Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

I've been a very long time Queen fan (prob since the mid 90's), and the only music i really have of them is the 2 disc Greatest Hits 1 and 2 set, and the new Absolute Greatest. And was wondering which one of their albums is considered the best, and even so, are they considered an album band, or are they considered one of those bands where the only so called "good songs" are the ones that were released as singles.
oh and if i had to pick my top 5 queen songs
bohemian rhapsody
somebody to love
don't stop me now
under pressure
tie your mother down

and also for the most part, i'm not really a big fan of the 80's synth stuff.

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

I think most consider A Night at the Opera their best.

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

You can't mention Night at the Opera without including Day at the Races. They're companion pieces.

Night at the Opera, with its white cover (contradicting the dark of "Night"), contained mostly upbeat, fun songs. Day at the Races, with its black cover (contradicting the light of "Day") contained mostly heavier, darker songs. Each is a roller coaster of its own, and each contains the most beautiful ballads Queen ever recorded - You Take My Breath Away and Love Of My Life, one on each album.

I honestly don't see how anyone can call themselves a true Queen fan and say they like one more than the other.

That's just my $.02. :)

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

My favorite Queen album is Sheer Heart Attack, but most people consider the best Queen album to be Night at the Opera--that's when they became widely known, and it is a really good album. I just like Sheer Heart Attack more. Queen II is pretty great too. I like Queen I as well, but Queen II does pick it up a lot

They have a ton of great stuff that's not singles. I have all their albums up through The Game, after that they drop off (for me) quite a bit.

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

Agree that Night at the Opera is pretty much considered their best. I think all of their first six albums are masterpieces. News of the World is my personal favorite.

As for whether they're an album vs. singles band, I definitely think they're an album band. Each one has a good mix of songs from each of the band members.

(I'm also not a big fan of their 80's synth stuff).

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

My personal favorite is also Sheer Heart Attack. All the songs on it are great, and the variety of musical styles is fantastic. However, you really can't go wrong with A Night At The Opera, News of the World, or The Game. Second tier would be Queen II, A Day At The Races, Jazz, A Kind of Magic, and Innuendo. The bottom rung (imo) is Queen, Hot Space, The Works, and The Miracle (although the last one has some really great tracks).

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

My favorite Queen albums are: Innuendo, Jazz, and News of the World. Doubt that's a common opinion - as said, most people would probably cite Day at the races or night at the opera. Queen II has always seemed pretty popular although that's one album I have never been able to get into.

I think most of Queen's albums are pretty solid overall with a couple misfires in the late 70s, early 80s (Flash Gordonn, Hot Space, The Works).

Michael

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

A long time fan since the 90's? Heh, heh, some of us actually go back to the 70's with Queen. Perhaps you're more of a mid-term fan. :)


:thumbsup:

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

My favorite albums are Jazz, A Night At The Opera, and A Day At The Races. In that order. And although I do love A Day At The Races, I find "A Night At The Opera" to be a significantly better album.

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

:thumbsup:

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

Total agreement here. You have to experience their albums as a whole.

Also don't care for the post-Game stuff. Game was so-so, and after that they pretty much became a singles band.

After careful consideration, and even with my love of Races and Opera, I'd have to agree with this as being my favorite album, as well. From start to finish, Sheer Heart Attack is just a fantastic album. They finally ironed out all the production kinks from the first two albums, and made a wide variety of solid musical pieces. They found their groove with this one, IMO.

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

Every album from their first to "The Game" is worth getting - every album afterward is varying degrees of shit.

I personally have a soft spot in my heart for "Queen II" because it's so weird and out there and yet it has all of Queen's signature trademarks, almost more than any other album. Comparatively, their later albums play it a little too safe. I also dig their 3rd album, "Sheer Heart Attack", mostly for the guitar explosion that is Brighton Rock.

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

I like News of the World personally. It's the first full Queen album I ever heard. My dad had it on 8-track and we used to listen to it in the car a lot when I was a kid! :D

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

their stuff into the later 70s and 80s I hated all of it. What's the most ironic to me is they used to put something like "proudly made without synthesizers" on their albums but they pretty much became dependent on them! My favorites are the first 3.

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

I'm curious about two of your statements: What "signature trademarks" are more prevalent on Queen II than other albums, and how do their later albums "play it a little too safe"?

