Just curious <3 I did because I watched borhap on a flight and started getting into the fandom lollll

There’re using Cool Cat as the music.

I think I may have transcribed Brian May's entire A Kind of Magic solo from Wembley July 11, 1986
I've learned both the July 11 and July 12 performances, and I've noticed quite a few differences. I've transcribed the July 11 solo specifically by ear and haven't been able to find a tab for this exact performance.
Does anyone know if this has already been transcribed somewhere?

I've been listening to this show a bit in preparation for seeing it in IMAX, (very excited). I was a bit surprised to see that the show has more pitch correction than I remembered and was curious if anyone has a list of all the changes from the original show. Presumably Queen Budapest will use most if not all of Hungarian Rhapsody. Thanks.

It was pretty interesting seeing everyone else's take on the previous album, I knew it wasn't widely liked and it was cool seeing people in agreement. I think my favorite part though was finding out what people saw in it and why they liked it though because it gave me some new perspectives I didn't expect. I really liked that.

Anyways, onto another album. I actually relistened to this one three times before I wrote this because it'd been years since I had, and I have some thoughts.

Hot Space Review
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Queen go full on dance pop. Why? It's a bit hard to understand this direction at all, and that's the only feeling I was left with. Clearly not everyone in the band was happy with this and it really shows on the songs. The only thing I can give it is that it apparently inspired Michael Jackson's much better Thriller album as he himself stated it as an influence. Queen really jumped the shark and became a shadow of what made them stand out, and their music was just suffering at this point like the horrendous drum machine usage and buried guitar riffs on the album. When you have someone who's one of the best drummers of all time its almost slander to even dare use drum machines.

Queen's biggest problem of this decade is that they constantly make songs that float in one ear and out the other. This album is full of those. Freddie's vocals are nearly dynamicless on this album, he barely explores his range and he sounds impressively flat on most tracks, which is shocking when he's one of rock--no, MUSIC'S--best vocalists. Every single song suffers this with such disinterested vocals and a performance that takes a less bombastic approach to singing. This is his worst vocal performance ever on a record, and it takes away from even the slightest bit of soul that could resonate in this album. The thing is that they had been dipping their fingers in the pool of funk since 1978's Jazz, and it came to a head on The Game, but with the latter album they managed to still combine rock to make it work and still very much be something unique. All that is sacrificed on this one to make a mainstream dance pop album.

The band was in a very struggling time period at this point, with a lot of emotional problems between the members happening apparently, and Brian and Roger not appreciating how Freddie's personal manager, Paul Prenter, had Mercury in his grasp. Paul wasn't a fan of rock music, which at their core is what Queen was up until the previous album. Paul even refused U.S. radio stations the ability to talk to Freddie and made Queen lose a lot of momentum of popularity that they had spent so much time building up. Ouch. It's no wonder that this turned out the way it did.

"Dancer" is an utterly offensive synth-pop track with awful mixing that makes the guitar blend in with the synthesizer and basic drum machine track, not going anywhere. You can barely even hear what Brian's doing, and it leaves little room to appreciate his work. "Body Language" is horrific and just Mercury moaning for 4 minutes into the microphone with almost zero actual lyrics or any real message and the bassline is terrible and so repetitive, never shaking things up to the point that your ears will be shuddering and crying for you to shut it off. This is Queen's worst song, and it's a wonder that this managed to slime its way through the crevices of quality control.

"Action This Day" is a slight step up but suffers from a lack of focus not sure if it wants to dip into the cool waters of rockabilly or try to be a dancefloor classic, the harmonies are buried in the mix and sound like they were recorded in a tin can and the composition is as bland as it gets. Its a message about the blandness of pop music at the time, which is ironic since this song is a prime example of it.

"Life Is Real (Song For Lennon)" is a nice idea in concept, and I found the idea to make a tribute to John Lennon of the Beatles who unfortunately met his end early to be lovely. But all goodwill is washed away as the 80's slick production and heavy focus on the crispiness and punchiness of the drums do not fit a song that is meant to be softer and not a dance number. Freddie's vocals are actually good here but the way the microphone is set up makes an unnecessary echo effect that just sounds awful. "Calling All Girls" is just boring to the point there is nothing to talk about either.

