Do you consider Queen one of the greatest rock bands of all time?

[WildRanger]

Yes or No?

[ChuckSteak]

I haven't explored their discography enough to answer that. I abstain.

[ganpondorodf]

Sure do. Not a massive fan, but they have so many iconic songs it's hard to say no

[Lowdz]

Absolutely. Whilst I don’t like everything they’ve done, they had their own sound, pushed the limits and had Freddie Mercury. 

You could never not recognise it was Queen, no matter what style of music they were playing.

[MirrorMask]

I consider Queen like the "National team" of music. A band that can bring everyone together. There's something for everyone: casual listeners, pop fans, prog rock fans, heavy stuff fans. And I think that 99,9% of people acknowledge Freddie was one of the greatest singers ever.

[TAC]

I would never behoove Queen of any accolade thrown their way. But they had zero effect on me and my musical life.

[Adami]

While they have a considerable amount of fluffy meh songs, they have SO many great songs that it's hard to not consider them one of the greatest.

[Cool Chris]

And I think that 99,9% of people acknowledge Freddie was one of the greatest singers ever.

You mean 99.9% of rock fans right? My wife might know who Freddie Mercury is. Let me check.

Later... she says "Is he the singer with the bad teeth?" There is no way any high % of people think he is one of the best singers ever.

I have a hard time with Queen. They have so many great songs, and so many.... crappy ones. One of the greatest rock bands of all time shouldn't have so many duds in their catalog.

I think their greatness lies in more than just their music. They put on a stellar show, they are (unless there is juice on them I am unaware of) all upright, honorable people (in an industry not usually known for upstanding individuals), and they did everything the way they wanted to do it.

So basically, I am the other side of the coin from Adami.

[ganpondorodf]

And I think that 99,9% of people acknowledge Freddie was one of the greatest singers ever.

You mean 99.9% of rock fans right? My wife might know who Freddie Mercury is. Let me check.

Later... she says "Is he the singer with the bad teeth?" There is no way any high % of people think he is one of the best singers ever.

I have a hard time with Queen. They have so many great songs, and so many.... crappy ones. One of the greatest rock bands of all time shouldn't have so many duds in their catalog.

I think their greatness lies in more than just their music. They put on a stellar show, they are (unless there is juice on them I am unaware of) all upright, honorable people (in an industry not usually known for upstanding individuals), and they did everything the way they wanted to do it.

So basically, I am the other side of the coin from Adami.

All fair points! (Apart from the upstanding individuals thing; Brian May seems to be taking the biggest dump on his own band's legacy imaginable)

Curious though, who would you consider to be some of the best rock bands of all time?

[WildRanger]

And I think that 99,9% of people acknowledge Freddie was one of the greatest singers ever.

I have a hard time with Queen. They have so many great songs, and so many.... crappy ones. One of the greatest rock bands of all time shouldn't have so many duds in their catalog.

This could be also said for Rolling Stones. They are widely considered one of the greatest, biggest and most legendary and iconic bands in rock history. And I find their discography very inconsistent, esp. their post-70's stuff are mostly lame, more than a half of their discography is not very good. But during the classic period they put out huge rock'n'roll classics as Aftermath, Beggars Banquet, Let it Bleed, Sticky Fingers, Exile on Main St. and Some Girls and for these 6 albums alone they deserve to be called one of the biggest rock legends IMO. 

[Ninjabait]

One of the greatest rock bands of all time shouldn't have so many duds in their catalog.

I think every band that could even remotely be considered one of the greatest rock bands has discographies filled with duds. The Rolling Stones, Yes, Rush, Pink Floyd, Queen, The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, U2, Metallica, Coldplay, Radiohead, The Doors, Nirvana, AC/DC, The Eagles, Green Day, etc. All of them have some duds. Heck, even Beethoven, almost universally considered the greatest composer ever wrote a LOT of crap. A lot. It's not even funny how many mediocre pieces of music Beethoven wrote. We just remember the great pieces of music he wrote instead, since that's what's impacted people over the past 200 odd years.

