Queen album. The first side (side white) is lighter and less dark than the heavier second respective sides. Most of the tracks are excellent and performed in a wide variety of styles, but Loser in the End lets the standard down a bit, bring a bit unsophisicated.
White the end - though as an earlier reviewer says, it doesn't quite fit and seems tagged on. Mercury's keyboard playing is an integral and often underestimated part of the band. This Posted Saturday, July 30, 2005, 13:57 EST |
great progressive music.
From the opening beats of the instrumental Procession to the closing singalong that concludes the amazing fantasy single Seven Seas Of Rhye, Queen II will have you on the edge of your seat. May has two wonderful tunes in the hard-rocking jerking moments on guitar. As if to counter the power of White Queen, he handles lead (You've never heard my song before, the music was too loud" he sings) before The Loser Mercury's side goes even further, with some of Queen's greatest ever songs.
The ultra- vocals, lyrics and powerful guitar-riffing from May. It's followed by the harpischord driven incredibly brief piano ballad Nevermore. All this is then topped by The March Of The Black piece, it has all the hallmarks, fantasy lyrics, outstanding harmony vocals, twists and turns that range from storming hard rock to music hall choruses (dance with the devil, beat with the band, ahh!
) . Funny How Love Is provides a little bit of light relief before the glorious minutes) closes one of the outstanding, underrated albums in prog. .
.. 93% on the MPV Posted Sunday, July 31, 2005, 07:14 EST |
I'm not sure what it is I hate about this band, but I reckon its got something to do with Brian may.
I hate his guitar sound, I hate his hair cut, but most of all I hated the way he in the 'wind of change' Spinal Tap would have stopped short of these antics...
With that off my chest, I'd like to say a few words about Queen II. This is my favourite Queen album. It has a dark, camp charm and is home to some of Queens greatest moments in terms of melody and the written word.
No one should even try to doubt the of this album. I still listern to this album on vinyl, and wallow in the crackling nostalgia it gives me. I always felt that 'White Queen - as it began' should have been segued with 'March of the Black Queen' into one massive prog epic.
As it is, the second side of Queen II plays like one big prog masterpiece. The songs flow into one another with a gorgeous continuity; full of drama and humour (Black Queen, Ogre Battle, Seven seas..
) (Nevermore). On the downside the production, as with many Queen offerings is abysmal. I'm surprised they didn't insist on better!
Alongside 'Night at the Opera' this is the only Queen album I really like, there are great moments on others, but IMO, all there BEST moments are captured on Queen II. Posted Monday, August 01, 2005, 07:34 EST |
In my opinion, Queen's greatest achievement, as it realises their progressive pomp pretensions quite superbly. This album is an immeasuarable improvement over their already above-average debut, which despite its merit, didn't have great production and totally rectifies that, with absolutely amazing production quality and wonderful songwriting and musicianship.
It also made Queen register in the music fan's consciousness, as the debut hadn't set the world alight, because this album became a huge success straight away. It also continued their long running trend of 'no synths', which enabled Queen's creativity to run riot for years. Indeed, in my opinion, it was 'Procession' is a moody and atmospheric introductory track, that showcases Brian May's eerie guitar sounds over a DSOTM-esque heartbeat effect.
It sets the stage 'Father To Son' has an intriguing harpsichord motif that's full of intrigue, and enables the crunching rock riffing of Brian May and John Deacon to enter the foray. The whole band are on fire here, with some relentlessly heavy drumming by Roger Taylor and a wondrous and magisterial vocal by the great Freddie Mercury. This being Queen, the harmonies are top class, and the wonderfully bombastic singalong chorus is truly pomp 'White Queen (As It Began)' is a slightly more cerebral track, with a fairly relaxed folky beginning, with soothing yet operatic vocals and a gentle yet mysterious chord motif, with some very clever guitar effects that create the effect of a sitar.
However, this soon gives way to another slab of first class pomp rock, with sweeping vocals from everybody and some bone-crunching musicianship. First class stuff. After this epic bombast, 'Some Day One Day' comes as a light relief, and is a much more gentle Brian May showcase, where he plays some brilliant solos and handles the vocals 'Loser In The End' is by contrast, a very heavy rocker, with massive drumming and can sing).
