Queen
were straining at the boundaries of hard rock and heavy metal on
Sheer Heart Attack
, but they broke down all the barricades on
A Night at the Opera
, a self-consciously ridiculous and overblown hard rock masterpiece. Using the multi-layered guitars of its predecessor as a foundation,
encompasses metal (
"Death on Two Legs,"
"Sweet Lady"
), pop (the lovely, shimmering
"You're My Best Friend"
), campy British music hall (
"Lazing on a Sunday Afternoon,"
"Seaside Rendezvous"
), and mystical prog rock (
"'39,"
"The Prophet's Song"
), eventually bringing it all together on the pseudo-operatic
"Bohemian Rhapsody."
In short, it's a lot like
's own version of
Led Zeppelin IV
, but where
Zep
find dark menace in bombast,
celebrate their own pomposity. No one in the band takes anything too seriously, otherwise the arrangements wouldn't be as ludicrously exaggerated as they are. But the appeal -- and the influence -- of
is in its detailed, meticulous productions. It's prog rock with a sense of humor as well as dynamics, and
never bettered their approach anywhere else. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine