The Rocky Horror Show, including the legendary Time Warp, are a crucial part of its joy and appeal, as they’re catchy, funny and occasionally moving. Richard O’Brien actually wrote some of the songs before he came up with the idea of Rocky Horror, and found that he was able to slot some of them in.

So as the second part of my Halloween trilogy – after discussing the film and related productions, and before I talk about my recent experience at the live show – I thought I’d do some brief reviews of the relevant albums and songs I have in my music collection, and a few of the other recordings I’m aware of, as it’s always interesting to hear different interpretations. I certainly haven’t mentioned all of the music that has ever been released in relation to Rocky Horror, but I have covered most of the commercially available releases. So I hope you enjoy!

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