Queen is king of 'best of' collections

I really have no idea as to whether or not Queen is considered one of those bands like The Beatles or Led Zeppelin that you're "required" to like if you call yourself a rock fan. I spent my formative years in Germany (where Queen was the only band you listened to), so I'm not entirely certain if fawning over Queen is akin to calling John Lennon or Tiny Tim your favorite artist. All I know for certain is that they must have more "Best of" records than any other band ever.\nIt's debatable if the fact that "I Want to Break Free" was recently used (and horribly spliced) in a Coca-Cola commercial is enough to warrant another Queen collection, but like it or not, it's here. Culling from 1992's Classic Queen and Greatest Hits, this new anthology will fulfill every casual fan's desires as it contains "Bohemian Rhapsody" and "We Will Rock You," whereas you used to have to buy two separate albums for such a luxury. Of course, if you want to hear that catchy song from the Coke C2 ad, you're going to have to look elsewhere -- "I Want to Break Free" isn't on it.\nThis collection mostly focuses on the songs that came out between their 1973 self-titled debut and 1980's The Game. Most of them are Brian May stadium rock anthems like "Now I'm Here;" also included (as to confirm that Queen did write more than "Bohemian Rhapsody" before the late '70s) are "Seven Seas of Rhye," "Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy," "Killer Queen" and a live version of "Tie Your Mother Down."\nYes, these are "essential" Queen hits, but that doesn't mean that their catalogue can be fully represented on an 80-minute CD. For fans that don't ignore their post-1980 work, it's disappointing that their late-'80s/early-'90s hits (songs like "A Kind of Magic," "Radio Ga Ga," "Headlong," to name a few) were ignored. I would have liked to see "Body Language" as well -- just because Queen bucked the anti-disco trend doesn't mean that legitimate hits from their albums should be left off. \nThese omissions are most likely a matter of space concerns (and the fact that they never managed to rekindle the success in America they had with Jazz and The Game), which might suggest that you'll never find a definitive Queen collection outside of owning all of their albums. Unfortunately, the more Best of, Greatest Hits, Classic Queen and Queen Rocks derivatives churned out by Hollywood Records, the less likely it is that someone will buy A Night at the Opera. For a band this diverse and prolific, it's a shame to see them snipped down to 25 rotating, radio-friendly "classic cuts"