That said, Queen is without a doubt one of the greatest rock bands ever. I don't even have to think about voting yes.

[ReaperKK]

Definitely one of the greatest, the sheer amount of hits they have is incredible. I remember going through their discography a while back and just remember hit after hit.

[Cool Chris]

One of the greatest rock bands of all time shouldn't have so many duds in their catalog.

I think every band that could even remotely be considered one of the greatest rock bands has discographies filled with duds.

And this is where my struggle comes in, because this is wholly accurate. Which is why I tried to look at the bigger picture of Queen's career, which has me leaning more toward 'Yes' than when I first posted in this thread.

[Lowdz]

And I think that 99,9% of people acknowledge Freddie was one of the greatest singers ever.

I have a hard time with Queen. They have so many great songs, and so many.... crappy ones. One of the greatest rock bands of all time shouldn't have so many duds in their catalog.

This could be also said for Rolling Stones. They are widely considered one of the greatest, biggest and most legendary and iconic bands in rock history. And I find their discography very inconsistent, esp. their post-70's stuff are mostly lame, more than a half of their discography is not very good. But during the classic period they put out huge rock'n'roll classics as Aftermath, Beggars Banquet, Let it Bleed, Sticky Fingers, Exile on Main St. and Some Girls and for these 6 albums alone they deserve to be called one of the biggest rock legends IMO.

Apart from Satisfaction, and a song in the 80s tha5 was on mtv a lot, I haven’t heard any Rolling Stones songs.

[ZirconBlue]

Apart from Satisfaction, and a song in the 80s tha5 was on mtv a lot, I haven’t heard any Rolling Stones songs.

How is that possible?  Just from film and tv, you should have been exposed to quite a bit of their music.

[MirrorMask]

Apart from Satisfaction, and a song in the 80s tha5 was on mtv a lot, I haven’t heard any Rolling Stones songs.

How is that possible?  Just from film and tv, you should have been exposed to quite a bit of their music.

Now that I think of it, I'm vastly ignorant about Rolling Stones. I know Satisfaction, Angie, Paint it Black, and that there was a video with them walking as giants in the streets and... that's it. Oh, I also know there's a song called Jumping Jack Flash. Probably Brown Sugar is also from them (didn't Gn'R cover it?)

(Speaking of Paint it Black, there's an awesome version in Westworld, and an excellent orchestral cover by Rage)

[TAC]

No way. I don't believe either of you guys.

[bl5150]

Apart from Satisfaction, and a song in the 80s tha5 was on mtv a lot, I haven’t heard any Rolling Stones songs.

I would be amazed if you haven't heard Start Me Up and you probably heard that cool cover of Paint It Black I played on my podcast 

But I am similar - I would probably know a dozen or so Stones songs (if I heard them) but could only name 4 or 5 off the top of my head.

And also like a few above Queen had very little influence on my life.  I am a big fan of maybe half a dozen songs.  But having said that I would still consider them one of the greats.

[Spiritus]

Apart from Satisfaction, and a song in the 80s tha5 was on mtv a lot, I haven’t heard any Rolling Stones songs.

How is that possible?  Just from film and tv, you should have been exposed to quite a bit of their music.

I shit you not I too only know that one off the top of my head. I'm sure if I were played their hits I would recognize them but not from memory.

[jammindude]

See and I really think the Stones are the most grossly overrated band of all time for exactly the reasons everyone has mentioned. 

They were dynamite in the 60s and early 70s....then really averagely inconsistent through the mid 70s and early 80s...and then completely irrelevant ever since.   Not deserving of the "greatest of all time" label that everyone showers them with.   They just get an achievement award for having outlasted all their contemporaries. 

[King Postwhore]

I may not be the biggest Stones fan but their bluesy, gritty rock was pioneering.  After the Beatles they lead the British invasion.

[jammindude]

And as has been said, it's not that every band doesn't have *A* dud.  It's that many of these bands have *MANY* duds.   Rush has 1 or 2 duds in 40 years.   The Stones have almost half their output.   Led Zeppelin has 1 or 2 duds (some would say only Coda, and there's a question of whether that should even count as an official Led Zeppelin album and not just a collection of B-sides), but 80% of their output was "out of the park" good. 