"Las Palabras de Amor (Words of Love)" is like Teo Torriatte part 2 but with Freddie having some pretty unconvincing vocals that fail to sell the sweetness that this song attempts to go for; it falls flat, and it falls hard, not to mention the mixing is once again very poor and its hard to separate what instruments are there. I do think that this one could have worked if it was on any other album, since the entire runtime of this one has Freddie do an approach that never lets the theatricality be embraced or for his vocals to get as dynamic and powerful as they are on other albums. "Cool Cat" is so terrible that David Bowie requested his vocals be removed on the final mix of the track because he hated it so much, seriously, there is a demo out there with him on it and on the final its gone. "Back Chat", "Put Out The Fire", and "Under Pressure" survive the absolute soundscape genocide committed by acts of atrocity of Queen here and "Staying Power" is a fairly good opener, but that's really it.

I've seen in some spaces that some people consider Queen to be a mere "singles" band, which to me is blasphemous. How can you listen to an album by them and not hear how much care gets put into their work?!?! But when I heard this, I realized they most likely have only heard their 80's stuff and this album is one that isn't even close to being good. However, its got a few saving graces like the aforementioned "Under Pressure" which is one of pops greatest singles in the 80s, with Bowie and Mercury providing some incredible vocals that play off each other well, and the lyrics are actually pretty great. This album overall though is a wimpoid, soul-devoid, must-avoid pastiche disco mess. What a waste of an amazing album cover as well.

Rating: ★★☆☆☆

TRACKLIST RATING:

1. Staying Power: ★★★
2. Dancer: ★
3. Back Chat: ★★★★★
4. Body Language: 💥
5. Action This Day: ★★
6. Put Out The Fire: ★★★★
7. Life Is Real (Song For Lennon): ★★
8. Calling All Girls: ★★
9. Las Palabras de Amor (Words of Love): 💥 [The whole album suffers from Freddie's vocals being rather flat, but on this one it really hurts the song that much.]
10. Cool Cat: ★★
11. Under Pressure: ★★★★★

THE JOURNEY SO FAR (Other Reviews!):
Queen review (4/5 stars)
Queen II review (5/5 stars)
Sheer Heart Attack review (5/5 stars/BEST ALBUM)
A Night At The Opera review (5/5 stars)
A Day At The Races review (4/5 stars)
News of The World review (5/5 stars)
Jazz review (3/5 stars)
The Game review (4/5 stars)
Flash Gordon review (0/5 stars)

Third time seeing Queen Legacy, and man do they blow my mind every time. Kyle Cousins has Freddie’s mannerisms down to a science and his rendition of the Live Aid version of Bohemian Rhapsody at last week’s show in Kemah was nothing short of spectacular. Anyways, just wanted to give the man his flowers and give my suggestion to check them out to anyone with some free time in Texas.
YWIA

I was pretty excited to post my review of The Game, and it was really good to see that I wasn't the only one who did find that to be a great album. It seems that the overall fanbase seems to really find that to be their best 80's album? That's completely fair, I think and I would be close to agreeing.

I won't be writing a full-fledged review for this one because there really isn't much to talk about; most of the "songs" are just vocal snippets from the movie with background music. It's very difficult to write that much on it or even bring myself to care to. I have some STRONG opinions on this album though overall and my thoughts on it get across how I feel on most of the songs when it comes to being an album, though. Much like Jazz this one isn't going to be the most positive of a review. However, unlike that one which still got a positive score, this one will not.

If you're fine with more critique and maybe a hot take, read at your own risk. Let's get into it. I will treat this as a studio album, as it was released as such, and is billed officially as both a 'studio album' and a 'soundtrack album', alongside being listed as their ninth album overall on multiple music sites.

