Queen remains dominated by Freddie Mercury’s outsized personality, with only Brian May’s red guitar to give him the smallest of challenges in the band’s iconography. There is, it seems, barely any room for Roger Taylor — who, while still providing Queen’s steady pulse, also made a number of important other contributions along the way.
Best, an 18-song compilation of solo high points that’s finally arriving in the U.S., makes the case in its own subtle way — beginning with “I Wanna Testify,” Taylor’s 1977 solo debut. A triumph of conception, it includes a layered vocal backing on par with anything Queen did in their Roy Thomas Baker-produced hey day, and a series of eruptive electric asides.
Only Taylor’s gruff approach with the lyric gives anything away. Otherwise, this could just as easily have been an here-to-fore undiscovered track from News of the World. And so it goes through Best, with moments both large and small that reflect and then amplify Queen success stories like “A Kind of Magic” and “Radio Ga Ga,” a pair of charttopping hits composed by Taylor. He also co-wrote “One Vision” “Under Pressure.”
The collection, due in America on October 28, 2014 via Omnivore, advances a huge box set that collects everything Roger Taylor has done outside of Queen. The Lot stretches to 12 CDs and a DVD, packaged with a hardbound 64-page book — and covers everything from “I Wanna Testify” through his 2013 release Fun on Earth, including the later-released bonus material — and his trio of albums with Cross.
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