luca reed

Not at all in agreement. You are incapable of distinguishing a good greatest hits from a bad one. Now, it may be that all of this serves the bonsai car radio of the latest yuppie, and that's fine. However, the sequence of tracks that wanders without intermediate stops between past and present is extraordinary, with its ghosts (Barrett) and those temporal echoes that become, in every sense, popular symbols of our contemporaneity (the wall, the atomic bomb, the moon, the memory clocks of a Florensky, the pigs). An extraordinary anthology that has the breath of a time machine as a summation of a future that perhaps has nothing left to say, and that dusts off forgotten classics like "Set the controls..." or a track from the splendid, unattainable "A Saucerful of Secrets," right through to the progressive avant-garde of "Dark Side," the calm transition of "Animals," the Kafkaesque obsessions of Waters, and lastly, even the irritating pseudo-new age of the last albums. Whether all this actually serves the indifferent and cool listening of a car radio matters little to me. This is an immense record.

What can I say? I really didn't enjoy The Rising, except for a few gems (Mary's Prayer), and this one just doesn't engage me at all. Yet, I have to admit that it remains a decent product, although Ghost of Tom Joad was something else entirely. The trouble isn't so much whether the album is good or not; the issue is that we expect a masterpiece from Springsteen, and unfortunately, his albums are no longer "events" like they were back in the days of Darkness... Nebraska, or even Born in the USA. But live, he's still the best showman in the world.

"Unforgettable Fire," "Sunday Bloody Sunday," "A Day Without Me," "Stories for Boys," "Gloria," "Where the Streets Have No Name" are, for me, songs with an epic breath. If you want mythology and all the rest, then Ronnie James Dio or Virgin Steele are much more epic.

Yes yes I understand... anyway, the fact that he is a guitarist works in his favor, right? I think of the many possibilities he would have with supergroups like Symphony X and the like. A greeting to you!

Anyway, the only one from Queen who could have a solo career of some weight is Brian May, in the guitar-hero style, other things that excite me little but would leave the onanists in ecstasy.

Eh eh Sabbath, a great love... yes, maybe you're right, the fact remains that they influenced everyone, including Queen ("seven seas or rhye," etc. etc.)

Yeah... Once upon a time it was called... one of the most disgusting albums in the history of rock, worse than Zenyatta Mondatta by the Police, Pictures for an Exhibition by EL§P, All That You... by U2, The Bells by Lou Reed... a complete mess. But at least I want to keep the memories of the early albums inside me... For Enrico 71: did you know they reissued all the Sound albums? Now Jeopardy is circulating in indie stores with a certain frequency.

It seems a bit forced to say that A Perfect Circle et similia remind of the Minds... and if we want to be honest, bringing together two completely different albums like New Gold Dream and Sparkle in the Rain without explaining anything about the escalation of the following album is just wrong. The Minds, after all, died right after that record, which, by the way, included a decent cover of a Lou Reed song. Alive & Kicking, Don't You, and all those monstrosities may have sold millions of copies, but it was the funeral of Jim Kerr and co., who since then have partially recovered with only one album ("Street Fighting Years"). From a cult band ("Sons and Fascination") to a teenage band. I don't want to add anything more, especially since just the memory of "Alive & Kicking" triggers uncontrollable murderous impulses in me.

Of course, fighting over music is pointless; there are far worse things out there that give me an ulcer... Anyway, since we're on the subject, what do you think about the recycled Queen with the resurrected Paul Rodgers on vocals? God only knows how much I've loved this singer with Free and the early Bad Company, his incredibly intense and bluesy voice, but his mere presence today makes me think that early retirement would be ideal even for rockstars: I'm not comparing him with Freddy, I just think they could have chosen a less decrepit singer. Time passes for everyone; at least it's understandable for Paul Rodgers, a bit less for Bono. Have a good evening.

Oops, the rhetoric... U2 yes, they always were, but they had the ability to create immensely epic tracks... obviously, I don't really consider today's songs. The early years of Queen are interesting, sure, but excuse me, Led Zeppelin or Mountains were on another planet. Moreover, it's worth noting that F.M. always had some rather questionable musical references, like certain baroque music, polka, Viennese operetta; he himself admitted to certain, um, startling influences. I don’t think Bono is a good benchmark ("all the songs sound the same" meh), especially when referring to U2 up to and including Achtung Baby. A track like "Bullet the Blue Sky," for example, among many to mention. If anything, as English bands, Queen can be compared to groups like Styx, Magnum, Boston, Only Child; the entire American pomp-rock movement owes something to Mercury and co.'s style, which I personally struggle to appreciate for the same reasons.