worst album ever

I'm pretty sure that old lady with the All Access was Paul Stanley.

Why are we even discussing KISS in this thread, they are the best band with the best albums, so shut the fuck up.

definitely 'the game'. seeing freddie on the cover like that almost made me tear my own eyeballs out at the time.

the album had some truly terrible songs on it imo.

don't try suicide is embarrassing, and the guitar always made me think of 'the police'.

need your loving tonight is too sickly sweet, but i've always imagined the americans would've liked that one.

sail away sweet sister is another embarrassing song. also the comment made by brian 'to the sister i never had', is so cringe-worthy.

crazy little thing called love. although i've never cared for it, i do appreciate why so many liked it. plus it was one of the first solos i learnt how to play.

in saying all of that, there are good stuff on it too. the game and hot space are the only queen records i don't own. for years i thought that i shouldn't break the set, i need all the albums. however i then realized, 'who cares' if i don't have every album of theirs, whats the point in having a couple that never get played?

The Works for me, or A Kind of Magic, but I love Who Wants to Live Forever so that probably saves it from the last spot.

The Miracle, although Hot Space has grown to be less enjoyable over the years.

Here's my take - although I'm a Queen fan - I've heard loads of albums besides those 15 gems that we all adore (inc. Flash Gordon but not Cosmos, of course)...

As "albums", The Works & A Kind Of Magic are weak. Together they may have some of the greatest Queen tracks ever - but as albums, Queen just threw 'em together and packaged it off for the masses to buy....

Works:

The Classics: Radio Ga Ga, A Hard Life, I Want To Break Free & Hammer To Fall

You can argue that Keep Passing The Windows is a great album track that deserves some recognition.

The rest - F*I*L*L*E*R! - Tear It Up was the successor to I Go Crazy (in my opinion, since they sound the same), but both should have been B-Sides... Man On The Prowl was Freddie being selfish and keeping it off his album in favor of Made In Heaven which would have made The Works A LOT more interesting, Machines was horrible, just horrible, and finally we have Is This The World We Created - an ok track that doesn't really fit on The Works.

Magic:

The Classics: One Vision, A Kind Of Magic, Who Wants To Live Forever

Good Tracks: Princes Of The Universe & One Year Of Love

Throwaways: How Friends Will Be Friends ended up as a hit is beyond me - I can't stand it. Don't Lose Your Head and Gimme The Prize were written for a movie and have no business being on the album. Pain is So Close To Pleasure ranks as one of the worst recordings Queen have put out as a band (Machines should be pooled with that as well, actually),

My opinion is they should have shelved The Works and taken the better tracks and combine them with better songs on A Kind Of Magic and put out another classic album. Doing that, may have continued their success into the US.

Hot Space was not a bad album at all - it was a breath of fresh air - I think Queen should have built on it and continued the sound on their following album...but they shyed away and took a break instead, oh well.

The Works was one of the first Queen albums I bought after discovering the band. The local record store didn't have much of a selection and I was working from Classic Queen, which was the first Queen product I bought and made me want to dig deeper into this band's repertoire. It might well have been the second album I ever bought, after A Kind Of Magic. It was a matter of "Well, there a bunch of songs I know from *this* album, 'cause they're on Classic Queen. I'll take a chance!" Classic Queen being predominantly '80s material, that's where I started. The '70s albums were among the last ones I discovered. The '70s albums I was finding used on vinyl at garage sales and yard sales (everyone was dropping their records for CDs in the early '90s).

This may account for my view of The Works as a good album.

Is it mind-blowing? No, but certainly pretty good, if of its time. Always, I tend to view it as a harder rock album than it may have been in 1984, since I was listening to the Hollywood Records 1991 re-issue cassette, which ends not with "Is This The World We Created...?" but with "I Go Crazy" after it. IGC is, in my heart of hearts, part of the album, even though I know it was a B-side only. I still tend to think of non-album B-sides as extensions of their parent albums, like deleted scenes in a movie. I think it's easy to neglect the themes of the album, too, those of a loss of humanity, the over-abundance of machines and disconnect from the people and the world around us. The musical approach reflects this, with the band utilizing the very styles and machines the lyrics rail against. 

As for the worst Queen album? I think "worst" is an imprecise and loaded word. The album which engages me the least would be Flash Gordon. It's just hard to get into, mostly because I'm not a fan of the movie, per se. I do like "Flash" and "The Hero," and a few other tracks. I'd love to hear a full album without the movie dialogue and such.

I agree with the Flash Gordon being hard to get into... but it's a Soundtrack album - which shouldn't be ranked with the other 14... In fact, it's actually one of the better true-soundtrack albums ever-recorded... Mind you, not many bands do that sort of thing anymore... 

Also, many writers who critiqued the film agreed to skip the movie and listen to the soundtrack instead - since you were able to get the whole story through the dialogue and the engaging soundtrack written by the band in condensed form without having to waste time in watching the shoddy acting and not-so-special effects.

I, too, would love to hear a music only version of Flash Gordon - maybe we'll be so lucky for a break in the current convention of releasing the deluxe editions that we'll instead get a second disc of music-only rather than live versions of Flash, Vultan's Theme/Battle Theme , Flash, The Hero and Flash again? lol

i love the flash gordon album and love the fact that its got dialogue thru' it. i think the film itself is fantastic, very funny and camp.

I thought the movie was okay, but I only watched it because Queen were involved. I'm not really a fan, but I don't hate it or anything. I also don't hate the album, it's just hard for me to get into. I can't let myself go and imagine anything other than the film. Unlike the Highlander tracks, where I can picture whatever comes into my mind, not necessarily Highlander imagery. With Flash Gordon, all I imagine is Flash Gordon-y scenes, because of the dialogue. A dialogue-free alternative would allow the music to stand on its own, without being dependent on the film. I generally like soundtrack score albums, but most don't have dialogue throughout. For example, I'll pop on the Star Wars soundtrack, or Alien, and may picture bits of the movie with a few specific pieces, but usually my imagination wanders wherever it wants to go.

I thought the film was bad. Really bad. So bad it's wonderful!

a great soundtrack album is for the film 'bagdad cafe'[yes thats the way bagdad is spelt].                          there is a section on the album that does have dialogue, which i like as it helps me to relive the film. however most doesn't have dialogue.

i think it's a german art-house independant film, although it has english dialogue. hollywood legend jack palance is in it. its very good and very different.

http://au.movieposter.com/posters/archive/main/57/MPW-28513

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