Italian reviews of Rainbow '74, "Queen" and "Queen II" - from 'Nuovo Sound', 20 April 1974
May 9, 2023 5:56:37 GMT
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Post by fabiogminero on May 9, 2023 5:56:37 GMT
Hi everyone.
Today I share with all of you a nice gem, a sublime find dating back to 1974: this is one of the first complete and detailed articles published in the Italian press about Queen.
On April 20th, 1974, the Italian music magazine Nuovo Sound dedicated the cover of number 16 of the weekly to the band and, in particular, to the concert held just under a month earlier at the Rainbow Theatre in London (March 31st, 1974); the title on the cover read in fact Esclusiva da Londra: Queen in Concert (translated as Exclusive from London: Queen in Concert). On page 24 of the magazine, entitled Queen: Regina del Rock (translated as Queen: Queen of Rock), the journalist Tom Apolloni offers his review of the concert at the Rainbow, very positive indeed; he doesn't spare his praise even to the lighting technicians. On the same page there is also the review of Queen's debut album, written by the journalist Pierre Forlani; although the latter had been released in the UK on July 13th, 1973, EMI Italiana (the Italian division of EMI) had just distributed it in Italy (it was in fact released on January 8th, 1974). The second album 'Queen II', released in the UK on March 8th, 1974, arrived in Italy a few days after this article (on April 26th to be exact), but is however reviewed in this article.
An interesting passage of this article is in the final lines: Forlani writes that the band will visit Italy around Christmas 1974, because first they will be engaged in America, Japan and Australia - obviously, we know very well that the band will land in Japan in April of 1975 and in Australia in April 1976...but was Italy really considered in the European tour of November-December 1974? Given the appreciation reserved for the two albums and for the band in general, it would not be surprising if several Italian impresarios tried to bring Queen to Italy as early as the first half of the seventies.
Below the scan of the article and my translation from Italian to English. Enjoy the reading!
Those who have been to the Rainbow will have been satisfied overall with the musical performance and artistic expression of Queen.
The concert was sold out, a clear sign that the group is making its way by operating in a delicate and precise way in that fabric of music where the taste of the public is as important as the incorruptible artistic need.
At 9 p.m. Freddie Mercury and Co. take the stage: boos and
. Freddie is a "bride" all in white: she immediately and pleasantly cheers up the audience with a couple of tracks that let you instantly understand her good vocal possibilities and the disposition for the open stage and the gras. It undoubtedly makes up the spectacular group element. of the
"OGRE BATTLE" ends amid lots of, however we also praise the skill of the lighting technician who enlivened the piece with green reflectors, letting the lively and dense beams of light play here and there, and then suddenly muting them in a green light but diffused and bright.
BRIAN MAY on guitar and DEACON JOHN on bass are frozen in concentration by the attention they pay to the pieces, but Freddie, who plays the plano only occasionally, has all the space he wants for body poses. It is pleasant and amusing to see him run, make a sudden statue, mimic the happy minstrel of an all-rock hour.
"SON AND DAUGHTER" takes us back to the first album. We rediscover the musical dialectic enlivened by the rules of the race on the stage and polarized in the typical rhythm, even if not original, made up of continuous musical oscillations up to the short fall of a sad-happy score that normally serves as a breather. "WHITE QUEEN" returns to the top of thoughts where the kind and cruel creature trembles, the crystalline prism that gives us the clear horizon or the dense fog right into the brain: it is a hymn to the white queen.
"GREAT KING RAT" is a more spectacular track, phù there peace: the artificial forms of the performance become more natural: the stage becomes a common place where everyone recovers in himself the personality of the sicist canceled in space
of expression and/or distorted in creative and communicative incomprehension. At mid track Freddie leaves the scene: I immediately think of a feint from Lager. I'm wrong: he comes back dressed in a very shiny, very tight "all black". Then comes a very nice piece, "THE FAIRY FELLER'S MASTER-STROKE". Near the stage many are already moving, someone raises his arms and deflates with disharmony the virill pulsations that give him the head or heart or hips: who knows!
With "KEEP YOURSELF ALIVE" we finally reach a more heartfelt and general sharing: we accompany Queen by clapping our hands, we summarize by singing the title of the track, the old philosophy that translates the naturalistically selfish attachment into terms of thought at vi
ta.
There is a short pot solo by ROGER MEDDOWS-TAYLOR on drums Blond, fast, a little low, he doesn't need so much strength to hit: there are eight tracks only for his drums and these just flowery ones show all their power .
