'A Day At The Races' (1976)

'A Day at the Races' is an overlooked masterpiece. It is the perfect realisation of all the styles Queen had explored on previous albums, perfectly performed and perfectly produced. It was that obsession with perfection that drew the ire of the critics. 

'A Night at the Opera' was such a triumph that Queen were in the difficult position of having to decide what to do next. Any deviation risked being criticised as a fall from grace. And yet 'Night' was so remarkable, so unique, that it would have been impossible to reproduce. There could also be no chance of repeating the shock value of releasing something so irreducibly exceptional. 'A Night at the Opera' was inimitable, an impossible act to follow. But Queen made the attempt anyway, this time in a more self-conscious, knowing, manner in light of experience. A better way of seeing these albums when set back to back is to see "Day" as fully working out all of the creative potentials created by "Night," not a repeat but a continuation and a consummation. The result was a polished album of superbly crafted songs which had balance and symmetry. If it was impossible to pull the magic rabbit out of the hat more than once, it was possible to lay hold of that rabbit given that it was still jumping and hone the magic for one more, final, perfect, statement.

The band's intentions with respect to continuity were made plain by taking the title of another Marx Brothers' movie for the album's title, 'A Day At The Races.' The album is routinely dismissed as an attempt to repeat the sounds and successes of the previous album - as if such a thing could so easily be done! Music critics repeat themselves to a far greater extent than do musicians, utterly lacking the creativity whose absence they deride in others. Even if the criticisms were true, that would still indicate an ambition and an execution that was far in excess of most other bands. Words like repetition lose their critical value in relation to a band that possessed a vision and imagination far in excess of the pop norm. All style and no substance is the essence of the critics' charges, 'all soft centres and no hard nuts' (as Peter Hogan's completely mistitled 'complete guide' to the music of Queen puts it). I remember the band being in the shadow of 'A Night at the Opera' and 'Bohemian Rhapsody,' with critics - predictably - claiming that the band were copying themselves, even parodying themselves, with the next album and singles. This isn't criticism in the sense of musical appreciation, merely lazy journalism, saying the easiest and most obvious things - the kind of things you could have predicted the critics saying even before the album had even been recorded. The problem is that most music journalists know little about music and so merely write on tastes and preferences. It's one reason why so many focus on lyrics. There is an inevitability and predictability to the criticisms of such journalists, and the way that their views are reinforced by repetition. It's pure laziness. The same critics who never saw the triumph that was 'A Night at the Opera' coming now used that triumph to denigrate a follow-up of the same standard and stature. How terrible of Queen to have repeated, even perfected, the work of genius that the critics missed first time round! Critics are too daft to even laugh at. The critics set Queen up against the impossible standard they themselves had set and took barely concealed pleasure in doing the band down. It's not even clear that 'Day' was inferior to 'Night,' being in the same style and losing nothing in comparison. Being more of the same is hardly a criticism when that same refers to the album which is generally considered to be the band's masterwork. The demand for change and difference is also based on a faulty premises. First of all, Queen did change, and change often, causing critics to lament the move away from the sounds they loved. Secondly, in retaining and playing to their trademark sound, the band were delivering the sound their fans wanted and expected of them. To say that 'Day' sounded like 'Night' strikes me as more a compliment than a criticism. 

There was another aspect to the criticism, equally shallow and superficial. In becoming so big and successful, Queen were now considered pop royalty, the establishment that stood in need of overthrowing. Punk rock was on the horizon. I lived through punk and never remotely bought into its pretensions to be the voice of alienated youth. Coming from an old and declining industrial town, with pit closures on the horizon, leaving school to mass unemployment, I didn't need lessons on alienated youth, least of all from middle class art school types and pop 'journalists' fantasising about street-cred and revolution. I was one of the alienated youth. As rock'n'roll, then disco, proved the alienated want the escapism that allows them to preserve their dreams and hopes from hard, soul-destroying, realities. Escapism is not denial, nor even diversion. In the sense in which Tolkien used the word it is an attempt to break free of life-denying constraint in search of a better world. 

