by Georg Purvis
The first signs of a new Queen product, their first since the re-release of ‘Keep Yourself Alive’ in the US in July 1975 (there hadn’t been a UK single since ‘Now I’m Here’ in January), came in October 1975 in the form of ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’. Freddie stated, quite casually, in Melody Maker that “We look upon our product as songs. We don’t worry about singles or albums. All we do is pick the cream of the crop, then we look upon it as a whole to make sure the whole album works.” The resulting collection is best listened to as a complete process, even though Queen were loath to record concept albums (the closest they got was with Queen II): each song complements its predecessor nicely, and most act as a kind of introduction or segue to the next song, as in the lengthy ‘Tenement Funster’, ‘Flick Of The Wrist’ and ‘Lily Of The Valley’ triptych on Sheer Heart Attack.
As Brian explained to BBC’s Radio Two in 1999, “For A Night At The Opera, we sort of returned to the Queen II philosophy. We had our confidence, because we’d had a hit. We had a kind of almost desperation about us too, because we were totally bankrupt at that point. You know, we had made hit records but we hadn’t had any of the money back and if A Night At The Opera hadn’t been the huge success it was I think we would have just disappeared under the ocean someplace. So we were making this album knowing that it’s live or die. A bit of a competitive edge as well, I think – we wanted it to be our Sgt. Pepper and we each individually wanted to realize our potential as writers and producers and everything.”
The very title of the album suggests a more polished and refined Queen, as if they had honed their skills to become a more regal and adventurous unit than the underground rock outfit they had established themselves as on their first three releases. By contrast to Sheer Heart Attack, the title of which indicates a more balls-to-the-wall kind of rock album than the stadium rock Queen would perfect over the next few years, the albums’ covers are almost night and day. Whereas on Sheer Heart Attack the band are represented as sweaty, exhausted rock stars, on A Night At The Opera the patriotic redesign of Queen’s official insignia adorns an otherwise plain white sleeve, with the band’s name and the album title regally splashed in a cursive font. The back sleeve reads almost like a programme or playbill, while the inside features full lyrics (for the first time on a Queen album) and four black and white photos of the band members.
“The title of the album came at the very end of recording,” Freddie told Melody Maker in 1975. “We thought, ‘Oh God, we’ve got all these songs, what are we going to call the album?’ It was going to be called all sorts of things, and then I said, ‘Look, it’s got this sort of operatic content. Let’s look upon it that way.’ Then Roger and I thought of the title. It fitted, not only because of the high singing. It seemed that Queen were putting their necks on the line; we’ve always done that. We go through so many traumas, and we’re so meticulous. There are literally tens and twenties of songs that have been rejected for this album – some of them nice ones. If people don’t like the songs we’re doing at the moment, we couldn’t give a fuck. We’re probably the fussiest band in the world, to be honest. We take so much care with what we do because we feel so much about what we put across. And if we do an amazing album we make sure that album is packaged right, because we’ve put so much loving into it.”
The critics were almost universal in their praise: Melody Maker wrote, “The overall impression is of musical range, power and consistently incisive lyrics. My hair is still standing on end – so if you like good music and don’t mind looking silly, play this album.” Sounds argued that “Queen have the ability to actualise and encompass the outer limits of their sense of self-importance,” while American magazine Grooves opined, “Sharp operatic interludes, abrupt rhythmic changes, A Night At The Opera defies convention and places Queen in that rarefied circle of genuine superstars.” “Don’t get the idea that A Night At The Opera constitutes Queen’s attempt at light opera,” the Winnipeg Free Press wrote. “There’s still plenty of the familiar firepower which fans have come to expect from the group, although the overall emphasis is on the quieter, more subdued side of the group’s diverse musical framework.” Tony Stewart in NME opined that “Already there’s been a suggestion that this, Queen’s fourth album, has cost more to make than any other recorded in British studios ... More than anything else, A Night At The Opera is a consolidation of the previous album’s success, skillfully balancing artistry and effectology. Throughout the album, they display their individual songwriting abilities and musicianship to devastating effect – though there is one track, ‘Sweet Lady’, which is probably the most awful rock number they’ve ever recorded; it mars an otherwise excellent set ... If it’s the most expensive album ever made in a British studio, it’s also arguably the best. God save ’em.”
