by Georg Purvis
DROWSE (Taylor)
• Album: Races
Roger had been proving himself more and more versatile as a songwriter since his debut on ‘Modern Times Rock ‘n’ Roll’ in 1973. His glam-rock effort, ‘The Loser In The End’, hadn’t been critically well received, but the dark and ominous ‘Tenement Funster’ was a step in the right direction, and ‘I’m In Love With My Car’ would prove its staying power as a live favourite for nearly five years. Instead of continuing in the hard rock vein, Roger instead became introspective for his fifth song for Queen, harking back to the simple days of youth.
‘Drowse’ is an exquisite song, one of the finest Roger ever wrote, and certainly one of his finest vocal performances. It recalls Roger’s adolescence, when he and his friends would “scuff up the sidewalk with endlessly restless feet” and broaden their minds “more in the pool hall than we did in the school hall.” Essentially too young to enjoy what adults could but already past the border of childhood innocence, Roger finds himself bored to “rages of tears” with “the fantastic drowse of the afternoon Sundays.” Musically, the song is an accomplishment since it features an almost Spector-like ‘wall of sound’ of acoustic and rhythm guitars, played by Brian and Roger, and one of Brian’s first attempts on slide guitar, which soars effortlessly throughout the song.
Issued as the American B-side to ‘Tie Your Mother Down’ in March 1977, ‘Drowse’ eluded a placement in the live repertoire. Oh, and the final words which Roger ultimately fades out upon, for years the cause of much speculation, were revealed in 1984: “I think I’ll be Clint Eastwood / Jimi Hendrix, he was good / Let’s try William the Conqueror / Now who else do I like?” And, if you turn up your volume loud enough, you can hear Roger’s answer to his own question: “Brian May.”
THE DUET (THE FALLEN PRIEST):
see EXTRACTS FROM GARDEN LODGE
EARLY MORNING BLUES (Blake)
This song was performed live by The Cross, with Brian on guitar and vocals and John on bass, during the band’s 1988 Christmas party for the Fan Club.
EARTH (Staffell)
• Compilation (Smile): Ghost Of A Smile
One of the better tracks recorded by Smile to surface from the June 1969 Trident Studios sessions, ‘Earth’ is a laid-back, slightly spacey track reminiscent of Pink Floyd, with a suitably prominent Hammond organ high in the mix. The song predates ‘’39’ and is about an astronaut lost in space, singing of the many worlds he sees, but lamenting that he’ll never again see the planet Earth; heavy stuff, yet the song was chosen as the most chartworthy track from the sessions, and was released as Smile’s first single in August 1969. Unusually, the single was a US-only release, and since Smile had no means of promotion in America, the single failed to chart, which brought a premature end to their deal with Mercury Records. Shortly after their sessions in August 1969, Tim Staffell would jump ship, bringing an end to what could have been a promising career as a blues-based rock band.
In December 1992, at The Cross’ Christmas concerts at The Marquee Club in London, a huge holiday present was in store for the fans: midway through the band’s set on the first night, in strode Tim Staffell, who had been asked by Roger to perform on ‘Earth’ and ‘If I Was A Carpenter’. The following night, in addition to Tim was Brian, thus becoming the first reunion of Smile in over twenty years.
The song was later issued on the 1982 bootleg Gettin’ Smile, which prompted Brian and Roger to question the authenticity of the tracks; apparently, they didn’t remember recording as many as six tracks (presumably, ‘Earth’, its B-side ‘Step On Me’ and ‘Doin’ Alright’ were the only ones to jog their memories as being legitimate), but they eventually recognized the remaining songs as their own. Only in 1998 were all six songs officially released on Ghost Of A Smile.
EIGHT DAYS A WEEK (Lennon/McCartney)
Originally by The Beatles, ‘Eight Days A Week’ was performed by 1984.
EL NOI DE LA MERE (trad. arr. May)
During Brian’s nightly guitar solo on the Magic tour at the Monumental Plaza de Toros in Barcelona on 1 August 1986, he inserted a scrap of a traditional Catalan popular song.
ENSUEÑO (Mercury/Moran/Caballé)
• Album (Freddie): Barcelona
• Compilation (Freddie): Solo Collection
‘Exercises In Free Love’ had impressed Montserrat Caballé so greatly that she took the music of that song and added her own set of lyrics, making ‘Ensueño’ a standout track from the Barcelona album and a true showcase of Montserrat’s vocal capabilities. The lyrics, written and sung exclusively in Spanish, are about a dream that a woman has of seeing her one true love, and are made all the more poignant with Freddie and Montserrat duetting effortlessly.