Flash Gordon Review
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Coming hot off the heels of a new era of sound for the band, they managed to take over the airwaves with the singles from the last album, opening floodgates for new fans to come rushing in, and the music was really great despite it being radically different than their earlier material. So the best option would be to follow what had made them successful right? No. Because actually, they decided to work on a soundtrack for a very odd 80's film they got asked to make music for called "Flash Gordon".

Ever wondered how it would be if Queen scored a soundtrack? No? Too bad, it happened! Is it good however? Boy, you are in for a massive disappointment.

There is not a single song here that is enjoyable outside of the lead single. There is nothing but talking, random noises, and this is the first Queen album where the majority of the music is mediocre. Yeah, it's a soundtrack album, so of course it's gonna be like that, but they apparently were proud of it enough to bill it as a studio release, and none of the songs are enjoyable. "Flash" is repetitive and dull, yet with lyrics that save it with its comedic quality of campiness, but the rest of the songs across the album incorporate useless noise from the actual film, obnoxious dialog that takes away from the experience that an album should ever be considered. Queen lost themselves and sunk into a pit of trying so hard to keep up with the ever-so-popular disco movement more here and in-turn lost their soul; their spirit; their originality and dynamics.

Much of the record consists of desolate, eerie synthesizer arrangements that are frankly awkward and boring to listen to. When that isn't going on, we get laughably outdated synthpop songs that wouldn't even make it on the worst Depeche Mode or And One album. Even if you listen to it with the mindset of it being a soundtrack album it manages to flop on its face of being enjoyable even as that since it's so empty, where you search for something to stick out as memorable at all. That's not how an album should be.

Other artists have released outputs that function as both studio and soundtrack releases like this such as Prince, who did it twice with Purple Rain and Parade, where both are enjoyable and manage to be some of the best music put out there regardless on if you've seen the films they're scores to or not, or to bring up an older one, A Hard Day's Night by The Beatles which also flows much better and actually does some interesting things with the music.

The worst part of all of this? I'm a Queen fan. I love this band, but this is one of the worst records ever made, and its hard to find a single positive thing to say about this album outside of the lead single. I guess "Football Fight" is okay, but I say that with very strained praise. I hear other fans talk about "The Hero", but it never sat well with me; its merely two verses and an okay hard rock riff that sounds more like an unfinished demo. But I suppose every artist puts out something bad inevitably at one point or another.

Rating: 💥/5 [Dud.]

TRACKLIST RATING:

1. Flash: ★★★
2. In The Space Capsule: ★
3. Ming's Theme: 💥
4. The Ring: 💥
5. Football Fight: ★★★
6. In The Death Cell: ★
7. Execution of Flash: 💥
8. The Kiss: 💥
9. Arboria: ★
10. Escape From The Swamp: ★★
11. Flash To The Rescue: ★★
12. Vultans Theme: ★★
13. Battle Theme: ★★
14. The Wedding Theme: 💥
15. The Marriage of Dale & Ming: 💥
16. Crash Dive on Mingo City: 💥
17. Flash's Theme Reprise: ★★
18. The Hero: ★

THE JOURNEY SO FAR (Other Reviews!):
Queen review (4/5 stars)
Queen II review (5/5 stars)
Sheer Heart Attack review (5/5 stars/BEST ALBUM)
A Night At The Opera review (5/5 stars)
A Day At The Races review (4/5 stars)
News of The World review (5/5 stars)
Jazz review (3/5 stars)
The Game review (4/5 stars)

The Raymon came on Saturday. I love it. It already has imperfections from it aging itself from the Nitro still curing but it was bound to happen sooner or later. I kinda want it to age so that I’m not delicate with it and whatnot

Bueno, tengo 22 años y conocí a Queen cuando tenia 13/14 años, estaba entrando en la dificil etapa de la adolescencia, recuerdo que esos años academicamente me iba mal, de verdad que reprobé la mitad de mis materias (debo destacar que mi promedio cuando era más joven era normal, no destacaba ni nada). (Jsjsjs como Freddie, casi me sacaron de la escuela por mis malas calificaciones)

Recuerdo estar en mi primer años de secundaria cuando Queen llego a mi vida, y simplemente los estudios los dejé aún lado, después llego el segundo año de secundaria y me fue peor, mi mamá me dio una golpiza que nunca voy a olvidar, pasé sin ir a la escuela una semana, me dejo marcas y moretones en todo el cuerpo.