In 1991, the album was reissued on CD, throwing in two bonus tracks – superfluous remixes of ‘I’m In Love With My Car’ and ‘You’re My Best Friend’ – but the real excitement came in 2002, when the album became Queen’s first DVD-Audio release. It was originally supposed to be released on 20 November 2001 but was withdrawn due to a poor remix that caused Brian to take a more hands-on approach in order to create the ultimate sonic scope so deserving of their masterpiece. When the thirtieth anniversary of the album came in November 2005, Brian teased the fans on his website by promising something very special, yet the end result was disappointing. A two-disc package appeared: the first disc was the expected album, remastered for CD (yet again), while the second disc was ... the album yet again, but this time presented in DVD-A (yet again).
On the DVD portion of the release, however – as a bonus – there were music videos for each song. While this may have been a good idea in theory, in practice it’s a huge letdown. Much like the Rare Live debacle years before, the videos on this package (except, of course, for ‘You’re My Best Friend’ and ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’, which feature the standard music videos issued for the umpteenth time) are cut-and-paste jobs, culled from several different concerts across several different eras, resulting in a jarring effect. Some of the inclusions are worthwhile (indeed, ‘Sweet Lady’ is extracted from the 1976 Hyde Park performance), but the worst offenders are ‘Seaside Rendezvous’ and ‘Good Company’, for which no footage was available since neither was ever performed live. For the first song, therefore, a collage was put together of old-time movies featuring men and women in the late 1930s and early 1940s strolling along the beach, while the second did the same with footage of families enjoying quality time together.
For those dead-set against the Queen + Paul Rodgers tour, there was initial disappointment that ‘’39’ and ‘Love Of My Life’ were taken from the official Return Of The Champions DVD, but there was no sign of Rodgers anywhere; granted, it would be a little strange to see footage of Freddie synched to ‘’39’, which was sung by Brian, and as the guitarist had never sung a complete song live during Freddie’s lifetime, something had to give. It all begs the question: why? Was this shambolic release really necessary? The DVD-A featured the fully restored ‘God Save The Queen’, the master tapes of which had gone missing for the previous release, preventing a proper 5.1 remix from being made, and the DVD did feature band commentary on each song. But it was otherwise a wasted opportunity, certainly not an appropriate treatment of Queen’s most esteemed album of all time.
In 2011, this wrong was righted with the release of a deluxe edition by Universal Records, which not only improved the sound, but added a bonus disc of live tracks and alternate mixes. (Most intriguing was the inclusion of the ‘Keep Yourself Alive’ retake, confirming its recording date to 1975 and not 1972, as previously believed.) Amid the superfluous live single edit of ‘Love Of My Life’ from 1979 were a few gems, notably the guitar and vocal mix of ‘I’m In Love With My Car’, a brief a cappella snippet of the operatic section of ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’, and a live 1977 recording of ‘’39’. It wasn’t a flawless presentation, leaving the true rarities safely in the vault and going the safe, predictable rout
e, but it did a decent enough job of adding some goodies to an already classic album.