"SEVEN SEAS OF RHYE" (from the second album) a couple of rock'n'roll classics and "LIAR" (from the first album) conclude the performance before that the four are called loudly by the audience shouting "we want Queen". After all, the personality of
Regina is strong and genuine: the four are not supermen but guarantee the solidity of professionalism with just a few pieces. The style is not new and original; it harks back to well-known themes and motifs, yet it is noble and beautiful.
Happily arrived at a first and significant stage of success, Queen translate common feelings quite well into musical language
discrete elements of a free and lively rock that has such a strong hold on teenagers. Then the fluency and the homogeneity of the sound manage to channel, to lead the motifs where experience often finds a rich terrain to strengthen success.
The structural scaffolding of the tracks is solid even if not so broad and refined, the opening always promises and the closing never lets up, or almost never. dissatisfied.
The creativity that annoys the artist, the one that leads to the fluid or aerial motif, to the deep womb of music where we live the pleasant and indeterminate time of our conscience, is not in the precise and correct lash of BRIAN MAY, not in the we hollowed out of FREDDIE MERCURY and his show, not in the discreet performances of DEACON JOHN and ROGER MEDDOWS-TAYLOR. The musical poetics lacks variety of motifs that compose and decompose, finally add up in the artistic unity of the composer and his track
Despite the genuine and global liveliness of the pieces, the absence of ambiguity and contortion of the sound, the freshness and naturalness of expression are not brilliant aspirations of Queen, they are significant and accomplished arrivals.
Tom Apolloni
ALBUM
Queen, a combination of energy and freshness, a wealth of sounds, a sometimes complex but always positive musical texture, a group that moves in a precise artistic and commercial direction, a group of young people in which all the enthusiasm and the creative force are not frustrated by the lack of technical background.
Brian May is an excellent guitarist, his almost paradoxical exchange of violent chords with dramatic solos uses the 'driving' force of Deacon John's bass and Roger Meddows Taylor's drums, to create a perfect base for Freddie Mercury's crystal voice.
It is not in words that music can be explained, especially when, as in this case, the emotional charge is the most important basis of the concept. From the first LP entitled "Queen" it can be understood that although the group has found its direction, the formative phase has not yet passed; a part of the compositions and created more for 'live' representations than for the recording market. The "Queen", precisely because of their innate energy, communicative charge and exhibitionism are made for the stage.
The English market coldly welcomed the first LP's entry onto the market, but after the great success achieved in the United States, the English too changed their minds. However, Queen were not completely satisfied with the work on sale, and released the second LP.
The second recording effort is an original creative explosion in which the group's identity was confirmed with prodigious punctuality and the first LP will help to understand and appreciate the second, even if between the two works there is above all in continuity an appreciable difference both artistically and what a technique.
I have to admit that the first time I heard 'Queen' I wasn't immediately blown away, but it was my first contact with their music and it's always difficult to get an exact idea on first listen, especially when you come from a different musical taste .
Gradually, however, I was captured, and now the only piece that really disturbs me is the second of side B, "The Night Comes Down", which clashes with the rest of the recorded material both in terms of artistic and technical quality. The four most valid pieces are undoubtedly "Doing All Right", "Great King Rat", "My Fairy King" and "Liar", which represent 'Queen' at its best. "Modern Times Rock 'n' Roll" is a typically show piece and in the recording it seems accelerated in the mixing phase to give it more grit; "Keep Yourself Alive" is the showpiece for performances in front of large crowds, to get them out of their chairs and reach the artists on stage in equal measure of nervous energy. "Getting by" is the sense of the title and so far everyone agrees, at home with a group of friends in front of a glass of wine, the concept of getting by becomes another one that goes beyond the feeling of four wild boys behind several thousand Watts that flood you with sound. With "Jesus" we find the true identity of the group, not at its best but in a pleasant interpretation of the birth of Christ in two parts, one with blues-rock tendencies that turns into heavy rock and then ends as it began.
Without virtue and without sin is "Son And Daughter" to finish an idea not yet in all its splendor of the second LP "Seven Seas Of Rhye".