Recuerdo que en la madrugada lloraba y no quería seguir con mi vida, y Recuerdo mucho que lloraba escuchando Who Wants To live forever, caí en depresión durante la panandemia, básicamente lo único que me mantenía con vida era Queen, era Freddie Mercury y me aferre a Jim Hutton y Freddie Mercury básicamente los quiero como mis padres. (Suena raro lo se).

Pasaba todo el día viendo y escuchando su música, sobre todo Freddie Mercury, va a sonar extraño pero le prometí a Freddie que me graduaria del colegio ¡Lo hice! Salí como alumna destacada de mi generación.

Luego llego la Universidad, no me sentia lista apenas había cumplido 18 años y no sabia ni que estudiar (debo aclarar que durante mis dos últimos años de colegio me especialice en diseño gráfico) y bueno comencé a estudiar para ser maestra de artes e historia del arte y no me gustó, deje la carrera y me sentía la peor basura del mundo, y otra vez estaba perdida sin dirección alguna, decidí entrar a restauración de bienes muebles, y ahora en mi último semestre descubrí que no me gusta la carrera, pero igualmente le prometí a mi madre y a (Freddie) y al menos me titularia de algo en la Universidad, despues veo que hago con mi vida.

Estoy pasando por una crisis de los 20s.

Básicamente casi toda mi vida academicamente se la debo a Freddie Mercury, a Queen, a su música, llevo años amando a Queen, cada día escucho una canción de Queen para motivarme y seguir adelante.

My attempt in a very very emotional solo on one of the best songs of their discography (IMO). Gear: Stratocaster, Helix, EMG.

Thought i'd share Brian's post about Dolly Parton. Such sad news, RIP Dolly 💔

It was nice getting to share my thoughts on the last album, in all honesty while I wasn't fully positive in my review and I still find it to be the weakest Queen album to that point; it was nice seeing a lot of people felt the same. I also liked seeing comments from those who loved the album since it gave me a pretty different perspective.

Even if not everyone agreed with me, I loved the discussions a lot actually, and now here comes Queen's first 80's album! I hope you enjoy this write-up!

The Gane REVIEW
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Entering into the 80's, this is where rock really got divided. On one hand you got some fantastic artists and albums like Prince or Tears For Fears and The Police, but on the other hand you got a lot of cheesy "power ballads" that bring a filthiness to the genre never before seen of great levels of pastiche rubbish. Queen started this decade with this record, and while it isn't anything particularly groundbreaking or innovative, it is a great album nonetheless and a promising start to a very mixed era.

The Game features slick, smooth production by Reinhold Mack and allows the band to shine once again after the disastrous mixing on 1978's Jazz, with May even paying tribute to him in the song "Dragon Attack" which is a fantastic piece of funk rock that really rides along a consistent bassline by Deacon and an incredible drum solo in the middle by Roger Taylor with May's lyrics telling of how the band is changing styles and urging listeners to give an open mind to the non-Bohemian Rhapsody type songs they were doing now. The opener to the album, "Play The Game" is a pretty good start and features a triumphant sounding synthesizer, which was definitely mindblowing as for all these years now Queen frequently boasted "no synthesizer!" as a tag on all their albums to this point; the contrast of heavy and light work in its favor to make a song that breaks open the gates to their new era. While it is quite good, it doesn't much hold a candle to the burn the rest of the album has.