Had 'A Day At The Races' preceded 'A Night at the Opera' it would almost certainly have had the same impact as the latter and would have been heralded as an artistic triumph and masterpiece. The objection might be raised that there's no 'Bohemian Rhapsody' on the album, but that's neither fair criticism nor even quite true. First of all, 'Bohemian Rhapsody' is so unique that it would have been impossible to replicate it and unwise to try. Who has ever even come close to that track in the entire history of pop music? (Actually, Queen had anticipated the track on their first two albums with 'My Fairy King' and 'March of the Black Queen'). Although Queen didn't attempt 'Bohemian Rhapsody' Mark II, they did present a grand and ambitious track on 'A Day at the Races' - the incredible 'Somebody to Love' with its vocally demanding combination of gospel and opera. If I was made to choose the best ever Queen song, then there's a very good chance that I would choose 'Somebody to Love.' Freddie Mercury himself openly stated his view that 'Somebody to Love' is a 'better song' than 'Bohemian Rhapsody' and since he was the author of both, who is anyone to disagree? 

We can go through the rest of the album in the same way, making a track-by-track comparison between 'Night' and 'Day.' The rock on 'A Day at the Races' easily stands comparison with the rock on 'A Night at the Opera,' with the likes of 'Tie Your Mother Down' making a livelier opener than 'Death on Two Legs' and 'White Man' being a more perfectly realized - and condensed - hard rock number than 'The Prophet's Song.' Both 'Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy' and 'the Millionaire Waltz' turn the whimsy of 'Lazing on a Sunday Afternoon' and 'Seaside Rendezvous' into pop perfection. 'You Take My Breath Away' serves as 'Love of my Life' and so on. (To those still inclined to dismiss this album as a mere copy of 'A Night at the Opera,' just listen to Freddie Mercury's vocal harmonies introducing 'You Take My Breath Away.') 

'A Day at the Races' has perfect balance and structure, each song being of a consistently high standard. Ten tracks at five a side appeals to my sense of symmetry and order. 'A Night at the Opera' is a little more uneven in comparison, no doubt reflecting its experimental character. It's best to look upon 'Night' and 'Day' as two volumes of the same record, since they fit together so seamlessly. 'Day' is the completion of 'Night.' This was the pinnacle of the 'early' Queen and the birth of 'classic' Queen, the band that combined imagination, flair and musical intelligence with production values. It was the culmination of the band's musical trajectory to this point, and glorious end for all that.

A Day at the Races (1976)

"Tie Your Mother Down"

Boisterous, brash, and barnstorming, this is a brilliant opening track and gets the album off to a rollicking, riotous start. It made for a great opening number in concert too. Whenever spirits are flagging, this one is guaranteed to get you up and running again. Then there is the title, shouted out boldly and repeatedly. Freddie Mercury was once asked "why 'tie your mother down'?" The Queen frontman replied: "Well this one in fact is a track written by Brian (May) actually, I dunno why. Maybe he was in one of his vicious moods." None the wiser. I remember reading that Brian May had a great riff and a working title, and Freddie encouraged him to keep it. This song is guaranteed to get any crowd bouncing on its feet.

The song is about adolescent rebellion against parents, wanting freedom when you are young. May was playing the guitar riff and the words "Tie Your Mother Down" entered his head. He described it as 'the cry of a boy's frustration': 'This is a song about growing up and being frustrated with your parents.' The song expresses the fantasy of escaping parental authority and getting a girl. Knowing that the girl's mother would more than likely object to his best laid plans, the song advises she be dealt with in a cartoonishly fiendish way. It's probably not meant to be taken literally, and basically advises the girl to get her mother out of the way. It's the song of a frustrated young man, then. It's interesting that whilst May was twenty nine when he wrote the sing, he still considered himself 'still a boy, not quite a man.' I was eleven when the song came out, so what chance did I have? I remember being ribbed about the song by Colin Hannon in the dinner queue at school, but he was a most precocious boy. 

