QUEEN II

As one of the last Queen classic era albums that I got into, you could almost say that I saved the best for last. From the heavy metal with style of Ogre Battle to the Beach Boys meet Beatles beauty of Funny How Love Is, we come upon a group of musicians that wrote what they wrote because that's what came out, not worrying how to fit it into a style or movement of the moment. Already fully realized by this, their second album, Queen showed an ability to wow fans like very few others. Whether melding hard rock guitars, thoughtful lyrics & perfect harmonies on songs like Father To Son , or on a Taylor penned rocker Loser in the End, it just didn't seem like this was a group who would be satisfied with doing the same old song and dance. Going from March of the Black Queen to the aforementioned Funny How Love Is might seem like disrupting on other bands records. But here, and on later records, Queen showed themselves to be deserving of the title of artists. Like the Beatles and many other groups, the song mattered. SO what if one was heavy metal , then the next a campy theatrical bit, then a melancholy piano ballad followed by a rocker. That made it all the more interesting than many one track albums (and this is an AC/DC fan talking). And as they say, variety is the spice of life. While many would argue that they are not prog, one must surely admit, that as a musical entity, Queen shared many of the attributes that prog is constituted of - lyrics that go beyond moon june swoon, boy meets girl or old blues; a musical palette covering much of what had come before them in terms of musical styles (classical, jazz, blues, music hall, metal, rock n roll, and eventually R & B & Rap); but most of all, the attitude that boundaries do not exist when it comes to making art. And Queen II is Art.