A DAY AT THE RACES
EMI EMTC 104, December 1976 [1]
Elektra 6E-101, December 1976 [5]
EMI CDP 7 46208 2, December 1986
Hollywood HR 61035 2, March 1991
Parlophone CDPCSD 131, 1994
Island Remasters 276 441 6, March 2011 [104]
‘Tie Your Mother Down’ (4’49), ‘You Take My Breath Away’ (5’08), ‘Long Away’ (3’33), ‘The Millionaire Waltz’ (4’55), ‘You And I’ (3’26), ‘Somebody To Love’ (4’57), ‘White Man’ (5’00), ‘Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy’ (2’54), ‘Drowse’ (3’45), ‘Teo Torriatte (Let Us Cling Together)’ (5’53)
Bonus tracks on 1991 Hollywood Records reissue: ‘Tie Your Mother Down’ (remix by Matt Wallace) (3’44), ‘Somebody To Love’ (remix by Randy Badazz) (5’00)
Bonus tracks on 2011 Universal Records deluxe reissue: ‘Tie Your Mother Down’ (backing track mix) (3’48), ‘Somebody To Love’ (live version, Milton Keynes Bowl, June 1982) (7’57), ‘You Take My Breath Away’ (live version, Hyde Park, September 1976) (3’07), ‘Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy’ (Top Of The Pops version, July 1977) (2’52), ‘Teo Torriatte (Let Us Cling Together)’ (2005 HD remix) (4’47)
Bonus videos, 2011 iTunes-only editions: ‘You Take My Breath Away’ (live version, Earl’s Court, June 1977), ‘Tie Your Mother Down’ (live version, Milton Keynes Bowl, June 1982), ‘Somebody To Love’ (promotional video)
Musicians: John Deacon (Fender bass, acoustic guitar on ‘You And I’), Brian May (guitars, vocals, leader of the orchestra, harmonium, piano and Vox electric piano on ‘Teo Torriatte’, introduction on ‘Tie Your Mother Down’, slide guitar on ‘Tie Your Mother Down’ and ‘Drowse’, guitar orchestrations on ‘The Millionaire Waltz’, lead vocals on ‘Long Away’), Freddie Mercury (vocals, piano, choir meister, tantrums), Roger Taylor (drums, vocals, percussion, pandemonium, lead vocals, rhythm guitar and timpani on ‘Drowse’), Mike Stone (backing vocals on ‘Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy’)
Recorded: July–November 1976 at The Manor, Oxfordshire; Wessex Studios, Highbury; and Sarm East Studios, Aldgate
Producers: Queen
“Each time we go into the studios, it gets that much more difficult,” Freddie explained to Circus in 1977, “because we’re trying to progress, to write songs that sound different from the past. The first album is easy, because you’ve always got a lot in your head that you’re anxious to put down. As the albums go by, you think, ‘They’ll say I’m repeating a formula.’ I’m very conscious of that.”
A Day At The Races takes all the knowledge and experience Queen had accumulated from six years of studio work and wraps it up nicely in a ten-track, forty-minute album. Progressing, if it was possible, from the studio trickery of A Night At The Opera, the album was superficially as blatant a follow-up as an album could be, featuring similar typesetting and a black cover, even sporting a title taken, again, from a classic Marx Brothers film. Still magnificently produced, the album featured all the trademarks of its predecessor: music hall (‘Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy’), a gorgeous ballad (‘You Take My Breath Away’), pure, fun pop (‘You And I’) and heavy rock (‘Tie Your Mother Down’, ‘White Man’), though the band also managed to break into different musical territories, most successfully with gospel on ‘Somebody To Love’, experimenting also with foreign languages on ‘Teo Torriatte (Let Us Cling Together)’ and testing the limits of studio technology on ‘The Millionaire Waltz’.
However, it would be unfair to compare the two albums, as A Night At The Opera is more instantly recognizable, thanks to ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ and ‘You’re My Best Friend’. Sitting uncomfortably in the shadow of its predecessor, A Day At The Races has still managed to become a fan favourite over the years, and is widely regarded, along with Queen II, as the band’s crowning glory.
Roger said of the album in Circus, “The new songs are stronger, and the playing is quite possibly better (the writing’s better, too!),” explaining further that the album represents “a step ahead of our previous work. We tried to avoid over-complicating. We tried to get a more basic feel in.” Though none of the arrangements were as elaborate as those on ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ or ‘The Prophets Song’, the band were still ambitious in their own way. ‘The Millionaire Waltz’ and ‘Somebody To Love’ definitely rivalled the production values of the previous album, and the introduction (later reprised at the album’s conclusion) constituted some of Brian’s most challenging guitar work to date.
What’s obvious is that the band had matured and were just about to find their ‘voice’. As a result of their new eminence, it would also be the last album the band meticulously produced. Everything released after this would cater to a newer audience: the people who filled up the vast stadia they hadn’t attempted to fill before the success of ‘We Will Rock You’, ‘We Are The Champions’ and all their early to mid-1980s achievements. A Day At The Races is a transitional album for Queen, and cynics would say that the band were merely repeating a well-worn formula. While there might be some semblance of truth in that criticism, Roger was correct in saying that the songs were more basic-sounding. There’s a kind of roominess that washes over the ten songs, allowing the music to breathe more freely. Compare ‘Sweet Lady’ and ‘White Man’: whereas in the former the instruments are all very closely mic’d and pristinely recorded, there’s a degree of rawness and roughness around the edges in the latter title. ‘White Man’ would have introduced an unrefined note to A Night At The Opera, while ‘Sweet Lady’ would have been too polished for A Day At The Races.