The music is considerably more sophisticated than the lyrics. May composed the riff on a Spanish guitar. The opening consists of an apparently endless ascending guitar effect, inspired by M. C. Escher's Ascending and Descending. The song is driven on by an exceptionally powerful, and memorable, hard-rock riff.

"You Take My Breath Away"

This is one of the finest Queen ballads, understated, quiet, and reflective.  Freddie shows a very fine touch on the piano, and sings with great restraint and romanticism. Again, it is not merely the variety of songs on a Queen album that impressed, but their sheer quality. Whatever the style, Queen delivered a perfect case. The a capello vocal with which the track opens is quite breathtaking.

"Long Away"

This is an overlooked classic. I once heard Brian May in interview talk of the arguments that often took place in the band over single selection, with Brian saying he thought that 'Long Away' could have made a great single release. Whether the great public would have accepted the switch from Freddie to Brian to have made for a big hit is debatable - every hit record by Queen had Freddie singing lead. But it's a fine track, a very good medium-paced rocker. It makes for a great album track in the best sense of the word, possessing hidden qualities that reveal themselves with each play. It sounds a little Beatlesque, and hence something of a throwback. It definitely could have been a single. 

"The Millionaire Waltz"

Pure Freddie, pure genius. If I had to simplify, I'd say that Brian May and Roger Taylor rocked hard, Freddie Mercury had the quirkiness and imagination, and John Deacon had the pop and soul sensibility. That's a huge simplification, of course, seeing as all members had a multifaceted musical intelligence, with Freddie having a number of great rockers to his name. 

You can't really describe 'The Millionaire Waltz', you just have to put it on and enjoy it. To say something like Gilbert and Sullivan with hard rock repels more than it appeals. It shouldn't work, and it doesn't for nearly all those who attempt some such thing; but Queen had the musical intelligence to make it work. As the scarves held by fans in the concerts of 1984/5 stated, "Queen Works." It takes some strange, incredible imagination to conceive of something like this, it takes an even greater flair and confidence to pull it off. Quirky, camp, and light-hearted, the track takes flight on the back of heavyweight musicality. This was 'Bohemian Rhapsody II.' A gem. The guitar solo alone is worth the price of admission. 

"You and I"

A light and breezy pop song that is easily overlooked among the heavyweights on 'A Day at the Races.' Direct, catchy, and uplifting, it has all the qualities of a classic pop song. Written by John Deacon, it is easy to see this as a follow-up to 'You're My Best Friend.' It is easy, too, to imagine this song as a single release. It's a real gem that shows Deacon's great pop sensibility.

"Somebody to Love"

If I was pushed hard to name the greatest ever Queen song, I would still try to evade being pinned down and instead break the band's' music down into different categories in the attempt to select the best in each - rockers, ballads, electric, acoustic, soul/disco, blues, oddities etc. But if I still had to select just one ... it might well be 'Somebody to Love.'  'Somebody to Love' is a truly great song, big, infectious, with immensely powerful vocal harmonies that build relentlessly to a giant crescendo. The song incorporates those great hooks from opera within a great soul sensibility. It is clearly influenced by Freddie's love of Aretha Franklin and just oozes gospel. It also incorporates the operatics of The Student Prince. I think because of Queen's popularity and because of their determination to entertain, thrill, and please a crowd, there is a tendency to miss just how musically intelligent and musically demanding many of their songs are. As Geoff Tate of Queensryche said, this is 'a really hard song to sing.' Whilst Queen made thrilling hard rock and great pop, 'there was so much else to them.' It was that 'much else' that distinguished them.

"White Man"

A crunching hard rocker based on a 'Red Indian' beat, beefing up a very artistic and polished album. This is a more concise version of 'The Prophet's Song,' containing a damning prophecy of sorts. The track was proof that Queen could still rock hard. This song packs a hard punch.

"Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy"

As camp and quirky as hell, and utterly irresistible. In the tradition of 'Killer Queen,' this was a huge fan favourite back in the seventies. It was the lead song on an EP release and performed - and performed well - in concert. It also made it onto Queen's 'Greatest Hits' album, the biggest selling UK album ever. So the song once had a high profile. The sound was considered quintessentially Queen (a sound repeated on Eddie Howell's Man from Manhatten from 1975, a track which Freddie Mercury produced and on which Fred sang and Brian May played). For some reason the song seemed to fade from view in the 1980s. The song is the perfect realisation of that 1920s/30s vaudevillian side of the band, apparent on 'Bring Back that Leroy Brown,' 'Lazing on a Sunday Afternoon,' and 'Seaside Rendezvous.' This is the kind of song which defined the appeal of the band for me in the 1970s. Alongside the hard rock was this quirky, imaginative and very different sound.

"Drowse"

After the high passionate intensity of 'I'm in Love with my Car' on 'A Night at the Opera,' Roger Taylor drops down a few gears for 'Drowse.' As the title suggests, this is something of a somnolent, even melancholic, take on the challenges of teenage life in suburbia. The song is a rumination on the boredom of confinement before breaking out, should those who were slumbering ever muster the energy. It is a distinctly Roger Taylor song, which always brought its own distinctive sound to bear on a Queen album, adding to the diversity. The song deals with the conflicted emotions of being stuck somewhere between young and old, a care-free, if boring and meaningless, middle class adolescence and a worrisome middle age. You can spend so long reminiscing about the good times of a lost past whilst being fearful of the responsibilities of an approaching middle age that all the dreams you had when young go unfulfilled. The only ambition left to you is to become the 'a boy next door,' an average person who makes conventional decisions in a mundane, humdrum, everyday life, reconciled to a life of lamentation over the person one aspired to be. 

In an interview with Saturday Scene from 1976, Roger stated about the track: 'I seem to have a bit of a rock n' roll tag, but I have my quiet moments as well. This is one of them, a slightly more relaxed thing than usual. It's rather American, as it turned out, but you'd never know until you finished.' That's an interesting comment from the guy associated with 'modern times rock'n'roll.' It tends to get overlooked how often it is Brian May who goes headlong into the loudest, bluntest, heavy rock on a Queen album, and sometimes the crudest, too, lusting after women with a ferocity known to all teenage boys. There's little idealisation of teenage fantasy in Taylor's vision here, expressing perfectly the oddly enervating tension between raging emotions and boredom in that age. There is nostalgia in the melancholy but also an awareness that the feeling is based on a delusion that traps you in a past that never was. The song condenses the somniferous tedium of a teenage life caught between an irretrievable past and a beckoning future. The music perfectly complements the lyrics, the slow, low guitar meandering back and forth to convey a morass of sadness. If it works in teenage years, it works for later life, too. You have to be very young or very disappointed to truly appreciate a song like this, especially when Taylor's voice, already full of regret and resignation, fades away, rambling like a drunk singing to himself and his beer in the night. We are left with one too many wasted sunsets. The effect is weirdly compelling:

It ain't easy at all.

Thinkin' it right, doin' it wrong

It's easier from an armchair.

Waves of alternatives wash at my sleepiness.

Have my eggs poached for breakfast I guess.

'Nothing really matters to me ...' And nothing really changes much. Lyrically and musically, the song wavers between thoughts of a lost past, vague desires to change it, and the distractions offered by the mundane happenings of a boring present. Such is life as we drift on trying to pretend it all matters before we fade away. The song sounds lightweight, a makeweight filling out the album, and it is true that it is routinely overlooked. But it is a perfect case of whatever kind of thing it is. It deserves to be much better known. 

"Teo Torriatte (Let Us Cling Together)"

A tender but ultimately big ballad that builds to a great crescendo. It ends in a great Queen sing-a-long, made for the big stadiums. Queen made no bones about it, they were crowd pleasers aiming to be big, big, big. Brian May was inspired to write this song by the enthusiastic response to the band in Japan. It's a song for the Queen fellowship, pointing towards 'We are the Champions' and 'Friends will be Friends.'

"Woe"

This track is rumoured to exist from the 'A Night At The Opera' or 'A Day At The Races' sessions. Other than that, nothing is known.