Queen + Paul Rodgers
The Cosmos Rocks

Having grown up musically with Freddie Mercury, I couldn't help but be puzzled, like all Queen fans, when a few years ago Brian May and Roger Taylor were reported to be collaborating with singer Paul Rodgers. Initially, this was to involve a world tour during which they would perform Queen's greatest hits. Nothing new, in short, just a purely commercial operation to exploit the name of the British band once again. After the tour, the collaboration continues, and this time it involves the creation of a new album. The situation is then different, with Brian and Roger getting back into the game after almost 15 years of silence and returning to songwriting, using the name they themselves had helped to create for nearly 30 years, alongside a great singer like Paul Rodgers.

The result is "The Cosmos Rocks," which, after buying and listening to it, I can say deeply disappointed me. Fourteen tracks in total, and, in my opinion, you can count the genuinely good ones on one hand.

And yet the start shows real promise, with the excellent rock of "Cosmos Rockin'". The riffs of Brian's Red Special are heard again, Taylor's perfect rhythm, and over these, Rodgers' excellent voice (beware of comparisons with Mercury). But the magic vanishes suddenly. What follows are tracks that are too often slow, fundamentally lacking energy, and too self-referential (the distorted voice at the beginning of the album identical to that opening the song "One Vision", the handclaps copied from "We Will Rock You" and pasted into the middle section of "Still Burnin'", the echo at the end of the chorus in "We Believe" that reminds one greatly (too much) of the end of "Mother Love").

Positive signals come from the hard rock in full Queen style of "Warboys", from "We Believe" with an excellent performance by Rodgers (perhaps the best of the album), from "Through The Night" with May's beautiful guitar lines, and from "Say It's Not True" where the guitarist and drummer return to vocals as well. Total disappointment with the first single "C-lebrity", which I find quite banal. Too little for these three (great) musicians engaged in elevating an important name like Queen. In my opinion, there needed to be a greater willingness to take risks and break away from the glorious but still past of the band.

Now I will go see them live in Rome, hoping that at least in that setting they can return to their levels.