News of the World (album)
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| Studio album by Queen | ||||
| Released | 28 October 1977 | |||
| Recorded | July – September 1977 | |||
| Studio | Sarm West Studios and Wessex Studios, London | |||
| Genre | Rock | |||
| Length | 39:30 | |||
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Cover sold in retailer Kmart's stores
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| Singles from News of the World | ||||
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| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |    |
| Chicago Tribune | |
| Encyclopedia of Popular Music | |
| Q | |
| Rolling Stone | |
| The Village Voice | C |
News of the World is the sixth studio album by the British rock band Queen, released on 28 October 1977 by EMI Records in the UK and by Elektra Records in the US. News of the World was the band's second album to be recorded at Sarm West and Wessex Studios, London, and engineered by Mike Stone, and was co-produced by the band and Stone. Containing the hit songs "We Will Rock You", "We Are the Champions" and "Spread Your Wings", it went 4x platinum in the United States, and achieved high certifications around the world, selling over 6 million copies. News of the World is Queen's highest selling studio album to date.
Having received some criticism that their first completely self-produced project, A Day at the Races, was a "boring" album, Queen decided to shift their musical focus towards the mainstream but remain as the producers of the next album.
After completing the A Day at the Races tour, the quartet re-entered the studio to begin work on their sixth studio offering in July 1977, enlisting Mike Stone as assistant producer at the Basing Street and Wessex Studios in London. They scaled down their complex arrangements and focused on a "rootsier" sound (as Brian May put it). However the staple of the Queen sound, multi-tracked harmonies and guitar orchestrations, still exist on this album, albeit a bit more subtly. News of the World shows Queen's songwriting less dominated by May and Freddie Mercury, with Roger Taylor and John Deacon composing two songs each. The group completed recording and production of the album two months later in September and released the album on 28 October 1977.
"We Will Rock You" (sample ) was released as the B-side of "We Are the Champions", and became one of Queen's biggest songs worldwide as a staple of arena and stadium sports. It was a conscious decision by Brian May to make the song simple and anthemic ("stomp, stomp, clap, pause" twice per 4/4 measure), so that their live audience could be more directly involved in the show. In the video for "We Will Rock You" and "Spread Your Wings", May used a copy of his guitar. He supposedly did not want to commit his Red Special to the weather, as the videos for these songs featured the band performing in the snow in Roger Taylor's garden.
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