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Post by fabiogminero on Dec 10, 2022 9:18:36 GMT
Hello everybody.
Today I share with you a review of the album 'A Day At The Races', published in New Musical Express magazine on December 18th, 1976, just eight days after its release in the UK by EMI. Nick Kent, the English journalist who wrote this review, is not at all positive about the album; in fact, his opinion of the latter is rather bad.Enjoy the reading. |
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Post by akirafish on Dec 10, 2022 9:51:23 GMT
The same guy described the debut album 'a bucket of urine'. I suppose he's never positive about Queen.
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oreno
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Post by oreno on Dec 10, 2022 12:07:56 GMT
Apart from Somebody To Love being probably the greatest Queen song of all, and Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy being irresitable good fun, I tend to agree with the spirit, if not the wording, of this review. Shocked face.
I mean, I am a Queen fan and there's nothing I'll not listen to or find some good in. But I still find DATR really too much, my least favourite 70s Queen release as a whole. As with this reviewer, my album highlights (aside from the Fred songs mentioned) are TYMD and Drowse, by a country mile.. YMMV..
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Post by fabiogminero on Dec 10, 2022 12:33:20 GMT
Apart from Somebody To Love being probably the greatest Queen song of all, and Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy being irresitable good fun, I tend to agree with the spirit, if not the wording, of this review. Shocked face. I mean, I am a Queen fan and there's nothing I'll not listen to or find some good in. But I still find DATR really too much, my least favourite 70s Queen release as a whole. As with this reviewer, my album highlights (aside from the Fred songs mentioned) are TYMD and Drowse, by a country mile.. YMMV.. Many fans find "A Day At The Races" a stretch, an attempt to copy "A Night At The Opera", which in part I believe is true... but according to my humble and debatable point of view, I believe instead that the album is a worthy successor to ANATO.
"Somebody To Love" and "You Take My Breath Away" are superlative, and also other songs considered minor as "Long Away" and "You And I" I think are real beauties. Not my favorite album from the 70's though. |
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oreno
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Post by oreno on Dec 10, 2022 12:56:06 GMT
I never think of it as a ANATO follow up.. or rather, I don't really think of it as a rehash. If anything I feel like it gets too indulgent with the stuff that was just about held in check on ANATO.. it's still a progression of sorts but not in directions I particularly enjoy. Love Of My Life stays just the right side of soppiness, Seaside Rendezvous is cheeky and charming but I find Fred's similar ADATR stuff often goes way over the top. And White Man, Long Away and Teo Torriate feel too self consciously earnest to me, whereas '39 and Prophet's Song gain a lot by being more poetic, or allegorical.
ADATR is Queen's most emotional-based 70s album I suppose but the emotions never really ring true to me. I will say though that the Queenpod episode on the record was one that made me hear it with a different sensibility and appreciate it a little more.
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ted
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Post by ted on Dec 10, 2022 16:54:46 GMT
While I appreciate the Author of the article for providing such candid (and thereby honest) opinions in his appraisal of ADATR, many of the elements that he considers to diminish the quality of the album actually go a long way to enhancing the album's quality in my view. I've always rated 'Races' higher than ANATO and I don't consider hardly any of the songs within to be lacking in quality.
Ted
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jo
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Post by jo on Dec 11, 2022 3:28:03 GMT
Nick Kent has admitted he was a heroin addict during the 1970's. A fairly good guitar player he was unable to land a permanent spot with any band mostly because of his drug abuse. How these guys get gigs as rock critics is beyond me, his writing during this era was disjointed and just plain weird.
Any follow-up to ANATO was going to be panned, too much like it, too little like it, yada, yada, yada. It has though stood the test of time, STL is probably the Queen track I hear most often on the radio (followed by Killer Queen) and YTMBA is largely considered to be one of Freddie's most beautiful works. Their tour for the album was a huge success.
God they hated Freddie didn't they? It must drive them mad that he is still relevant today, thankfully they're all retired now or that movie would have made their tabloids spontaneously combust.
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Dimitris
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Post by Dimitris on Dec 11, 2022 8:29:33 GMT
A Day At The Races is not just an album. It is a statement - a proposal of the band of how they see their music in 1976.
Their compositions , orchestrations, lyrics and production is beautiful as piece of art.
Thanks God, history has proven that this album is on the top 3 of Queen albums. At least the majority of fans love it.
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georg
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Post by georg on Dec 11, 2022 14:27:56 GMT
It might have been a while since I’ve listened to either song but for the life of me I can’t hear any similarities between White Man and When The Levee Breaks. Maybe their titles both starting with Wh, but that’s about it.
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ted
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Post by ted on Dec 11, 2022 15:27:30 GMT
It might have been a while since I’ve listened to either song but for the life of me I can’t hear any similarities between White Man and When The Levee Breaks. Maybe their titles both starting with Wh, but that’s about it. I listened to part of that LZ song yesterday and I couldn't really pick out any similarities either.
Ted
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