Queen - Greatest Hits (CD)
ORIGINAL 1992 CD RELEASE!!!
No Skips, No Freeze ups!!!
No Scratches, No Scuff Marks!!!
CD and all artwork included.
CD in Excellent Like New condition.
Jewel Case has normal wear.
Queen brought a whole new meaning to the phrase over the top. While rock
& roll flamboyance stretched back at least as far as Little
Richard, Freddie Mercury continued to camp it up, taking little
seriously and smirking at the music's growing pretensions while
partaking in them no small bit. Many of the band's singles hold up
extremely well, such as "Killer Queen" and "You're My Best Friend". The
quartet's canny sense of melody and sophisticated vocal harmonies--not
to mention Mercury's raised eyebrow--have traveled well through the
years.
Track
listing
1. We Will Rock You
2. We
Are the Champions
3. Another One Bites the Dust
4. Killer Queen
5. Somebody to Love
6. Fat Bottomed Girls
7. Bicycle Race
8. You're My Best Friend
9. Crazy Little Thing
Called Love
10. Now I'm Here
11. Play the
Game
12. Seven Seas of Rhye
13. Body
Language
14. Save Me
15. Don't Stop Me Now
16. Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy
17. I Want to
Break Free
Product Details
- Audio CD (September 15, 1992)
- Original Release Date: September 15, 1992
- Number of Discs: 1
- Label: Hollywood Records
Queen Biography
Few bands embodied the pure excess of the '70s like Queen. Embracing
the exaggerated pomp of prog rock and heavy metal, as well as
vaudevillian music hall, the British quartet delved deeply into camp and
bombast, creating a huge, mock-operatic sound with layered guitars and
overdubbed vocals. Queen's music was a bizarre yet highly accessible
fusion of the macho and the fey. For years, their albums boasted the
motto "no synthesizers were used on this record," signaling their
allegiance with the legions of post-Led Zeppelin hard rock bands. But
vocalist Freddie Mercury brought an extravagant sense of camp to the
band, pushing them toward kitschy humor and pseudo-classical
arrangements, as epitomized on their best-known song, "Bohemian
Rhapsody." Mercury, it must be said, was a flamboyant bisexual who
managed to keep his sexuality in the closet until his death from AIDS in
1991. Nevertheless, his sexuality was apparent throughout Queen's
music, from their very name to their veiled lyrics -- it was truly
bizarre to hear gay anthems like "We Are the Champions" turn into
celebrations of sports victories.
That would have been impossible
without Mercury, one of the most dynamic and charismatic frontmen in
rock history. Through his legendary theatrical performances, Queen
became one of the most popular bands in the world in the mid-'70s; in
England, they remained second only to the Beatles in popularity and
collectibility in the '90s. Despite their enormous popularity, Queen
were never taken seriously by rock critics -- an infamous Rolling Stone
review labeled their 1979 album Jazz as "fascist." In spite of such
harsh criticism, the band's popularity rarely waned; even in the late
'80s, the group retained a fanatical following except in America. In the
States, their popularity peaked in the early '80s, just as they
finished nearly a decade's worth of extraordinarily popular records. And
while those records were never praised, they sold in enormous numbers,
and traces of Queen's music could be heard in several generations of
hard rock and metal bands in the next two decades, from Metallica to
Smashing Pumpkins.
The origins of Queen lay in the hard rock
psychedelic group Smile, which guitarist Brian May and drummer Roger
Taylor joined in 1967. Following the departure of Smile's lead vocalist,
Tim Staffell, in 1971, May and Taylor formed a group with Freddie
Mercury, the former lead singer for Wreckage. Within a few months,
bassist John Deacon joined them, and they began rehearsing. Over the
next two years, as all four members completed college, they simply
rehearsed, playing just a handful of gigs. By 1973, they had begun to
concentrate on their career, releasing the Roy Thomas Baker-produced
Queen that year and setting out on their first tour. Queen was more or
less a straight metal album and failed to receive much acclaim, but
Queen II became an unexpected British breakthrough early in 1974. Before
its release, the band played Top of the Pops, performing "Seven Seas of
Rhye." Both the song and the performance were a smash success, and the
single rocketed into the Top Ten, setting the stage for Queen II to
reach number five. Following its release, the group embarked on its
first American tour, supporting Mott the Hoople. On the strength of
their campily dramatic performances, the album climbed to number 43 in
the States.
Queen released their third album, Sheer Heart Attack,
before the end of 1974. The music hall meets Zeppelin "Killer Queen"
climbed to number two on the U.K. charts, taking the album to number two
as well. Sheer Heart Attack made some inroads in America as well,
setting the stage for the breakthrough of 1975's A Night at the Opera.
Queen labored long and hard over the record; according to many reports,
it was the most expensive rock record ever made at the time of its
release. The first single from the record, "Bohemian Rhapsody," became
Queen's signature song, and with its bombastic, mock-operatic structure
punctuated by heavy metal riffing, it encapsulates their music. It also
is the symbol for their musical excesses -- the song took three weeks to
record, and there were so many vocal overdubs on the record that it was
possible see through the tape at certain points. To support "Bohemian
Rhapsody," Queen shot one of the first conceptual music videos, and the
gamble paid off as the single spent nine weeks at number one in the
England, breaking the record for the longest run at number one. The song
and A Night at the Opera were equally successful in America, as the
album climbed into the Top Ten and quickly went platinum.