It's an underrated track, and has some superb accompaniment from the However, these tracks are nothing compared to the superb second side, which is a 'Ogre Battle' is possibly the heaviest Queen song of all, with incredible use of backwards tapes on vocals, drums and guitar, creating a stunning maelstrom for the relentlessly heavy riffing of the rest of the track. The vocals are outrageously brilliant, and this is truly one of those tracks where the studio becomes an instrument in itself, 'The Fairy Feller's Master Stroke' is a very whimsical yet delightful song, with Freddie Mercury lapping up the ideosyncracies of the lyrics. There's also some sterling use of the harpsichord, and some head-spinning harmonies, that show a band at the peak of This leads into the beautiful 'Nevermore', which despite its short length, is an obvious and indisputably great Freddie Mercury, but the backing vocals are again out of sight.
'Nevermore' also serves as a breath of fresh air to the huge, epic 'March Of The Black It starts with a brooding piano and guitar intro, which soon gives way to some superb harmonies and vocals from Freddie Mercury. This song has many different facets, going flourishes and some lovely Brian May guitar work, before the all guns blazing climax which is stuffed to the brim with ideas. Superb.
'Funny How Love Is' a prime contender for 'shoulda been a single' category, with a wonderfully catchy melody, which sees the harmonies at their most breathtakingly brilliant, and some great musicianship from the whole band. 'Seven Seas Of Rhye' was the single, and is one of the best songs they'd ever do. It pretty much summarises the whole album in under 3 minutes, taking in sweeping musicianship and harmonies, fanciful and whimsical lyrics all set to a heavy rock backdrop, with some added musichall whimsy at the end.
Marvellous. So there you have it, one of the most adventurous albums ever made by any group, Posted Monday, August 01, 2005, 07:41 EST |
Masterpiece of prog rock. If you never buy another Queen album, make sure you have this in your collection of prog rock, as it never disappoints, packing progressive elements in dense clusters, whipping backwards and forwards between the light and soulful, through the dark and somehow majesterial.
This is layered with quasi-mediaeva touches, and the "main" Father to Son theme, before a rippling motif overlaid with a bell-like motif leads to the wonderful riffs of "Father..".
These riffs develop, blurring the verse/chorus progression somewhat. When the chorus hits, it's huge and symphonic in style. The rippling and bell motifs return in an slightly extended form, and the Queen choir builds up a huge texture, with touches vaguely reminiscent of the Beach Boys "Good Vibrations" in places.
A huge riff is built up underneath this, and we enter a rockin' and rollin' bridge that develops into the solo, which flies all around the stereo picture in a dazzling display of dive-bombs, before lapsing into feedback before kicking off solo part 2, with May layering up the guitars authoritatively. This drops back to a single soft chord, as Mercury almost whispers "A word in your ear, from Father to Son", which kicks into the coda, showcasing fabulous melodies, style changes and, naturally, the Queen choir. The coda itself is a massive stadium chant of "Word goes around, from Father to Son.
.." etc, which fades out to ambient guitar feedback textures.
lyrics - and a dramatic Gong punctuating the ambient wash of acoustic guitars. Mercury turns in another brilliantly strong melody. Fabulous harmonies open the music up in a acoustic guitar, different words to continue the tale, and sensitive, dramatic percussion from Taylor.
May then imitates a sitar convincingly for a brilliantly ambient section - orchestrated section, and the Queen choir layer up, and the whole lot is broken down a half minutes. This is what I'm talking about. "Some Day, One Day" begins with a gentle acoustic rhythm awash with phasers, and prog is all about; Variety.
The lyrics enter mysticism territory here - with a slightly dark Together took us nearly there, the rest may not be sung". The overall style is of a fairly simple song, but there are many, many progressive elements packed in here - some into "Loser In The End" - but concentrate on the background layers if you will. The surface is a fairly standard rock song, but the layering of textural ideas is out of this world.
You could convince yourself that Queen were using synths - but, of course, at this point in their career, this is not the case. Side 2 opens with a whoosh, and thunder, before multi-layered and backtracked vocals and guitars create a cacophonous wall of sound, which magically turns itself around to grows and grows, painting the outrageously dramatic picture of the Ogre Battle, May excelling himself with guitar punctuation. A wall of screams is the highpoint of this song - it really is incredibly scary - but not long enough!
Like everything on this album, everything is so dense and passes by so quickly...
one, so I'll let you discover it for yourself. The lyrics are suitably prog too - so check those out, and listen to this a hundred times - or until you have worked out all the complexities in this song, whichever comes first - I suspect the former. Masterfully, this segues into "Nevermore", which hints at great songs that Queen would write later in their career.
Hauntingly evocative and nostalgic, this shifts seamlessly through many keys, driven by Mercury's ever-improving pianistic abilities. Black Queen". Less dense overall than the earlier material, but still packed with time, key and texture changes - including bells and outrageous vocal textures, sudden drops from vertiginous cliffs of sound into barbershop style harmonies and vaudeville song.
apart, and really, one could spend a huge amount of time in analysis and still not corner of the genre, and makes many other prog bands pale into near insignificance by It's amazing to me that opinion could be split over this album, as it seems to be in some circles - all I can think of is that if you don't hear the prog, you need to listen again and again until you do. It's all there in spades..
. make that dump truck loads - Queen awesome riffs - and rightly so. Prog should be more than the sum of its parts, and despite the enormous quantity of elements, this album is way more than "Seven Seas.
.." or "Ogre Battle".
Queen were so far ahead of their time, as this album closes with the pure prog "Seven every year. But then that would stop Queen II from holding the crown that it does. Magnificent opus - even if you don't like certain aspects of it, there's bound to be something in here you'll like or grow to like over time.
An essential rock album for Posted Tuesday, August 02, 2005, 03:25 EST |
Brilliant, over the top, pompous excessivly extravagant progressive symphonic heavy played with the tought of naming the album "Over the Top", for that was the intend, make something more daring and more excessive than anything done before. As noted in other reviews the album consists of two sides, the White side is written by Brian May, with one additional song by Roger Taylor, and the Black side is Freddie Mercury's domain. all the parts of this 1 minute song on guitar, with beautifull guitar orchestration, a great opening for this album, the outro of this song is also the intro to "Father to Son", which is mostly a heavy metal song, with great guitar play, and beautiful vocals from Freddie , the guitar solo goes from left to right, awsome and utterly brilliant, again the outro of this song is also the intro to the next song, the beautifull and amazing this song, slowely the song gets more intense, with fabulous guitar play, past midway, Brian's guitar arrangements give ita classic feel, who needs an orchestra when you have Brian on guitar, sublime how it ends, as it began.
After the three fabulous songs that started the White side, it continous fabulously with the softer and gentler, accoustic guitar based balad "Some Day One Day, sung by End" Roger Taylor's contribution to the song writing, a good song in itself, but a bit misplaced in general direction of the album, But it proofs that roger can sing. definitive Queen Masterpiece it is (along-sides ANATO, actually). Starting with the pompous, completely over the top heavy metal song "Ogre Battle".
Heavy noises, screams, back-played drums and guitars smoothly transformed to forward playing again, ever increasing speed, with some fabulous bass-play by John Deacon and heavy fast guitar play from Brian. brilliant opening to a brilliant second side of the album. with a Richard Dadd, very intens bass playing, with great guitarplay and fabulous piano and vocals and sounds and what more, utter genius, together with My Fairy King, this is my favourite Queen track of all time.
When the song stops, the piano continous to lay the "March Of The Black Queen A prelude to what Bohemian Rhapsody will become, maybe even better. A multi-part song, in form best comparable with My Fairy king, The Fairy Fellers Masterstroke and Bohemian Rhapsody, very much condenced to fit in six orchestrated guitarparts, and above all Freddie's very powerfull singing, with additional screams from Roger taylor, fabulous song, the last part in which freddie sings "Forget your sing a-longs and your lullabies, surrender to the city of the fireflies, dance to the Devil in beat with the band, to hell with all of you hand in hand" is also the intro to the guitar play, great song. The album closes with the fabulously great "Seven Seas Of Rhy" fast piano opens this song, and great canon like guitar play make up for the magnificent solo, a great piece of music to end the album with.