Apart from the standard album version, two alternate versions appeared on The Solo Collection: an instrumental version based on Mike Moran’s piano abilities alone, which is simply beautiful, and an alternate vocal version recorded with only Montserrat on vocals, though three takes are presented, each breaking down due to Freddie’s insatiable desire for absolute perfection.
ESCAPE (May)
• Soundtrack (Brian): Furia
Opening with a timpani roll and dominated by orchestrations, ‘Escape’ features The Red Special in full force – indeed, a rarity on the Furia soundtrack – but is, unfortunately, yet another variation on the main theme.
ESCAPE FROM THE SWAMP (Taylor)
• Album: Flash
Sounding curiously like Roger’s nightly timpani solo from the 1979–1981 era, ‘Escape From The Swamp’ is an atmospheric, synthesizer-driven composition with some masterful percussion.
EVERYBODY HURTS SOMETIME (Taylor)
• Album (Roger): Happiness? • B-side (Roger): 11/94 [32]
Like ‘Loneliness...’ and ‘You Had To Be There’, ‘Everybody Hurts Sometime’ is a shorter track, gracing the second side of Happiness? without much fanfare, yet is completely necessary to the album’s concept of self-discovery. Displaying a surprisingly soulful vocal from Roger (he often introduced the song as an “optimistic blues” track), the song deals with pain and suffering, but points out that, without such elements in a person’s life, “you ain’t livin’ at all.” The song is performed nearly solely by Roger, with the ever-present Jason Falloon contributing a terrific guitar performance, and Cathy Porter backing up Roger beautifully.
A live version, released on the 12” version of the ‘Happiness?’ single, was taken from a performance at Shepherd’s Bush, London, in 1994. While the album version is more emotive, the musical performance on the live version is clearly superior; the keyboards add to the emotions, and Jason Falloon’s guitar work is stellar, as usual.
EVERYBODY NEEDS SOMEBODY
This title, along with ‘Had To Believe Me’ and ‘In Search Of Love’, was written by Freddie but left unrecorded during Queen’s latter-day sessions in 1989.
EVERYBODY’S GOT TO LEARN
SOMETIME (Warren)
A live cover version of The Korgis’ No. 5 hit from 1980, ‘Everybody’s Got To Learn Sometime’ was performed at the 46664 charity concert on 29 November 2003 by Brian, Roger, The Corrs violinist Shannon Corr, Italian rocker Zucchero on lead vocals, and the 46664 house band.
EXECUTION OF FLASH (Deacon)
• Album: Flash
John’s first contribution to the Flash Gordon soundtrack consists of him doodling on a Fender Telecaster guitar as a synthesizer drones in the background. An effective atmospheric piece, the song leads into Freddie’s vocal tour de force, ‘The Kiss (Aura Resurrects Flash)’, with an orchestration from Howard Blake.
EXERCISES IN FREE LOVE (Mercury/Moran)
• B-side (Freddie): 2/87 [4] • B-side (Freddie): 10/87 [8] • Compilation (Freddie): Pretender, FM album, Solo Collection • B-side (Freddie): 1/93 [29]
In late 1986, following sessions for ‘The Great Pretender’ and with the probability of a collaboration with Montserrat Caballé becoming a reality, Freddie recorded ‘Exercises In Fr
ee Love’ as his vocal approximation of the opera diva, with Mike Moran backing him up on the piano and orchestration. Largely improvised with no lyrics whatsoever, the vocalizations are stunning, and it was this track that Freddie would take to his first meeting with Montserrat, impressing her so much that she insisted the two record an album together. She also performed the track live on 29 March 1987 at Covent Garden, with Mike Moran accompanying her; so beautiful was the performance that the audience gave them a standing ovation.
And here it becomes complicated: Freddie’s original version was released as the B-side of ‘The Great Pretender’, while a Montserrat vocal version, rerecorded during the Barcelona sessions, later became the B-side of ‘Barcelona’ in October 1987. Montserrat then took the music and wrote a special set of lyrics entirely in Spanish for inclusion on the Barcelona album yet, incredibly, Montserrat’s vocal version wasn’t included on The Solo Collection.
EXTRACTS FROM GARDEN LODGE
Several snippets of Freddie, Montserrat Caballé and Peter Straker, with Mike Moran fooling around on piano at the Garden Lodge on 29 February 1988, have been bootlegged as ‘Extracts From Garden Lodge’ or, alternatively, ‘Garden Lodge Tapes’. Featuring such improvisations as ‘The Duet’ (which later turned into ‘The Fallen Priest’) and ‘Idea’ (later becoming ‘Barcelona’), these insights into Montserrat becoming acquainted with Freddie’s new material are fascinating; even at this early stage, he knew exactly what he wanted from his new collaborator.