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

Long time fan - mid 90's???? ;)

Anyway my list would be:

Sheer
Night
Jazz
Day
Game

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

Go through it, song by song, and you'll find everything that Queen is known for, all in one place: You want the operatic bombast of Bohemian Rhapsody, you can find it on March of the Black Queen. It's got the nice melodic type Queen song in Nevermore. A couple straight up rock songs. You got your Roger Taylor sung song, your fantasy epic with Ogre Battle, crazy-ass period piece with Fairy Feller's Master Stroke and so on... And they're all wildly inventive with varying time-signatures, melodies and over-the top production that isn't over-produced. It's not their "best" album, but it's their most ostentatious and therefore most interesting album. Not to mention, side 2 of Queen II, as a medley, gives side 2 of Abbey Road a good run for it's money.

The songs on all the albums up to The Game sound like from their own dimension, time and space and are essentially ageless. Their later, post-The Game albums were all written in the studio by the entire band (all the previous albums contained songs written individually by each member), and it shows as they're lazy, boring songs. The unpredictability, the sheer veracity of the their earlier albums gone, replaced by slick, by-the-numbers production, sounding like any other pop/rock song of the day. While they were the greatest live band in the world, they had nothing left to prove in the studio, so by '82, consciously or not, they just stopped trying.

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

I'm very familar with the album, so I know exactly what you mean, and for the most part, I agree. My only problem with this album, and what probably keeps it from being placed in a close toss-up between it and Sheer Heart Attack for being my favorite album, is the production. Queen and Queen II are, for lack of a better term, and to put it as simply as possible, muddy. You're right in saying they're not over-produced. They're under-produced. The songs of Queen II are great, and inventive, and definitely represent the group starting to come into their own, but the overall sound of the album is just, in my opinion, crappy, and really prevents one from truly appreciating the work for what it should be. I believe that if someone were to take the original recorded tracks back into a state-of-the-art studio and really clean them up, this album could explode back into peoples' awareness of what a truly great Queen album is.

I'm glad you clarified that to mean post-Game albums. I agree with this also. I think Queen, at one point, came to feel a little too strongly about being more accepted in the US, and were too concerned with being a pop band. They went from making fantastic complete albums to just concentrating on singles, and writing filler for the rest. There's a reason why the Crown Jewels box set doesn't contain their later albums, but I've always wondered why they felt they had to include The Game, their first synth-assisted album, and the first to venture into corporate-pleasing music.

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

The band's "prime" era (IMO) are these albums:

Sheer Heart Attack
A Night at the Opera
A Day at the Races
News of the World
Jazz
The Game

Previous to that era, Queen and Queen II, are okay. Hot Space is a flaming piece of shit. The Works is the closest album that gets close to the band's prime. A Kind of Magic is alright. Everything after, hard no.

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

Even lazy Queen had their moments of inspiration. The synth version of I Want To Break Free is one of my favorite Queen songs, as is the title track for Innuendo.

The Game, however, does not feel like music made by committee or just to get on the radio. It's an excellent album with some very popular singles, but the album tracks are also great. It's fairly obvious why that got included in the Crown Jewels box, and it certainly deserves to be their more than their first album.

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

I think the only reason The Game was included in the set was because of Another One Bites The Dust, probably their biggest single, but to me one of their worst songs in their career. Lyrically dumb, and musically it's a piece of repetitious crap.

As an album, it doesn't give you an overall feel. With their albums before, you got an experience of something different with each complete listen, from beginning to end. It was a journey. With The Game, you just come away feeling like...you just listened to some songs.

I agree, there are good songs on it. But to me, it was just the beginning of a downhill slide to the end.

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

I didn't mean to imply that it was - when I'm talking great Queen albums I mean up to and including The Game - Dragon Attack alone makes it a fantastic album, but then it also has so much more.

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

My comment was actually directed at Infidel. Don't Try Suicide alone ranks The Game up there with the best Queen albums.

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

Yeah, I was the one making the "corporate music" comment. :)

I think it's safe to say, supr, that we're both pretty big Queen fans. Nobody's going to like everything, right?

Re: Whats considered the best Queen album?
 

Don't forget "Sail Away Sweet Sister." God I love that song.