Superlatives are not enough for this album, this is sheer brilliance, and I have heard nothing quite like this ever again. I tried to describe some of what's happening in the album, but I completely failed, this is one of those albums that can't be described in any way, because there's so much going on. FABULOUS ALBUM, and a DEFINITIVE MASTERPIECE not beause i'm a fan of the band, but because this album is utterly brilliant in all aspects.
Listen to it yourself. Posted Thursday, August 04, 2005, 10:41 EST |
Damn close to "Masterpiece" status. Queen II played right along side Yes, ELP, KC and Genesis in my vinyl rotation during the seventies.
Queen was so far seperated from the mainstream in the early seventies. Their first four albums consistently forged a new sound, coupling combinations never before explored by rock and roll. Queen II was the height of into "Father to Son," a paen to rebellion and lineage.
Heavy and segmented. "Ogre Battle" choriographed scream. Roger Taylor is so underrated in his vocal contributions.
He is simply incredible. "March of the Black Queen" is simple their most ambitious tune up until then. The momentum shifts every second or fourth bar, keeping the listener entranced.
Medieval and powerful. May evokes pure pandemonium in sections, playing as a man possessed. The vocal harmonies are "not of this earth" as they combine, break and return.
Mercuries voice is so mulit-facited that one looks for guest singers on the sleeve. He's all over the place. Roger Taylor and Brain May add to the vocal palette, elevating the overall nuance.
"Ferry Feller's Master Stroke" makes great use of the under-used harpsichord. "Seven Seas of Rhye" expands the idea originated on Queen I, with other-worldly vocal harmonies and Sure the album has a few non-prog tunes. So what.
Overall, Queen II is a powerful additon to any prog collection. Posted Sunday, August 07, 2005, 20:56 EST |
It is just possible that this is Queen's best offering ever! Certainly it is the most progressive, a wonderful mixture of heavy guitar, interspersed with gentle interludes, hilarious, fanciful lyrics, gorgeous harmonies, and memorable melodies.
I especially love the way certain tracks run into each other. There is not a single bad track here. Right through from "Procession", the album runs its stunning course, only, maybe, "Seven Seas Of Rhye" sounding slightly different from the rest.
Highlights are "Someday One Day" with its understated and atmospheric guitar work, "Father To Son" (of course!) "White Queen", oh, in fact the whole bloody album! Side one is the quieter side, side two is the heavier, faster and funnier side.
"Funny How Love Is" has always been a personal favourite. "Ogre Battle" oozes class, as does "March Of The Black Queen". And the lovely "Nevermore" shows just how a true ballad should be composed, short, atmospheric and tear-jerking.
Wonderful stuff! I have always found it hard to choose my favourite Queen album. The first four all have their claimants.
The debut I would put at number four, then the other three have to fight it out amongst themselves. At the time of writing I would just give Queen 2 the nod. Even the cover is sensational.
I have the original vinyl, of course, and the simple contrast between the white and the black side, glossy et al, is visually stunning. Any one wanting to get into the true Queen, (which means avoiding like the plague this. They were fresh, exciting, and appealed to many different types.
These days, there are so many, so called Queen fans, who know nothing about the band except for the greatest hits. Sad really. Buy the first four, you will soon forget the rest.
(Although "Innuendo", to be fair, was a good album for Freddie to go out on.) Posted Monday, August 29, 2005, 08:32 EST |
If you thought Queen was a sell-out arena rock band you only heard one side of the story, because in it's early days (or daze?), Queen delivered with it's second album one critical slap in the face of progressive rock.
Queen had so much talent, they created waves of influences that bands around the world pumped throughout the years. Some songs are just plain rock and roll, but the big part of the album is a hard piece of progressive pie. Queen II is simply bombastic at worst and genius at best.
The Black Side of the record is a almost no choruses. Some songs are quite hard to digest because they keep changing pace, propulsing you from one side and punching you to another one. They feel more progressive than some done by Yes or King Crimson!
To me, the cherry on the top has to be the total abscence of keyboards in the record. No synthetisers, no hammond, not even a pinch of vcs3. Only a traditional grand piano and a harpsicord are admitted.
Hurray! To me, discovering this totally new side of Queen by experiencing it's theatrical approach, very long time. This is an absolutely huge progressive experience and I'm sorry I haven't heard this before, I could've save money and invest more in stuff like this.
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