One dream, one soul, one prize, one goal

Continuing my trip back through the 1986 album charts

31/08/86 : A Kind Of Magic - Queen

I'm sure I've heard this, but I have to admit I don't remember doing so - I'm expecting some fine singles and some fair to middling other tracks.

And first up, a couple of fine singles - "One Vision" (I'd forgotten how weirdly it starts and I'd never noticed he sings "gimme fried chicken" at the end) and the title track. And I think fair to middling is probably a fair reflection of most of what follows - it's not horrible, but it pretty much slid past me unnoticed, except for "Princes Of The Universe" which is just a mess. I'd also argue that "Friends Will Be Friends" is merely a fair to middling single, but I do like "Who Wants To Live Forever" - there's no doubt the other guys owe Freddie a huge debt for making it all as listenable as it is though. And what were they thinking with that album cover?

We're at #4 in the charts this week on their thirteenth week of a 57 week run, with it debuting at #1 and spending the first thirteen weeks in the top five. The rest of the top five were Now 7, Lionel Richie, Madonna and Chris de Burgh and the highest new entry was Status Quo (#7) - thank God I was spared that.

Wikipedia has a reasonable amount on the album (152 milliPeppers) and it tells us this is their twelfth album and it's the second "kinda soundtrack" album we've had recently (after this) because it's "based on the soundtrack to the film Highlander" which is a strange turn of phrase (and "One Vision" actually appeared in a different film, Iron Eagle). It was their first album since Live Aid and their last album supported by a tour, because Freddie became too ill after that. We are then given a track-by-track breakdown which I felt no need to read - although I did notice in passing that apparently Elaine Paige has done an album of Queen covers, so at least I know to avoid that in future. 

Back to this album, the critics were pretty scathing about it whilst also realising that anything they said would make no difference - AllMusic hit the nail on the head with "like every Queen record since Jazz, A Kind of Magic was a so-so album, cleverly loaded with two or three potential hit singles". And yes, it did well commercially making the top ten in quite a few countries, although it only made #1 here and in Argentina and it only got to #46 in the US.

"Customers also listened to" Freddie Mercury, Roger Taylor, Brian May and The Cross, with the latter being a Roger Taylor spin-off group - I'm quite happy to avoid all of them, thank you. As for this one, there was (for a change for them) nothing hateful on it, but away from the singles there unfortunately wasn't a lot that was any good.

24/08/86 - Not as bad as they'd have you believe
07/09/86 - Very smooth