Live at Wembley '86

by

Queen

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"Queen Live at Wembley" captures the band at its most lively, playing in front of 400,000 on July 11th and 12th in 1986. Supporting the music of their latest studio album "A Kind of Magic", Queen's 2 performances at Wembley were backed by outstanding visuals and a 160 feet wide stage (if you're looking for this, get the DVD). As a double live album, these performances stand up to any studio work done by Queen.

"One Vision" is an emphatic opener, with Brian May's heavy guitar and Mercury's powerful vocal driving the song the whole way. "Tie Your Mother Down" is performed in the same vain, as Queen quickly established a heavy rock sound early in this concert. Queen then assembles into a few short, excellent performances of two 70s classics ("In The Lap Of The Gods...Revisted" and "Seven Seas of Rhye) and the hard hitter off "The Works" album "Tear it Up". "A Kind Of Magic" is an excellent, extended live version and "Another One Bites The Dust" has strong energy. "Under Pressure" has one of Mercury's best vocals from the show. "I Want To Break Free" is altered from its studio counterpart to have May playing the synth sections and creates an entirely new sound. The "Brighton Rock Solo" is a 9 minute electrifying, raunchy guitar performance from May. "Now I'm Here" is excellent too, and equally heavy.

The acoustic tunes from the show are just as valuable, with Mercury bringing us down to earth in "Love Of My Life". Brian and Freddie follow this with another moving tune "Is This The World We Created...". The medley of tunes is a nice ode to some oldie tunes. "Hammer To Fall" is another good rocker, and Roger Taylor makes this one with his backing vocals. "Radio Ga Ga" builds amazing crowd energy, and that helps for a great transition to the closing of the show.

Overall, Queen gave two of their most astounding, heavy and beautiful shows at Wembley in 86 and it's all captured in this double album. For the visual aspect of the show, check out the DVD. Currently, there is alot of controversy surrounding the touring of Queen and Paul Rodgers. If you have some kind of problem with this new band, then check out this great live release, Queen Live at the Bowl, or Live Killers. Highly recommended.

I have been a huge QUEEN fan since seeing them back in 1974...and another 7 times from 1974-77....I was lucky enough to grab a bootleg album on vinyl of Hammersmith Odeon Christmastime 1975....which was obviously a soundboard copy made for FM radio broadcast...I have since remastered the album and burned it to CD...as I exhausted my patience waiting for the record industry to release it in an official capacity....I have listened to LIVE BOOTLEG....WEMBLY. (both these official releases were lame and made a joke of the band) .and a couple of live shows I have viewed online....the funny thing is....QUEEN was never as good as they were back in Christmas 1975....I caught them in Feb 1976...at the Chicago Auditorium Theatre....which was the perfect setting for this particular tour....This was QUEEN at their peak...in their prime..surging with power and class. I would hope their management would want their legacy to live in a product that would show them in their element...back when they were riding the huge tidal wave of success...where everything they did had the audience and medias attention. The LIVE KILLERS and WEMBLEY shows came during a time when the bands fame had fallen off...and their albums would be more miss than hit.

The record company needs to get off its lazy ass and release that show....if they want to pay homage to a band who really shined in live performance...and did it at their peak...not years later...

They could come up with many excuses for not releasing it....they should have considered those excuses before releasing the trash they did with KILLERS and WEMBLEY