It’s in that supposed drawback that A Day At The Races scores its greatest success. There isn’t a weak song on the album, and while Freddie was still able to indulge himself with songs like ‘Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy’ and ‘The Millionaire Waltz’ – both comparable to the slighter ‘Lazing On A Sunday Afternoon’ and ‘Seaside Rendezvous’ – the songwriting as a whole is decidedly stronger and more meticulous. Roger and John especially shine as songwriters: John’s contribution, ‘You And I’, sounds like a follow-up to ‘You’re My Best Friend’, but he was able to advance his writing and arranging abilities and succeed in writing a song that surpassed his prior contribution in every way.
Roger, too, achieved unexpected prominence with ‘Drowse’, a song so superbly written and arranged that it’s impossible to believe it came from the man who wrote ‘Modern Times Rock ‘n’ Roll’ and ‘The Loser In The End’. While Brian had always been a strong songwriter, unfairly rated second to Freddie, he outdid himself this time by contributing four consistently strong songs. It would seem that Freddie was starting to let the others contribute equally, whereas previously he had dominated the albums with his songwriting. That’s not to imply that he was attempting to assert himself as the sole songwriter in the group, or that his songwriting had deteriorated on this album, but the other three were finally comfortable enough to take on the responsibility of writing more.
Recording sessions for the album were initially held at The Manor in Wessex in the summer of 1976, nearly three months after their last group activity on a tour of Australia. There wasn’t any great rush to get the album out, as there were, unusually, no tour dates until January 1977: normally, the band would tour for the first half of the year, record an album in the interim, then go back out on tour until the end of the year. However, they were now eager to put pleasure ahead of business. They had finally broken from their previous managers and had become more or less self-managed, meaning they could work at their leisure. On top of that, Brian finally married his fiancée, Chrissy Mullen, on 29 May; it was a perfect excuse to take some time off, which also allowed John to spend time with his own wife, Veronica, and their son Robert.
When sessions finally started, the band used ideas and songs that had been first attempted during the A Night At The Opera sessions the previous summer. Certainly, the riff for ‘Tie Your Mother Down’ had been w
ritten back in January 1975, while ideas for ‘Teo Torriatte (Let Us Cling Together)’ were started after Queen’s first trip to Japan in May 1975. At the end of July, basic tracks for six songs had been started: ‘Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy’, ‘The Millionaire Waltz’, ‘You Take My Breath Away’, ‘Simple Man’ (a working title of ‘White Man’), ‘Drowse’ and ‘Somebody To Love’. Recording progressed slowly, partly due to the intentional absence of Roy Thomas Baker. “We finally got that organized,” Freddie explained to Circus in 1977. “We just felt that, for this one, we needed a bit of a change. We were quite confident in doing it ourselves. The other albums we really co-produced, although we always took a very keen interest.”
“It was all very amicable,” Roger told Circus. “Roy’s been in and out of the country. He’s heard some rough mixes. Who knows? Maybe he’ll be back producing the next one! It’s been tremendous pressure recording this album.” Freddie agreed somewhat, but was more optimistic. “I think it turned out for the better,” he told Circus. “Taking more responsibility has been good for us. Roy’s been great, but it’s a progression, really – another step in our career. We simply felt that it was now or never.”
Surprisingly, John was the most candid on the subject. “We had a chat with Roy [Thomas] Baker, who’s very well known now, who did our first three albums,” he said in a KLOS-FM radio interview in 1977. “And we needed him, ’cause he’s like a really good super engineer, he knew all the technical ins and outs of the studio. So he was able to tell us how we could do this, sort of record our vocals over fifty times, or do this ‘phasing’. The ideas that we wanted to do, just how he could actually, physically record them. But A Night At The Opera was the last album we did with him. We had done four albums with him, and we came to the position where we had taught ourselves what to do in the studio, and one didn’t really need the services of the producer, because within the group, within the four of us, we had plenty of ideas. All we really needed was a good engineer. So that’s what we did with the new album ... we more or less produced it ourselves with an engineer [Mike Stone].