Second LP which is entitled "Queen II" in which there is no side A and side B but White side and Black side, the latter decidedly sensational. It begins with "Ogre Battle", a fairy tale that would leave many children prey to nightmares made of ogres who with their tongues catch flies as big as a hand; the tale continues but you can read it on the envelope inside the cover, and here the sound of "Queen" acquires all its character and personality; the drum sound is full, definitely TRident Studios brand, "the best drum sound in the world", words of Billy Cobham and who am I not to accept them?
Of a different style was the fable that followed, "The Fairy Feller's Master-Stroke", the simple story of fairy-tale folk gathered on a moonlit night.
12 in the afternoon to witness the cracking of the nut by a man from the world of fairy tales, who, while lifting his axe. he swears he will perform a masterstroke, the nymph is in yellow, the others are all there, then the pianio enters without interrupting the cheerful atmosphere and the masterstroke of this LP enters "cross-fading" and suddenly we find wrapped up in the magic of this very short piece but full of emotions; "Nevermore" is only one minute and 15 seconds long but should be much longer and that's all that can be said; then the apotheosis "The March Of The Black Queen", piano and guitar, chorus and lead vocals, then bass and drums in unison, lead guitar and choral explosion.
The sound is excellent, the production brilliant, above all because it never gets the upper hand and leaves the final result with all the freshness and spontaneity of inspiration.
"Funny How Love Is", the single piece which didn't completely satisfy me and has the disadvantage of being in too much good company, followed by that idea which was not developed on the first LP. "Seven Seas Of Rhye" hit the 45 chart in England almost instantly and would become a number one worldwide; the single will be released in America before mid-May because "Liar" is still climbing the US singles chart.
There is something, in the explosion of Queen, which recalls what happened with David Bowie, even if the bases are different: while Bowie for seven years lived in the world of adults waiting to be recognized, and had drawn on Syd Barrett and he had breathed the air of Jagger and Clapton, as with him the explosion took place in two stages that took the counterattack. "Starman" began to sell "Hunky Dory" and everything that has been ignored until then, just as "Queen II" is making the interest return to the first album which, despite having achieved great success both in America and in Sweden, it had been ignored by the rest of Europe. For Italy there isn't this problem yet because the second LP will be distributed in a short time, and the first was released in February on tiptoe.
Queen's manager, Jack Nelson, has assured that the group will come to Italy around Christmas; it's impossible to see them sooner because they'll be busy in America, Japan and Australia and then they'll have to rest, prepare the third LP and then they'll be able to start a tour of Europe.
Pierre Forlani
Today I share with all of you a nice gem, a sublime find dating back to 1974: this is one of the first complete and detailed articles published in the Italian press about Queen.
On April 20th, 1974, the Italian music magazine Nuovo Sound dedicated the cover of number 16 of the weekly to the band and, in particular, to the concert held just under a month earlier at the Rainbow Theatre in London (March 31st, 1974); the title on the cover read in fact Esclusiva da Londra: Queen in Concert (translated as Exclusive from London: Queen in Concert). On page 24 of the magazine, entitled Queen: Regina del Rock (translated as Queen: Queen of Rock), the journalist Tom Apolloni offers his review of the concert at the Rainbow, very positive indeed; he doesn't spare his praise even to the lighting technicians. On the same page there is also the review of Queen's debut album, written by the journalist Pierre Forlani; although the latter had been released in the UK on July 13th, 1973, EMI Italiana (the Italian division of EMI) had just distributed it in Italy (it was in fact released on January 8th, 1974). The second album 'Queen II', released in the UK on March 8th, 1974, arrived in Italy a few days after this article (on April 26th to be exact), but is however reviewed in this article.
An interesting passage of this article is in the final lines: Forlani writes that the band will visit Italy around Christmas 1974, because first they will be engaged in America, Japan and Australia - obviously, we know very well that the band will land in Japan in April of 1975 and in Australia in April 1976...but was Italy really considered in the European tour of November-December 1974? Given the appreciation reserved for the two albums and for the band in general, it would not be surprising if several Italian impresarios tried to bring Queen to Italy as early as the first half of the seventies.
Below the scan of the article and my translation from Italian to English. Enjoy the reading!
Those who have been to the Rainbow will have been satisfied overall with the musical performance and artistic expression of Queen.
The concert was sold out, a clear sign that the group is making its way by operating in a delicate and precise way in that fabric of music where the taste of the public is as important as the incorruptible artistic need.
