QUEEN "NEWS OF THE WORLD" (1977) by Geoffrey

Time changes a lot. When I first bought News of the World in 1991, I did so on the strengths of “We Will Rock You” and “We are the Champions.” Years later, I found those tracks so overplayed and so devoid of any real heart that it was difficult for me to appreciate the whole album; after all, they open the disc.

Now I’m beginning to rekindle interest in the tracks as well as the album as a whole as a gutsy response to punk. Too outlandish a theory? I don’t know. Consider how ornate and produced Queen’s A Day at the Races, the album preceding News of the World, was. It is literally dripping with affectations and genre explorations. News of the World, released when punk was in full swing opens with the minimalist “We Will Rock You,” the lyrics of which seem to reference Queen’s ability to out rock the “disgrace” of punk. Although “We Are the Champions” has more in common stylistically with earlier Queen pieces, it's lyrics recall the band’s rise from poor nobodies in the early 70s.

The rest of the album seems to more than bear out this theme. Outside of the authentic-sounding torch song, “My Melancholy Blues,” the record as a whole is leaner, rawer, and harder than Queen’s earlier records. Drummer Roger Taylor’s “Sheer Heart Attack,” which follows “Champions” seems another effort to take on punk, this time by outdoing them at their own game of extremely fast simple guitar riffs while seeming to mimic some of punk’s lyrical concerns. The churning “Fight From the Inside,” also by Taylor, seems to attack the bravura of punk and that the title of the song is the best method to affect change.

While the rest of the album doesn’t go on the attack in the same way, I think it’s notable that both “Spread Your Wings” and “Sleeping on the Sidewalk” tell the stories of working-class Joes in different ways, the latter making use of bluesy guitar playing that May rarely tries.

Outside of the ubiquitous opening salutes, I’ve never had an issue with much of the material on the rest of the album. Still, put in the context of a response to punk, the other songs on News of the World sound a lot fresher to my ears, harder, and ballsier. Given how uncool Queen was in 1977, News of the World feels like a damn bold move. It’s just too bad that the band blew their success on a follow-up album, Jazz, that reeked of rock star excess and did as much to undo whatever street cred News of the World had given them.