The classic Queen song Brian May can’t stand listening to: “The way it was mixed”
It seems that no matter how many years pass by, and as the world becomes a more inconsistent and scary place, the one thing you can always rely on is people’s love for Queen.
Ever since that band originally laid music on wax, there has been a mass of fans flocking to see what they might come up with next, and even after Freddie Mercury sadly passed away, fans have kept up with each band member’s solo venture and filled stadiums at reunion shows, so what is it about this band that people love so much?
The answer is obviously subjective depending on the listener, but if we’re playing the numbers game, a contributing factor is their unwavering approach when it comes to creativity, because nothing was ever off limits when it came to Queen and making music, if something felt impossible or if an idea seemed lost, the band would chip away at it painstakingly until their original idea (or a better version of it) was born.
Just look at Brian May and his entry point into rock. He played an old acoustic guitar, and then, when he decided he was going to start writing riffs and solos, employing distortion and churning out rock ‘n’ roll hits, he knew he had to get an electric guitar. No money? No problem. There was always a solution.
“I was desperate for a proper electric guitar, but there was no way we could afford it, so Dad and I started making one,” said May. “I was 17, and my dad was a great electronics engineer and a craftsman, so me and my dad set about making a guitar… I couldn’t afford a Stratocaster or a Gibson or whatever, so we thought, ‘We can make a guitar, and maybe we can make something that’s better than anyone’s ever made.’”
May’s attitude was reflected by the entire band, and the end result was a bunch of musicians who refused to bow down to anything. Whether that was during the writing process, recording in the studio, or pitching ideas to record labels, they stood by what they knew would be best for the band, and that resulted in one hell of a discography.
With this in mind, it’s interesting to learn that there was one exception to the rule, and it comes in the form of one of the band’s most loved songs, ‘Under Pressure’. Despite the fact that this is considered a classic by many who listen, Brian May remembers the recording process as one of the only times he’s ever bowed out of voicing his opinion. Given the track was put together during a tumultuous period for the band, paired with the bickering of David Bowie and Freddie Mercury, May knew it best not to voice his opinion at risk of making an already pretty bad situation a whole lot worse.
May recalled initially making the song, and it being a lot heavier than the version that we hear today. “[I]t was a pretty heaving backing track… It sounded like The Who. It sounded massively chord-driven,” he recalled. “And I was beaming… I remember saying to David, ‘Oh, it sounds like The Who, doesn’t it?’ He says, ‘Yeah, well it’s not going to sound like The Who by the time I’ve finished with it!’”
The guitarist was forced to do something he never usually did, and then was back out of the creative process. “I think it’s probably the only time in my career I bowed out, because I knew it was going to be a fight,” he concluded. “I never liked it, to be honest, the way it was mixed. But I do recognise that it works. It’s a point of view, and it’s done very well. And people love it.”
