The Cross - Most underrated band ever.

Sir GH wrote:

The first album was awful in its dancy nature (...) Power To Love, Life Changes, and Final Destination stick out to me.

Indeed, indeed, indeed !!

I gave "Shove It" another oportunity the other day and .... fuck, it's unlistenable !! I didn't remember it's so afwul ... was Roger listening too much rap music in those days?? or what ??

I save some details in Cowboys and Indians, Love Lies Bleeding and ... well, Heaven For Everyone for providing us Freddie. I still think the MIH version is a vast improvement of the original, though. 

The production of the album ruins it all ... Stand Up For Love could have been something but it remains there, in the middle of nowhere ....

Rog, Rog, Rog .... you´ll always be my fave band member ... but you should be punished for this album!

On the other hand .... you´re forgiven because I enjoy so much MBADTK and Blue Rock, and for that revisited version of Final Destination you did with Yoshiki ...aaaaaah, yes!! loving your drumming there!  
 

** sorry double post **

Absolutely right, the revisited version of Final Destination with Yoshiki is just sublime.







as to the earlier ref about The Cross NOT being an 'underrated' band because we have heard of them, has it occurred to you that NONE of us here would have heard of them if we were not Queen fans?



When I joined the Q fan club (for just a year) in 1990, I was SHOCKED to get my first magazine from the 'Queen, & The Cross Fan Club' and honestly thought I had joined some other fan club.



I went out and bought Shove it and Mad Bad on cassette straight away, and fell in love with them.



Had I not joined the club then, I would have NEVER heard of them till LAST year when I joined the forums.



That would have been a shame as I would have missed out on seeing Clayton at the 12 bar club in London in around '97, and chatting with him for a good half an hour as he packed up :)



(he is really short LOL).







The Cross rocked.

Well just these days I've been listening to Roger's verson with the Cross of the Heaven For Everyone, and though I don't know much about the band, it's far better than the MIH version. Great version.

MmP wrote:

Well just these days I've been listening to Roger's verson with the Cross of the Heaven For Everyone, and though I don't know much about the band, it's far better than the MIH version. Great version.

Completely agree with that. The MIH version is crap by comparison. However there IS a fan mix of the two, which is even better than the cross version. I will try to find a link.

Here is the link to the fan mixed Queen/Cross version put together.



It fetaures just Freddie on vox, it is NOT the 'duet' version.



I love this version because it retains the feel of the original version, but has some of the good RS parts from the MIH version, and has Roger's 'sit by my side' spoken part.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNgvmlYyIhE

MmP wrote:

Well just these days I've been listening to Roger's verson with the Cross of the Heaven For Everyone, and though I don't know much about the band, it's far better than the MIH version. Great version.

I like the Made In Heaven version more, but I like both.

aaah, i totally love The Cross! and i totally agree - v. underrated. 

i'm still not feeling Shove It though. ¬¬ but I love the rest. (:

No offence but to call the cross the most underrated band ever is touch too far in my eyes

Honestly, what does the Cross' version of Heaven For Everyone have that Queen's doesn't?  Besides Roger's vocal, of course... his delivery is great, but certainly no better than Freddie's.

The song just doesn't build like the Queen version does.  More guitars and a second vocal are introduced in the second chorus, and then it breaks down, followed by a grand instrumental section by Brian.  And then the song peaks before falling off.  The Cross' version, by comparison, pretty much stays at the same dynamic level throughout.  And the synth bass line sounds so bland (and dated) compared to John Deacon's simple yet very effective bass work, especially in the choruses.

It's a good song, but adding the other three Queen members made it a great song.  There's a reason why Queen are one of the greatest rock groups ever and The Cross aren't.  The four Queen members together were bigger than the sum of their parts.  Each brought something to the table, which is the express route to being able to consistently create great songs on every record.

Well The Cross was just fun I think it was in no means the most underrated band ever, but I think it was better then The Cosmos Rocks

Sir GH wrote:

Honestly, what does the Cross' version of Heaven For Everyone have that Queen's doesn't?  Besides Roger's vocal, of course... his delivery is great, but certainly no better than Freddie's.

The song just doesn't build like the Queen version does.  More guitars and a second vocal are introduced in the second chorus, and then it breaks down, followed by a grand instrumental section by Brian.  And then the song peaks before falling off.  The Cross' version, by comparison, pretty much stays at the same dynamic level throughout.  And the synth bass line sounds so bland (and dated) compared to John Deacon's simple yet very effective bass work, especially in the choruses.

It's a good song, but adding the other three Queen members made it a great song.  There's a reason why Queen are one of the greatest rock groups ever and The Cross aren't.  The four Queen members together were bigger than the sum of their parts.  Each brought something to the table, which is the express route to being able to consistently create great songs on every record.

Honestly it is merely a matter of opinion, right?



I love Queen to bits of course, and always have, and waited with excitement to hear MIH when I first bought if upon release, but frankly I was disappointed with all of the 'remakes' on the album - certainly of the songs I already knew.



I had know the Cross version for at least 5 years prior to it and that song was my favourite of all their songs (with FREDDIE on vox - not Roger) and while the Queen version may have more of a build up etc. that is not always what makes a great song. It is the 'feel' of it , the vibe - the originality of a song which determines ho wmuch you like it.



14 years later, I am STILL no happier with the MIH remakes. I feel that Brian's 'accoustic' effect sound is horrible on those songs - though the Lead sound is of course delicious as ever. This is why I prefer the mix I posted a link to above - it maintains the 'feel' of the original, yet includes the GOOD bit's of the Queen remale.



I recently only heard the original version of 'My Life Hs Been Saved' for the first time, and even prefer THAT to the MIH version. In fact MIH is the only Queen album where I skip more than one song. I love Mother Love, YDFM, A Winter's Tale, Let Me Live and both Beautiful Days but as for the rest, I much prefer the originals or have not heard the originals (Let Me Live etc.). Yes even IWBTLY ;)

The Cross were a good band but the only reason they were even on a label is because of Roger.
They were very powerful live and fun to watch but had none of the sheer power,enbergy and entertainment factor that Queen had

A great pub band in all honesty, had Roger not fronted them they would not have got past the Rose & Crown
That being said I loved their gigs, but I doubt I would have gone if Roger was not performing

bhm0129ad wrote:































Honestly it is merely a matter of opinion, right?

Yep... to each their own!

Except perhaps for this...

Yes even IWBTLY ;)

Rating dated 80s synth pop over the Queen version?  You are one of a select few.. :-)

Sir GH wrote:

bhm0129ad wrote:







































































Honestly it is merely a matter of opinion, right?

Yep... to each their own!

Except perhaps for this...

Yes even IWBTLY ;)

Rating dated 80s synth pop over the Queen version?  You are one of a select few.. :-)

Still only a matter of opinion, perhaps interspersed (for me) with an amount of nostalgia (being that I knew the Mr. Bag Guy album before any full Queen album back in '85) and a bit of not really liking Queen's particular take on the song.







It is not 'rating 80's synth pop' over Queen, but just having a preference for the song in the way Freddie (the composer and original artist) had left it. It was not a demo like some of the other MIH tracks, it was a fully fledged song with a video and everything. I know you know all that, but I am just saying.







When it comes down to it, there are very very few covers of ANY songs that I prefer to the originals.







Point in case, I THOUGHT that Elkie Brookes (70s) did the original of Lilac Wine - a song I simply adore by Jeff Buckley (90s), and I thought his version was better, but I recently discovered what I now believe to be the original by Eartha Kitt in 1953, and I actually think her's is as good as Jeff's (so maybe even he did not improve on an original).















If I am one of a select few, then so be it LOL.