Queen is tougher for me.   They don't have as many duds as the Stones do, but they certainly have a high amount of 'meh' material.  But I would say their first 8 albums probably qualify them as one of the greatest of all time.   That is a pretty amazing 8 album run.  It gets spotty after that, but most of it is good enough to qualify as at least "really good". 

[King Postwhore]

It's easy.  When people saw Queen as duds they look at just the US numbers. While they waned in the US, other countries they were still killing it. 

[Architeuthis]

No

[TioJorge]

I voted no but for a pretty specific (and probably stupid) reason. I think "greatest" is way too vague to just blanket state the term to the band. They're one of the most world renown, they did a whole lot for the music industry entirely, and they brought a lot of people together for a multitude of reasons. But to me, none of that even relates or comes close to encompassing the idea of being a "great rock band". To me, they were a lot more than just a band and when I did listen to them back when I was first exploring and finding my musical niche. It was a lot less about the music itself and a lot more about what they had to say and about the people of the band, Freddie especially (obviously and popularly).

So greatest rock band? Eh. Most influential and important of the time (and perhaps even today, though that is fading)? I'd vote yes to that. It may be a bit semantic but I think it's an important distinction to make when discussing Queen. Which...may be obvious that I've discussed before, with friends...under...the influence of...things. Now totally sober, my once two-page retort is hardly two paragraphs. Oh how the times have changed, and I with them.

[Stadler]

Apart from Satisfaction, and a song in the 80s tha5 was on mtv a lot, I haven’t heard any Rolling Stones songs.

How is that possible?  Just from film and tv, you should have been exposed to quite a bit of their music.

Now that I think of it, I'm vastly ignorant about Rolling Stones. I know Satisfaction, Angie, Paint it Black, and that there was a video with them walking as giants in the streets and... that's it. Oh, I also know there's a song called Jumping Jack Flash. Probably Brown Sugar is also from them (didn't Gn'R cover it?)

(Speaking of Paint it Black, there's an awesome version in Westworld, and an excellent orchestral cover by Rage)

I would bet my Stones collection (I have every studio album on CD and most of the live stuff, so it's a pretty significant stack) that "Sympathy For The Devil", "You Can't Always Get What You Want", or "Gimme Shelter" have been heard too, on a soundtrack, in a commercial, in a TV show, as a bumper on a sports broadcast... somewhere.

Look, I get the hate for the Stones - I don't share it, but I get it - but the Stones are like Queen in that sense; you either get the bigger picture or you don't.  It's not about liking "Radio Gaga" or "Some Girls".   But those bands find themselves - it's earned, if you ask me - on the world's biggest stages for a reason.   If you're old enough to have seen Live Aid in real time, you count Queen as one of the greatest rock bands in the world even if you DON'T like the "Lazing on a Sunday Afternoon" stuff, or think Freddie a poofter.   They DESTROYED Live Aid, in a way that isn't replicable in video.  You either experienced it or you didn't.   

Same with the Stones; I was a little young for them, but they were THE BAND that bridged the promise and whimsy of the 60's and the psychedelia (which they couldn't really get their arms around; Jagger is a lot of things but he doesn't have the psyche for a "Summer of Love" mindset) and the dark of the early 70's Vietnam-era.   That was when they switched from being a follower - of their good friends the Beatles - to leaders, albeit, leaders into the abyss. 

As for Queen, I agree with most of the comments here.   Great band, yes (though slightly overrated in the sense that they were a little too weird to really be in touch with the zeitgeist, like the greatest bands usually are).   I too think that Brian is shitting on the legacy to a degree.   I also think Freddie is the greatest singer of the modern rock era. 

[WildRanger]

I'm glad that most people here voted YES.

[Nekov]

Yes they are. When people talk of duds I think of Hot Space which is a horrible album, and even that one has one of their greatest songs. The rest of their material is mostly great, some goods and maybe 1 or 2 average records.

