NEWS OF THE WORLD

After the succes of the previous two albums, Queen had the choice, either to continue on the path they had set with songs like BoRap, Somebody to Love, or change. They decided to change. And they minimalised their sound somewhat, less overdubs, and basicaly less complex. Still a good album though, but nothing you would expect knowing their former 5 albums.

News Of The World is the first of a series of albums that each explore a different side of music, in the typical Queen style, on this album the focus (second side of the album mostly) lies on more blues rock based songs (It's Late, Who Needs You, Sleeping On The Sidewalk, My Melancholy Blues, Spread Your Wings and All Dead All Dead, all have a bluesy feel to it IMO).

The album opens with the duo-single Will Rock You/We Are The Champions somehow these two songs appear to belong together, and that's not a coincidense. during the previous tours Queen noticed that often the audience wanted to sing along with the band, so Freddie and Brian decided to write some audience-participation songs. And thus Brian thought up the two stamps one clap structure (in practice the audience prefered three claps), combined with an easy sing-a-long chorus. Freddie wrote the ultimate stadium rocker We Are The Champions, fabulous basline, typical Mercurian keyboards and gorgeous singing with the Queen choir in great form. 4,5/5

Sheer Heart Attack, the first of two Roger compositions, originally written for the Sheer Heart Attack album, but they didn't finished it in time. A great high speed heavy rock song with Punk energie running through it, probably the most heavy song Queen ever wrote. Fabulous, like the title suggests, this can cause a heart attack, sheer fabulous. 4/5

All Dead, All Dead, a very sad ballad by Brian, with beautifull piano's (Brian) and good singing from Brian also. after the high energie rock from the previous song, this is a welcome slow break. 3/5

John delivers a great rock ballad with Spread Your Wings, great guitar harmonies and really a beautiful song. 4/5

Side 1 ends with Fight From The Inside, written by Roger, based around some cool rhythms, reasonable good, but one of the lesser songs on the album. 3/5

The second side of the album starts with the Freddie Mercury composition Get Down Make Love not really brilliant, but it was mostly written to be played live, with a light-orchestra and weird sound-effects from Brian on guitar and Freddie's vocals. 3/5

Sleeping On The Sidewalk is a blues song, mainly played on accoustic guitar, it sounds a bit sloppy, but that only enhances the effect, nice but forgettable song. 3/5

Who Needs You is the second John song on the album, some latino/spanish elements interwoven to this sweet song, and Mercury's vocal lines are incredible sweet 3/5

It's Late The longest song on the album, in shortened form released as a single in the US. Great guitars drums bass and fabulous singing, and for non-Queen fans, don't judge this band before listening to this awsome rock song. 5/5

My Melancholy Blues ends the album, with some marvelous piano playing, and Freddie's singing is absolutely the highlight of the album for me. Just Fabulous. 4/5

News Of The World is a complete change of style from Queen, and thus it's hard to compare it with other Queen albums, the only other album I can compare it too is the following Jazz. A good album, but not as consistantly good as previous efforts, the first couple and the last couple of songs are great if not fabulous, but between that there's too much lesser songs. 3,5 stars really, but highly recommended to Queen fans, or fans of good music in general.