UMUR
"The Game" is the 8th full-length studio album by UK rock act Queen. The album was released through EMI/Parlophone in Europe and Elektra/Hollywood in the USA in June 1980. "The Game" was a great commercial success upon release and generally received favorable reviews too.
Compared to "Jazz (1978)", "The Game" is quite different sounding. While the former featured quite a few hard rock tracks with edgy riffing, the latter is more of a sophisticated pop/rock album. Of course such a simple description of Queen´s music is somewhat ridiculous, as they are eclectic beyond eclectic and their music features so many different elements, moods and atmospheres. That´s also the case with "The Game", but it´s like they´ve toned down their most wild theatrical/progressive ideas and gone with a more commercial mainstream sound on this one. It´s starts out pretty interesting with "Play the Game" and "Another One Bites the Dust" is of course also a "classic", but there are not many highlights on the album. In fact I´d say that even though the musiciaship as usual are on a high level and the sound production and songwriting professional, most of the tracks on the album come off unremarkable to my ears. Sure "The Game" is a decent listen and there´s nothing offensively bad on the album, but I´m not feeling Queen´s usual burning passion on this one.
"The Game" is a step down from anything Queen released in the seventies. The few glimpses of excellence on the album are not enough to for me to rate "The Game" higher than 3 star (60%) rating.