Following
A Night at the Opera, Queen were established as superstars, and they
quickly took advantage of all their status had to offer. Their parties
and indulgence quickly became legend in the rock world, yet the band
continued to work at a rapid rate. In the summer of 1976, they performed
a free concert at London's Hyde Park that broke attendance records, and
they released the hit single "Somebody to Love" a few months later. It
was followed by A Day at the Races, which was essentially a scaled-down
version of A Night at the Opera that reached number one in the U.K. and
number five in the U.S. They continued to pile up hit singles in both
Britain and America over the next five years, as each of their albums
went into the Top Ten, always going gold and usually platinum in the
process. Because Queen embraced such mass success and adoration, they
were scorned by the rock press, especially when they came to represent
all of the worst tendencies of the old guard in the wake of punk.
Nevertheless, the public continued to buy Queen records. Featuring the
Top Five double-A-sided single "We Are the Champions"/"We Will Rock
You," News of the World became a Top Ten hit in 1977. The following
year, Jazz nearly replicated that success, with the single "Fat Bottomed
Girls"/"Bicycle Race" becoming an international hit despite the massive
bad publicity surrounding their media stunt of staging a nude female
bicycle race.
Queen were at the height of their popularity as they
entered the '80s, releasing The Game, their most diverse album to date,
in 1980. On the strength of two number one singles -- the campy
rockabilly "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" and the disco-fied "Another
One Bites the Dust" -- The Game became the group's first American number
one album. However, the bottom fell out of the group's popularity,
particularly in the U.S., shortly afterward. Their largely instrumental
soundtrack to Flash Gordon was coldly received later in 1980. With the
help of David Bowie, Queen were able to successfully compete with new
wave with the 1981 hit single "Under Pressure" -- their first U.K.
number one since "Bohemian Rhapsody" -- which was included both on their
1981 Greatest Hits and 1982's Hot Space. Instead of proving the group's
vitality, "Under Pressure" was a last gasp. Hot Space was only a
moderate hit, and the more rock-oriented The Works (1984) also was a
minor hit, with only "Radio Ga Ga" receiving much attention. Shortly
afterward, they left Elektra and signed with Capitol.
Faced with
their decreased popularity in the U.S. and waning popularity in Britain,
Queen began touring foreign markets, cultivating a large, dedicated fan
base in Latin America, Asia, and Africa, continents that most rock
groups ignored. In 1985, they returned to popularity in Britain in the
wake of their show-stopping performance at Live Aid. The following year,
they released A Kind of Magic to strong European sales, but they failed
to make headway in the States. The same fate befell 1989's The Miracle,
yet 1991's Innuendo was greeted more favorably, going gold and peaking
at number 30 in the U.S. Nevertheless, it still was a far bigger success
in Europe, entering the U.K. charts at number one.
By 1991, Queen
had drastically scaled back their activity, causing many rumors to
circulate about Freddie Mercury's health. On November 23, he issued a
statement confirming that he was stricken with AIDS; he died the next
day. The following spring, the remaining members of Queen held a
memorial concert at Wembley Stadium that was broadcast to an
international audience of more than one billion. Featuring such guest
artists as David Bowie, Elton John, Annie Lennox, Def Leppard, and Guns
N' Roses, the concert raised millions for the Mercury Phoenix Trust,
which was established for AIDS awareness. The concert coincided with a
revival of interest in "Bohemian Rhapsody," which climbed to number two
in the U.S. and number one in the U.K. in the wake of its appearance in
the Mike Myers comedy Wayne's World.
Following Mercury's death,
the remaining members of Queen were fairly quiet. Brian May released his
second solo album, Back to the Light, in 1993, ten years after the
release of his first record. Roger Taylor cut a few records with the
Cross, which he had been playing with since 1987, while Deacon
essentially retired. The three reunited in 1994 to record backing tapes
for vocal tracks Mercury recorded on his death bed. The resulting album,
Made in Heaven, was released in 1995 to mixed reviews and strong sales,
particularly in Europe. Crown Jewels, a box set repackaging their first
eight LPs, followed in 1998. Archival live recordings, DVDs, and
compilations kept appearing through the new millennium. The Queen name
was revived in 2005, but this time with "+ Paul Rodgers" appended to it.
Rodgers, the former lead singer of Free and Bad Company, joined Brian
May and Roger Taylor (John Deacon remained retired) for several live
shows, one of which was documented on 2005's Return of the Champions, a
double-disc release issued by the Hollywood label. International touring
continued, as did a new studio album featuring Rodgers' vocals.
Released under the "Queen + Paul Rodgers" tag, The Cosmos Rocks appeared
in September 2008, followed by an American release one month later.
Reception was decidedly mixed.
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