[MirrorMask]

Apart from Satisfaction, and a song in the 80s tha5 was on mtv a lot, I haven’t heard any Rolling Stones songs.

How is that possible?  Just from film and tv, you should have been exposed to quite a bit of their music.

Now that I think of it, I'm vastly ignorant about Rolling Stones. I know Satisfaction, Angie, Paint it Black, and that there was a video with them walking as giants in the streets and... that's it. Oh, I also know there's a song called Jumping Jack Flash. Probably Brown Sugar is also from them (didn't Gn'R cover it?)

(Speaking of Paint it Black, there's an awesome version in Westworld, and an excellent orchestral cover by Rage)

I would bet my Stones collection (I have every studio album on CD and most of the live stuff, so it's a pretty significant stack) that "Sympathy For The Devil", "You Can't Always Get What You Want", or "Gimme Shelter" have been heard too, on a soundtrack, in a commercial, in a TV show, as a bumper on a sports broadcast... somewhere.

I forgot about Sympathy for the Devil.

If I know the other two songs you mentioned... I don't know that I know them, or that I heard them. I should try and check them out.

[Silent Man]

Not at all IMO. They did some memorable songs (many singalong songs), but their fame rised after FM died. What defines a great rock band in my book is a band where alle members stand out due to their musicianship and personalities, which Queen did not IMO. Who'll ever remember the drummer and the bassplayer from Queen? Can you recognize their styles in a test? I guess the answer is no, because these two alone could have been replaced by anybody else, they were totally anonymous. Take another band: The Who. Here you can talk about one of the greatest rock bands of all time. Each member had a stand out personality with musical gifts which influenced the music in their time. So to not misuse the concept, I'd say Queen was not one of the greatest rock bands of all time. I'd mention Led Zeppelin, ELP, Dream Theater (of course), and many others - but not Queen.

[King Postwhore]

Not at all IMO. They did some memorable songs (many singalong songs), but their fame rised after FM died. What defines a great rock band in my book is a band where alle members stand out due to their musicianship and personalities, which Queen did not IMO. Who'll ever remember the drummer and the bassplayer from Queen? Can you recognize their styles in a test? I guess the answer is no, because these two alone could have been replaced by anybody else, they were totally anonymous. Take another band: The Who. Here you can talk about one of the greatest rock bands of all time. Each member had a stand out personality with musical gifts which influenced the music in their time. So to not misuse the concept, I'd say Queen was not one of the greatest rock bands of all time. I'd mention Led Zeppelin, ELP, Dream Theater (of course), and many others - but not Queen.

Completely disagree. Everyone in Queen wrote a #1 hit.  they were also bigger before the fall of FM radio.  You are way off there.  John deacon was well known as a great bass player in the 70's and 80's.  Roger Taylor was also a singer in the band. He sang lead on a few songs.

Styles you say?  Brian May's guitar tone it one of the most recognizable sounds around.  His layering of guitars is legendary.   Everybody knows the baseline to Another One Bites the Dust written by John Deacon.  Queen was well known for their musicianship. 

[Nekov]

Take another band: The Who. Here you can talk about one of the greatest rock bands of all time. Each member had a stand out personality with musical gifts which influenced the music in their time.

Really? Who was the bassist? What made him so special? What made the singer so special? And on the other hand, I could argue that John Deacon created one of the simplest and yet most recognizable bass lines in Under Pressure, it's nor all about flare and technical prowess. Sometimes simpler things are better

Edit: Ninja'd by the king

[King Postwhore]

Well John Entwistle was well known and influential to many bass players including Geddy Lee but what the SM said is false.

[Silent Man]

It's all a matter of opinions. If someone doesn't know John Entwistle or Roger Daltry, I'll be questioning their knowledge about rock music. Queen was not a great rock band, but a great singalong band, perfectly suited for drunks on a Saturday evening in the pub. I agree FM and BM stood out, the other two were nothing (even if they wrote songs).

[King Postwhore]

How old are you SM?