Description
Used, 2nd hand. Burned right side of the sleeves, THEREFORE the cover is in BAD condition. That’s why the price is so low, it is because of the bad picture sleeve. Please take that into consideration before buying. If you want both the covers and the vinyl to be perfect PLEASE don’t buy this record, you will definitely be disappointed.
*QUEEN* Flash Gordon – 1980 UK EMI LP EMC 3351
QUEEN : Flash Gordon – Original Soundtrack Music
First pressing UK vinyl LP album released in 1980 on the EMI label, catalogue number EMC 3351 with die-cut printed inner sleeve.
Format : Vinyl LP Album
Label : EMI
Cat. No. : EMC 3351
Matrix Nos. : A-3 / B-4
Released : 1980
Country : UK
Other : First pressing / die-cut inner sleeve
vinyl appears to be in very near mint condition (visual inspection ONLY)
Flash Gordon is the ninth studio album of British rock band Queen, and is one of the two movie soundtracks Queen produced, along with Highlander. It is the album to the science fiction movie Flash Gordon, and features lyrics on only two tracks. The track Flashs Theme was the only single to be released from the album, under the title Flash. The album reached number 10 in the UK charts and number 42 in the United States.
There are two versions of the opening track. The album version (Flashs Theme) is the start to the movie, with all the dialogue from the first scene. The single version (Flash) features parts of the dialogue taken from various parts of the movie. This version was also included on the Greatest Hits compilation from 1981. The single reached number one in Austria. The track is noted for its pounding, repetitive bassline and the camp humour of the snippets of dialogue from the movie that it contains.
All but two of the tracks on the album (Flashs Theme and The Hero) are instrumentals. The album makes extensive use of synthesisers, which Queen had employed for the first time on their previous album, The Game, although to a much lesser extent.
Side A of the album, except for the opening track and Brian Mays Football Fight (also chosen as a B-side for the Flash single), contains mostly synthesizer, vocal, guitar and drum soundscapes (accompanied by the movie dialogues), written and performed by Mercury, Taylor and Deacon. Side B, while starting with similar compositions by Deacon and Taylor, develops for the most part around the full-band rockier themes, mainly Flashs Theme and Battle Theme, composed and arranged by Brian May. The last track, “The Hero”, while an individual song, reprises both motifs. Different takes of the song were used for the end credits in the film and for the album finale.
The album contains mostly the score performed by Queen, and only two short fragments of Howard Blakes orchestral score (appearing in The Kiss and The Hero).
Side one
No. Title Writer(s) Length
1. “Flashs Theme” Brian May 3:30
2. “In the Space Capsule (The Love Theme)” Roger Taylor 2:21
3. “Mings Theme (In the Court of Ming the Merciless)” Freddie Mercury 2:53
4. “The Ring (Hypnotic Seduction of Dale)” Mercury 0:58
5. “Football Fight” Mercury 1:29
6. “In the Death Cell (Love Theme Reprise)” Taylor 2:26
7. “Execution of Flash” John Deacon 0:43
8. “The Kiss (Aura Resurrects Flash)” Mercury 1:47
Side two
No. Title Writer(s) Length
1. “Arboria (Planet of the Tree Men)” Deacon 1:41
2. “Escape from the Swamp” Taylor 1:44
3. “Flash to the Rescue” May 2:47
4. “Vultans Theme (Attack of the Hawk Men)” Mercury 1:15
5. “Battle Theme” May 2:20
6. “The Wedding March” (“Bridal Chorus”) Richard Wagner, May 0:56
7. “Marriage of Dale and Ming (And Flash Approaching)” May, Taylor 2:04
8. “Crash Dive on Mingo City” May 1:01
9. “Flashs Theme Reprise (Victory Celebrations)” May 1:39
10. “The Hero” May 3:31
To truly quantify the gloriousness of the soundtrack to the 1980 sci-fi flick Flash Gordon, you’ve got to understand just how terrific a choice it was to have Queen (that great near parody of rock excess that still somehow managed to make heads bang) create the music for such a cornball movie. This was a band that wrote bouncy songs about bohemian rhapsodies and fat-bottomed girls, so naturally it would have no problem scoring a film about the adventures of a dim Jets quarterback, a hottie named Dale, and requisite mad scientist Hans Zarkov, all trapped in the lava-lamp landscape of the planet Mongo.
From the pounding theme song (”Flash! Ah-aaah…he save every one of us!”) and the Arabian synth wa-wa of ”The Ring (Hypnotic Seduction of Dale)” to the arena-rock-ready ”Battle Theme,” the music is so goofily muscular, its like someone gave super intelligent space monkeys a bushel of PCP-laced bananas and let ’em loose in a room of guitars and keyboards. Better yet: The films blissfully inane dialogue is mixed in with the music everything from Zarkovs (Fiddler on the Roofs Topol) rantings to bald baddie Ming the Merciless’ (Max von Sydow) tyrannical marriage vows (”Do you promise to use her as you will…not to blast her into space?”). This album is such a fully rendered piece of art it rests on the same aural plane as great opera: You can take as much from listening as you can from seeing, maybe more. You see, dear friends, its like you never have to watch the movie again! And if loving this makes me guilty, then I don’t wanna be innocent.
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