In recent years, the market has almost been flooded with Queen compilations. We’ve seen ‘Absolute Queen’, three volumes of ‘Deep Cuts’ and most recently ‘Queen Forever’ a collection of ballads with a couple of unreleased bits to tempt the die-hard fan.
The band really pleased fans when they issued the complete ‘Live At The Rainbow ’74’ show, a live set capturing the very early Queen on fire. This release has led to some speculation as to whether more live sets will be issued. We all know that excellent quality footage from Hammersmith 1975 and Hyde Park 1976 exists in the Queen vault, but some fans are currently speculating about an expanded reissue of the classic ‘Live Killers’ disc…
In 2014 UK rockers Crowsaw released ‘Smoke & Mirrors’, a blues-edged collection of songs which was well received in some quarters. For those expecting them to pick up where they left off and build upon their cult following, 2015’s ‘Karma’ may come as a bit of a surprise. Rethinking their game plan, the band have taken their melodic vocal and riff-based sound, dispensed with pretty much any Hendrix and Cry Of Love influences and heavied up the guitars about seventy percent. There’s a huge amount of rock at the core of the material – as is only natural – but all previous blues influences have been thrown out of the window in favour of channelling a defiant metallic crunch.