What's a batch of Queen reissues without some compilations? The same day of the latest catalogue overhaul in the U.K., Island will release Deep Cuts 1973-1976.
True enough to its name, it will feature album sides from the first five albums, with no bonus material. While some of the tunes are known even to casual fans ("Stone Cold Crazy," "Keep Yourself Alive"), it's a fine enough disc for anyone who wants to dip more of their foot into the waters of Queen's discography (or see how new remastering has treated the catalogue).
There's some interesting celebrity input on this set: Queen members Brian May and Roger Taylor put the track list together with Taylor Hawkins of The Foo Fighters, and liner notes were written by British comedian Rhys Thomas, a longtime fan who's actually produced several of Queen's DVDs over the past few years.
Another interesting fact in the press release for Deep Cuts is the dates for the next two batches of reissues: June 13 and September 5. Mark your calendars appropriately.
And while we're at it, here's some more Queen clean-up for you:
- Maybe others were confused about this - I know I was - but these reissues look like they'll have two forms in the U.K. - straight single-disc remasters and double-disc deluxe editions. The latter sets will be the ones with bonus tracks, which is good to know albeit kind of wasteful (seriously, five or six bonus tracks on CD?).
- It's also worth noting, fresh off MusicTAP's Twitter feed, that Hollywood Records has Greatest Hits II slated for an April 19 release in the U.S. Maybe...?
The track list for this new disc is after the jump.
Queen, Deep Cuts 1973-1976 (Island/UMe (U.K.), 2011)
- Ogre Battle
- Stone Cold Crazy
- My Fairy King
- I'm in Love with My Car
- Keep Yourself Alive
- Long Away
- The Millionaire Waltz
- '39
- Tenement Funster
- Flick of the Wrist
- Lily of the Valley
- Good Company
- The March of the Black Queen
- In the Lap of the Gods...Revisited
Tracks 1 and 13 from Queen II (EMI, 1974)
Tracks 2, 9-11 and 14 from Sheer Heart Attack (EMI, 1974)
Tracks 3 and 5 from Queen (EMI, 1973)
Tracks 4, 8 and 12 from A Night at the Opera (EMI, 1975)
Tracks 6-7 from A Day at the Races (EMI, 1976)
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The reissues will be an iTunes "exclusive." Somewhere (iTunes?) I read that the downloads will have bonus features-additional photos and the like that will not be available in the cd packaging. No mention if the exclusivity agreement is similar to the Duran Duran deal, that was exclusive to iTunes for a while, then released to more tradition channels. It would be interesting to compare sales through the various Amazon channels/eBay, vs iTunes download.
Good choices. Interesting to see tracks 3, 4, and 5 of Sheer Heart Attack (which run into each other) are here in sequence.
I had theorized that there would be two more batches of five albums each (my lineup had the Flash Gordon soundtrack in the third). The only question is: what about the live albums? There are five of them, not counting At the Beeb.
This looks like a good compilation. I think I will add it to my preorder with the deluxe editions. I think Universal is doing a great job with these deluxe editions. I just received the Thin Lizzy reissues which are fantastic aside from a couple of track listing errors. I also got the deluxe edition of Rainbow's Down To Earth which is so much better than the 1999 single disc remaster. I am now awaiting the Rainbow Rising and Black Sabbath Dehumanizer deluxe editions.