a night at the opera (queen)
This is a pretty fun record. A nice balance between metal, a vintage English daintiness, and Zeppelinesque druidry. There's a versatility in the band's personality that really accentuates their appeal. "Death on Two Legs" is a great track, ominous, angry, defiant. I love the kinda-silly but passionate bravado of "I'm in Love With My Car"- the elements of that song work together really well. "You're My Best Friend" is my favorite track on the album and possibly my favorite Queen song… the synthesizers, the rolling, sweet chorus. My favorite of the jaunty English tunes (in general I didn't love these ones)- "Seaside Rendezvous." One of the prettiest songs on the album is "Love of My Life"- a very lovely, sad, and deeply sincere song; it sounds so much like a Broadway ballad.
"Bohemian Rhapsody" has entered a certain cliche realm, but hearing it in the context of the album makes it easier to appreciate- as I said, the album is a blend between metal, daintiness, and druidry… but mostly the songs are clearly one or the other. But this track truly fuses elements of all three. It's the most complete and most astonishing song on the album- clearly more sophisticated and strange than the ditties or the rockers; one of the slowest builds of the songs on the album. This really is the sort of song that needs to come at the end of an album- it's very much a culmination- it would just be embarrassing and overwhelming to the rest of the album to have a song with this intensity and versatility up front.
No comments:
Post a Comment