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26 of 28 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
"Queen for Dummies", 4 Oct 2009
If this was a book it would be called "Queen for Dummies", the cover would be bright yellow and it would introduce young kids and creatures from another planet to the music of Queen.
Their first Greatest Hits package sold in bucket loads since 1981 and in the same way that Bohemian Rhapsody broke the mold for video promos, it set the standard for Greatest Hits packages. There were no fillers, new songs or dud hits ... in fact they had to leave off single releases in order that it fit the LP Album format.
Now almost 30 years later, this release tries to encapsulate Queen inside the constraints of a single CD. Its a flawed and impossible task. Do you select songs that are familiar to a worldwide audience, do you select songs that charted best in a particular territory, do you pick concert rock classics or 3 minute radio friendly pop songs?
The problem is this - this is clearly aimed at "The Christmas Market" - people who maybe like Queen but don't love them. They normally wouldn't buy their albums but know a bit about them and have probably seen some of their stuff covered on X-Factor, Brittan's Got Talent or maybe on the soundtrack to an animated cartoon or feature film. However, the one set of people who will DEFINITELY buy this album will be their massive fan base (of who I am just one) who will buy it for completest reasons.
The latter of these groups are not going to be a happy bunch, even with the limited edition version with the book or the heavy vinyl edition. They want a big glossy rarities package of a similar nature to that released for Freddie Mercury in the 90's. They have all the commercial releases, they want the B-sides,the 12" inch mixes that were only available on vinyl, the unreleased videos incl. solo work, and if possible anything that Brian, Roger, John or Freddie sang in the bath (70's) or shower (80's) or on their way to the bank to lodge their royalties cheques.
I could burn this album onto a CD from my Queen collection........ but I will buy it. I might even buy it for my nephews and nieces to ensure the Queen legacy gets passed down the generations, who will tell me that I'm a mug and did I know that I could have downloaded it off the internet for nothing.
In conclusion 5 stars for content (despite the gems that have been excluded)but 0 stars for whoever felt the need to make this release happen. (I am guessing its the same Muppet that is re-issuing the vinyl back catalog and the CD singles in recession friendly chucks but who is too lazy to get their arse into the archives). Its time the band give their fans what they want, not "what they've been given a 1000 times before"
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Five stars for the music, one star deducted for the idea, 5 Nov 2009
There is no way in the world that twenty songs on one disc could do the legacy of Queen's back catalogue justice. This release is evidently aimed at people who have no real knowledge of the group or are such mildly interested fans that they would imagine that this is all they would need. However, getting that out of the way, as a single-disc compilation of Queen's music, it's not a bad one. If, as a Queen fan, you were given the task of compiling a 'best of' over one disc, what tracks would you include? I think the majority of the songs I'd include are covered here - so it does its job.
I can't really understand why anyone would give this disc one star. The music is easily worth five... although I can certainly understand people docking one or two stars for the irrelevance of the compilation, which is what I've done - but the songs here are absolutely brilliant and are certainly some of the best and most famous tracks of the 70s and 80s. Yes, there are better compilations of Queen. The Greatest Hits I & II packages aren't exactly definitive, but they cover the career of this talented band better than this one disc compilation. However, I'm well aware that this could be the starting point of a greater fandom for some younger people yet to have been introduced to Queen - or maybe even older fans who have never given the band a chance and, for that, it's worthy.
In fact, any compilation which includes songs such as "Bohemian Rhapsody", "Killer Queen", "We Are The Champions", "Don't Stop Me Now" and "Somebody To Love" should have a place in the world. If it brings Queen's music to new ears then I'm all for it, despite some criminal omissions that compilers with a one disc limit would have been forced to leave out. Yes, it's a flawed premise, yes, one CD doesn't do the band justice and no, I won't be buying it (I already have all of the material on offer here) - but I'm sure this compilation will give thousands of people a lot of joy and, for that, it gets my support.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Queen For People Who Don't Realy Care About Music, 28 Oct 2009
Greatest Hits albums are always a bit of a difficult one. As Graham Norton said to Kelly Jones who was on his show promoting the Steroephonic Hits CD, "So I really like yoiu but I inexplicably havn't got any of your albums..." If you like Queen at all then you will probably have at least 1 of the Greatest Hits CDs and /or some of their original albums. The crazy people here who argue about missing songs should get out more, you probably have the albums with your favourite songs on them anyway.
Let's face it it is quite easy to compile you ideal compilation of songs by your favourite artist using iTunes but if you really are a fan you should be compiling this from your collection of original albums.
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