At 9 p.m. Freddie Mercury and Co. take the stage: boos and
. Freddie is a "bride" all in white: she immediately and pleasantly cheers up the audience with a couple of tracks that let you instantly understand her good vocal possibilities and the disposition for the open stage and the gras. It undoubtedly makes up the spectacular group element. of the"OGRE BATTLE" ends amid lots of
, however we also praise the skill of the lighting technician who enlivened the piece with green reflectors, letting the lively and dense beams of light play here and there, and then suddenly muting them in a green light but diffused and bright.BRIAN MAY on guitar and DEACON JOHN on bass are frozen in concentration by the attention they pay to the pieces, but Freddie, who plays the plano only occasionally, has all the space he wants for body poses. It is pleasant and amusing to see him run, make a sudden statue, mimic the happy minstrel of an all-rock hour.
"SON AND DAUGHTER" takes us back to the first album. We rediscover the musical dialectic enlivened by the rules of the race on the stage and polarized in the typical rhythm, even if not original, made up of continuous musical oscillations up to the short fall of a sad-happy score that normally serves as a breather. "WHITE QUEEN" returns to the top of thoughts where the kind and cruel creature trembles, the crystalline prism that gives us the clear horizon or the dense fog right into the brain: it is a hymn to the white queen.
"GREAT KING RAT" is a more spectacular track, phù there peace: the artificial forms of the performance become more natural: the stage becomes a common place where everyone recovers in himself the personality of the sicist canceled in space
of expression and/or distorted in creative and communicative incomprehension. At mid track Freddie leaves the scene: I immediately think of a feint from Lager. I'm wrong: he comes back dressed in a very shiny, very tight "all black". Then comes a very nice piece, "THE FAIRY FELLER'S MASTER-STROKE". Near the stage many are already moving, someone raises his arms and deflates with disharmony the virill pulsations that give him the head or heart or hips: who knows!
With "KEEP YOURSELF ALIVE" we finally reach a more heartfelt and general sharing: we accompany Queen by clapping our hands, we summarize by singing the title of the track, the old philosophy that translates the naturalistically selfish attachment into terms of thought at vi
ta.
There is a short pot solo by ROGER MEDDOWS-TAYLOR on drums Blond, fast, a little low, he doesn't need so much strength to hit: there are eight tracks only for his drums and these just flowery ones show all their power .
"SEVEN SEAS OF RHYE" (from the second album) a couple of rock'n'roll classics and "LIAR" (from the first album) conclude the performance before that the four are called loudly by the audience shouting "we want Queen". After all, the personality of
Regina is strong and genuine: the four are not supermen but guarantee the solidity of professionalism with just a few pieces. The style is not new and original; it harks back to well-known themes and motifs, yet it is noble and beautiful.
Happily arrived at a first and significant stage of success, Queen translate common feelings quite well into musical language
discrete elements of a free and lively rock that has such a strong hold on teenagers. Then the fluency and the homogeneity of the sound manage to channel, to lead the motifs where experience often finds a rich terrain to strengthen success.
The structural scaffolding of the tracks is solid even if not so broad and refined, the opening always promises and the closing never lets up, or almost never. dissatisfied.
The creativity that annoys the artist, the one that leads to the fluid or aerial motif, to the deep womb of music where we live the pleasant and indeterminate time of our conscience, is not in the precise and correct lash of BRIAN MAY, not in the we hollowed out of FREDDIE MERCURY and his show, not in the discreet performances of DEACON JOHN and ROGER MEDDOWS-TAYLOR. The musical poetics lacks variety of motifs that compose and decompose, finally add up in the artistic unity of the composer and his track
Despite the genuine and global liveliness of the pieces, the absence of ambiguity and contortion of the sound, the freshness and naturalness of expression are not brilliant aspirations of Queen, they are significant and accomplished arrivals.
Tom Apolloni
ALBUM
Queen, a combination of energy and freshness, a wealth of sounds, a sometimes complex but always positive musical texture, a group that moves in a precise artistic and commercial direction, a group of young people in which all the enthusiasm and the creative force are not frustrated by the lack of technical background.
Brian May is an excellent guitarist, his almost paradoxical exchange of violent chords with dramatic solos uses the 'driving' force of Deacon John's bass and Roger Meddows Taylor's drums, to create a perfect base for Freddie Mercury's crystal voice.
It is not in words that music can be explained, especially when, as in this case, the emotional charge is the most important basis of the concept. From the first LP entitled "Queen" it can be understood that although the group has found its direction, the formative phase has not yet passed; a part of the compositions and created more for 'live' representations than for the recording market. The "Queen", precisely because of their innate energy, communicative charge and exhibitionism are made for the stage.
