A DAY AT THE RACES

This album is very under-rated I think, well at least HERE, because people consider it one of Queen's best albums, second only to ANATO, apparently. But I also think Queen II is better (their best album).

The main complain about this album is that it's a "copy" of it's predecessor. Well, I don't find this a bad thing, not only because ANATO is IMO one of the best albums ever, but also because Queen was always experimenting with their music, in a good way (their 70's stuff) or in a bad one (Hot Space), so I don't consider it a crime if for one album, they didn't do so.

The album has some outstanding songs, the best one I think is "The Millonaire Waltz", an epic following the line of "My Fairy King", "Bohemian Rhapsody" and "The March Of The Black Queen" , from their previous records. "You Take My Breath Away" is another great song, a dark ballad with an awesome intro and one of Mercury's best vocal performances.

"Good-Old Fashioned Lover Boy" and "Somebody To Love" are one of Queen's most famous songs from the 70's and are the other songs written by Freddie Mercury in the album. They're both awesome, Mercury was on fire in this album as regards songwritting as he wrote 4 of his best songs.

The other member of the band that wrote 4 songs was Brian May, "White Man", although sometimes consider the weakest point in the album, is a great hard-rock song. "Teo Torriate", which has some Japanese lines in the chorus is one of May's best songs. "Long Away" follows the line of "39', a nice ballad, although nothing spectacular and the last one, "Tie Your Mother Down", which it's not a bad song, but I think it's too generic.

John Deacon and Roger Taylor wrote the two remaining songs, "You And I" and "Drowse" respectively. The first one is a great ballad, and Deacon's best song after "Spread Your Wings" IMO, "Drowse", on the other hand is probably the weakest point in the album, although it's not what you could call a "bad" song.

I highly recommend this album.