Welcome to another Track of the Day - Queen Edition, where your hoddler-in-chief features songs from the greatest band of all time. In previous editions we examined the roots of Queen with My Fairy King, Brian May’s deepcut Long Away and Freddie Mercury’s triumphant final act in The Show Must Go On.
Before we get to the main business, here’s a bonus track:
Fitzie’s track of the day, part one: Jailhouse Rock, by Queen
I discovered Queen when I was an angsty teenager in high school. No one else I knew liked them. I listened to Killer Queen and I was hooked. Then, of course, Bohemian Rhapsody. But other songs filled my brainwaves during those years too: Save Me, Flash Gordon, Brighton Rock, It’s a Hard Life, Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy, Somebody to Love, The Prophet’s Song, Innuendo, Now I’m Here.
I think all these songs were on the Greatest Hits CD boxset I was gifted during my second year in high school.
The song that floored me, though, was Seven Seas of Rhye.
This single followed their first single Keep Yourself Alive, which failed to deliver on the charts. But, wow, what a song this is.
There are some songs that scream “Queen” and this is it. The lyrics bound in the mystic world built by Mercury, a glorious piano riff that is soon joined by a hard rock sound heavily inspired by Led Zeppelin.
It also displays Queen not quite at their peak, but close to it. And I feel these lyrics represent the band better than most of what else they wrote:
Begone with you short and shady senators
Give out the good, leave out the bad evil cries
I challenge the mighty titan and his troubadours
And with a smile
I’ll take you to the seven seas of Rhye
It feels so “Freddie Mercury” to challenge something as mighty as a titan. And yet he and Queen did, rising far above whatever a titan could possibly attain.
I listened to this song countless times (like I listened to all Queen songs). I even remember it playing on the CD player while I was driving my date (both of us wearing purple)
in my purple vehicle to homecoming in my final year of high school.
It wasn’t fashionable to listen to Queen back then. I still don’t know if it is now. Adam Lambert certainly helped revive it. But when I claim that Queen are the greatest band of all time, you won’t hear me put forth Another One Bites the Dust as my example. I’ll probably put Seven Seas of Rhye there (or March of the Black Queen or Bohemian Rhapsody).
Fitzie’s track of the day, part two: Seven Seas of Rhye, by Queen
And now for your links:
Jack P-B ($$): “Are Spurs set for another ticket price hike? ‘Very soon, I won’t be able to come here any more’”
Dan KP: “Ange Postecoglou dismisses record against Man City and makes title claim”
BBC: “Mourinho v Turkish football - what is going on?”