The English market coldly welcomed the first LP's entry onto the market, but after the great success achieved in the United States, the English too changed their minds. However, Queen were not completely satisfied with the work on sale, and released the second LP.
The second recording effort is an original creative explosion in which the group's identity was confirmed with prodigious punctuality and the first LP will help to understand and appreciate the second, even if between the two works there is above all in continuity an appreciable difference both artistically and what a technique.
I have to admit that the first time I heard 'Queen' I wasn't immediately blown away, but it was my first contact with their music and it's always difficult to get an exact idea on first listen, especially when you come from a different musical taste .
Gradually, however, I was captured, and now the only piece that really disturbs me is the second of side B, "The Night Comes Down", which clashes with the rest of the recorded material both in terms of artistic and technical quality. The four most valid pieces are undoubtedly "Doing All Right", "Great King Rat", "My Fairy King" and "Liar", which represent 'Queen' at its best. "Modern Times Rock 'n' Roll" is a typically show piece and in the recording it seems accelerated in the mixing phase to give it more grit; "Keep Yourself Alive" is the showpiece for performances in front of large crowds, to get them out of their chairs and reach the artists on stage in equal measure of nervous energy. "Getting by" is the sense of the title and so far everyone agrees, at home with a group of friends in front of a glass of wine, the concept of getting by becomes another one that goes beyond the feeling of four wild boys behind several thousand Watts that flood you with sound. With "Jesus" we find the true identity of the group, not at its best but in a pleasant interpretation of the birth of Christ in two parts, one with blues-rock tendencies that turns into heavy rock and then ends as it began.
Without virtue and without sin is "Son And Daughter" to finish an idea not yet in all its splendor of the second LP "Seven Seas Of Rhye".
Second LP which is entitled "Queen II" in which there is no side A and side B but White side and Black side, the latter decidedly sensational. It begins with "Ogre Battle", a fairy tale that would leave many children prey to nightmares made of ogres who with their tongues catch flies as big as a hand; the tale continues but you can read it on the envelope inside the cover, and here the sound of "Queen" acquires all its character and personality; the drum sound is full, definitely TRident Studios brand, "the best drum sound in the world", words of Billy Cobham and who am I not to accept them?
Of a different style was the fable that followed, "The Fairy Feller's Master-Stroke", the simple story of fairy-tale folk gathered on a moonlit night.
12 in the afternoon to witness the cracking of the nut by a man from the world of fairy tales, who, while lifting his axe. he swears he will perform a masterstroke, the nymph is in yellow, the others are all there, then the pianio enters without interrupting the cheerful atmosphere and the masterstroke of this LP enters "cross-fading" and suddenly we find wrapped up in the magic of this very short piece but full of emotions; "Nevermore" is only one minute and 15 seconds long but should be much longer and that's all that can be said; then the apotheosis "The March Of The Black Queen", piano and guitar, chorus and lead vocals, then bass and drums in unison, lead guitar and choral explosion.
The sound is excellent, the production brilliant, above all because it never gets the upper hand and leaves the final result with all the freshness and spontaneity of inspiration.
"Funny How Love Is", the single piece which didn't completely satisfy me and has the disadvantage of being in too much good company, followed by that idea which was not developed on the first LP. "Seven Seas Of Rhye" hit the 45 chart in England almost instantly and would become a number one worldwide; the single will be released in America before mid-May because "Liar" is still climbing the US singles chart.
There is something, in the explosion of Queen, which recalls what happened with David Bowie, even if the bases are different: while Bowie for seven years lived in the world of adults waiting to be recognized, and had drawn on Syd Barrett and he had breathed the air of Jagger and Clapton, as with him the explosion took place in two stages that took the counterattack. "Starman" began to sell "Hunky Dory" and everything that has been ignored until then, just as "Queen II" is making the interest return to the first album which, despite having achieved great success both in America and in Sweden, it had been ignored by the rest of Europe. For Italy there isn't this problem yet because the second LP will be distributed in a short time, and the first was released in February on tiptoe.
Queen's manager, Jack Nelson, has assured that the group will come to Italy around Christmas; it's impossible to see them sooner because they'll be busy in America, Japan and Australia and then they'll have to rest, prepare the third LP and then they'll be able to start a tour of Europe.
Pierre Forlani
