This is the third studio album by Seattle rock band, Heart. Before Little Queen, Heart was in a bit of a dispute with their prior indie record label, Mushroom Records, as the band signed with the CBS Records owned, Portrait Records before their previous contract was up. In retaliation, Mushroom Records released Heart’s 2nd studio album, Magazine, a month before Little Queen was released, before Magazine was ready, angering Heart. Eventually, this dispute went to court, and Heart lost, as the Mushroom record deal still required two albums. Magazine was then re-released under Mushroom Records after Little Queen was released with Portrait. Heart ended up getting the last laugh, as Little Queen went triple platinum thanks to their megahit, Barracuda. Barracuda was written in the wake of a patronizing, National Enquirer tabloid-esque ad from Mushroom Records for Heart’s first album, Dreamboat Annie, with the caption “Heart's Wilson Sisters Confess: 'It Was Only Our First Time!”, and a Detroit radio promotor made the mistake of assuming that Ann and Nancy Wilson (who are sisters) were a couple. So, it was a diss to their old record label for that incident and the aforementioned dispute. Barracuda was a massive success, and is arguably, to this day, their most famous song. A perfect lead single for Little Queen.
What brought me to Little Queen was a cover I did for Barracuda. A good friend of mine asked me to sing Barracuda for one of his cover videos, so I did. He asked me to do more songs and I realized two things. First, that he really likes classic rock, but also these covers I did could be a tool for musical discovery. So on they went to my random wheel and this time, my friend got his wish from the Music Gods. Heart’s potential magnum opus and arguably most popular album would get the review treatment from me.
Little Queen started out strong enough, but then it just faded away. The one word I would use to describe this album is “disappointing”. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a fine album, but it had a 4-song run that was near perfect starting with Barracuda, then faltered hard. It did make a recovery, but nowhere near that 4 song run.
The problems start with production, in fact it’s in production where this album is the most inconsistent. As for positives, drums and acoustic guitars sound nice and clear most of the time. Bass is also up front in the mix. Effects are fine and they remind me of Rumours but a little more in the way of using stereo sound to its advantage. For most of the album, production is fine, but on Kick It Out and the title track in particular, the guitar mixing is atrocious. In fact, everyone in the band sounds like you’re listening to the music through earmuffs. It takes the bite out of these songs that desperately need bite to work. Sometimes, the vocals are fighting to be heard, but that is far less egregious than a song that is supposed to be powerful being completely undercut by bad production mistakes.
However, the composition of this album is fun, even if Heart wears their Zeppelin influences on their sleeves. The bass is given a shocking amount to do. Drums are a mainstay to this record. Synths are used incredibly well like on Sylvan song with the guitars shaping the synths’ sound. Electric guitars add a lot of force or they are delicate depending on the mood of the song. Acoustic guitars can be delicate or driving, also depending on the mood of the song. I especially like the use of higher note chords on acoustics for this album. It gives a lot of credence to the “travelling gypsy” vibe that Heart is going for here. Structure is pretty wonky to me though. Album structure is fine as there are some nice transitions such as Silvan Song and Dream of The Archer, but beyond that, this is one of the more haphazard collection of songs I’ve heard in a while. Song structure is more egregious at points, just jumping from one musical idea to another on songs like Trust Me Well. It really could use some cleaning up. I understand they’re trying to do something cool outside of the regular pop structure every once in a while, but these movements clang together in a way that I don’t care for.
Lyrics are fine, for the most part. Ann Wilson is very much channeling Robert Plant with her vocal performance, but this still feels very much like a unique performance, but more importantly a good strong one to add some oomph to these rock songs. Ann’s harmonies with her sister, Nancy, are great as well, perfectly complementing each other. The lyrics themselves are all over the place and there doesn’t seem to be much of a cohesive story to tell, but the individual songwriting is actually quite interesting. The songs reach from concrete and angry on Barracuda, to mystical on Dream of The Archer and to sweet on Cry To Me. While the individual songwriting is on point, this record lacks a unified aesthetic from a songwriting standpoint. There are so many different moods on this album that it’s hard to land on what this album’s truly about and that’s a big problem for me. Nevertheless, the songs are still for the most part enjoyable.
I thought this album was just Barracuda and I was wrong. There are a few good songs on here, but I was expecting more from this album based on Barracuda alone. Little Queen is fine, but it lacks an identity, and it just couldn’t keep my attention half the time, especially from the drop off in quality after those first four songs. However, on closer inspection, individual songs are the key to enjoying this album. It’s not the best classic rock album from its year (Pink Floyd’s Animals and Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours came out the same year, after all), but it is definitely serviceable and fun.
I’m giving this one a Decent 6/10.
FAVOURITE TRACKS: Barracuda, Love Alive, Sylvan Song, Dream of The Archer, Say Hello, Cry To Me, Go On Cry
LEAST FAVOURITE TRACK: Kick It Out
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