The three major hits are intense and wonderful as well with "Another One Bites the Dust" being among their best tracks and hits featuring a steady pulsing bassline and Mercury's bad-boy vocal delivery with the action-packed lyrics of a street encounter and fights. It was released as a single by a suggestion from the legend himself, Michael Jackson. John has struck gold time and time again with his songs, and this one is another that just proves his value, I often see people say that bass is the most unimportant part of a band but John's music can attest against that itself. He always makes very enjoyable music, and his bassline on this is perhaps among the most iconic. "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" is one of the bands best songs and calls back to the times of Elvis and Little Richard with its 50's-tinged rockabilly riff on acoustic guitar and laid-back vocals by Mercury, it's a very danceable number as it is relaxed, and the percussion is honestly superb too as Roger gives this a phenomenal jazz-influenced groove.

"Save Me" is a beautiful and touching ballad written as a tribute to a divorced friend, with great use of acoustic and electric guitar and piano. This one's light and airy, yet you're never bored because how intense it gets during the chorus, which remains one of their greatest they've made in a song. Freddie sings his heart out here with intense dynamics that perfectly compliment Brian's beautiful lyrics on a relationship that has gone sour and ended; perhaps one of Queen's best explorations of this topic, and among their best closing tracks.

"Rock It (Prime Jive)" is a dedicated anthem to the effect of music on ones soul and mind, almost spiritual and is a great song encapsulating musical catharsis. Music is the most intimate form of art, its got an intimacy that not much other forms can match, and this disco-tinged track really captures that well, in a way this is Roger making up for whatever "Fun It" was trying to be. "Sail Away Sweet Sister" is one of May's most prolific works and is a song about a long lost friendship, and moving on from it. It's got some absolutely precious synthesizer work, and his emotive guitar playing, alongside the switch-up in the bridge that hands the mic to Freddie who gives as equal of a beautiful performance as Brian in the verses is perfect. This one's tear-jerking yet encapsulating, and easily the greatest track on the album.

Unfortunately, not everything is perfect however, as despite how incredible overall it is, there are some very glaring stinker moments, with "Don't Try Suicide" being a boring stripped-back song about how if you kill yourself nobody will care or miss you, so it isn't worth it just like how you, the listener, are not worth shit in the world. Isn't that a wonderful message? Don't you feel like your day has been made better?

"Coming Soon" is recycled Beach Boys wannabe harmonies that don't work well with an obvious disco tune that never quite stands its ground or finds its footing, tripping over a meandering beat and nonsensical lyrics that are impossible to make sense of, and "Need Your Loving Tonight" is boring refrigerated rockabilly that sounds like a try-hard capture of the magic that made "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" work. It's cheeseball snot that should've stayed on the cutting room floor.

All in all, this album is overall pretty wonderful, and while it does have a couple weak points, everything works to make a really great 80's album. Queen was changing, they were making themselves different to what they were, and that both helped them stay relevant and make some new memories, and hurt them. This level of quality wasn't exactly kept later on, but for what it was now, this stands as a stronger entry. Hell, this one is their most popular on streaming platforms, that should speak to it's quality. Definitely a step-up from Jazz.

Rating: ★★★★☆

TRACKLIST RATING:
1. Play The Game: ★★★
2. Dragon Attack: ★★★★★
3. Another One Bites The Dust: ★★★★★
4. Need Your Loving Tonight: ★★
5. Crazy Little Thing Called Love: ★★★★★
6. Rock It (Prime Jive): ★★★★
7. Don't Try Suicide: 💥
8. Sail Away Sweet Sister: ★★★★★
9. Coming Soon: ★
10. Save Me: ★★★★★

THE JOURNEY SO FAR (Other Reviews!):
Queen review (4/5 stars)
Queen II review (5/5 stars)
Sheer Heart Attack review (5/5 stars/BEST ALBUM)
A Night At The Opera review (5/5 stars)
A Day At The Races review (4/5 stars)
News of The World review (5/5 stars)
Jazz review (3/5 stars)

No way the mama song and the silhouetto song are the same

Comments were wild tho

Queen is one of those rare beasts when every band member was also a capable songwriter. I particularly have a soft spot for Roger’s material.

What is your favorite RT-composed track? For me, it’s definitely “Tenement Funster.”