Three additional ‘songs’ were recorded, without Montserrat but with Peter Straker instead: a lewd and profanity-laced version of ‘Que Sera, Sera’, ‘Rock-A-Bye Dixie’ and ‘Girl From Ipanema’, these are no doubt heavily influenced by liquor and the duo’s spirits are clearly heightened. Understandably, these were not included on The Solo Collection, but have been in the traders’ circuits for years.
FACE IT ALONE
Recorded during the Miracle sessions in 1989 and returned to the following year, ‘Face It Alone’ was name-checked by Greg Brooks at the 2000 Fan Club Convention, though if this track was played, it certainly hasn’t been bootlegged (the other songs from the convention, including the superb ‘Self-Made Man’, ‘My Secret Fantasy’ and ‘Robbery’, have been released on a bootleg titled Committing Robbery). Brooks stated that the song exceeds ten minutes, and is a three-part demo with Brian on guitar and Freddie on keyboards and multi-tracked vocals.
As with most demos and unreleased tracks, when the full version was finally leaked onto the internet in 2010, expectations for an epic forgotten Queen classic were quickly dashed, when ‘Face It Alone’ was revealed as nothing more than Freddie “da-dee-dee”ing his way around some mournful guitar noodling.
THE FAIRY FELLER’S MASTER-STROKE (Mercury)
• Album: Queen2
Falling between the manic ‘Ogre Battle’ and the sublime ‘Nevermore’ on Side Black of Queen II, Freddie’s ‘The Fairy Feller’s Master-Stroke’ is an accomplishment in studio trickery and creativity. “It was thoroughly inspired by a painting [of the same name] by Richard Dadd, which is in the Tate Gallery,” Freddie explained in a Christmas Eve 1977 BBC Radio One broadcast. “I did a lot of research on it and it inspired me to write a song about the painting, depicting what I thought I saw in it. It was just because I’d come through art college and I basically like the artist and I like the painting, so I thought I’d like to write a song about it.”
The song is a delightful excursion into fairies and mythical creatures, bringing to life Dadd’s busy painting with poetic superlatives and tongue-tied verbosity. The band are in fine form here, adapting to the quick pace with ease, and adding a refreshing glimmer of lightness to the otherwise dark Side Black. A harpsichord – which, according to Brian, Freddie hadn’t bothered to learn properly but fooled around with between takes – is the dominant instrument, only furthering the frivolous mood. With several layers of vocal harmonies and guitar orchestrations, the song is a true joy to listen to, and is a watershed composition in Freddie’s advancement as a songwriter. Due to its complexity, ‘The Fairy Feller’s Master-Stroke’ was never performed in the live setting, though Greg Brooks reported in his book, Queen Live: A Concert Documentary, that the song was rumoured to have been performed, along with ‘The Night Comes Down’, on 1 March 1974 in Blackpool.
THE FALLEN PRIEST (Mercury/Moran/Rice)
• Album (Freddie): Barcelona • B-side (Freddie): 10/88 [83] • Compilation (Freddie): Solo Collection
As on ‘The Golden Boy’, Freddie and Mike Moran collaborated with Sir Tim Rice on ‘The Fallen Priest’, and the results are just as impressive. This is one of the more dramatic pieces on Barcelona, with Freddie’s voice meshing perfectly with Montserrat Caballé’s, creating six of the most moving minutes ever to be caught on tape. From a lyrical standpoint, Freddie and Mike are aided superbly by Rice, who adds a loquacious touch to an otherwise straightforward album: the title character proclaims that his “life of sacrifice” controls him, before admitting the inevitability of succumbing to temptations far too “mercurial, more wayward by the hour.” Love, passion, and excess overpowers the priest as he ping-pongs between a life of celibacy and theological devotion, and giving into the seduction of the unknown, before God unfurls His wrath upon the priest and his forbidden lover. Heavy stuff indeed.
The arrangement is as impressive as the Greek tragedy, even more impressive that no other outside musicians were used; the music was painstakingly arranged and programmed by Freddie and Mike. With the equivalent of a full orchestra on synthesizers, the lush arrangements of ‘The Fallen Priest’ are fully appreciated by listening to the instrumental version included on The Solo Collection: as impressive as Freddie’s and Montserrat’s vocal performances are, the music itself is nothing short of a masterpiece.
The song was originally titled ‘Rachmaninov’s Revenge’, which was for many years thought to be a genuine outtake from the Barcelona sessions. This working title is appropriate to the musical arrangement, and is a nod to Russian–American composer and pianist Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff, a classical pianist whose style is alluded to in Mike’s busy piano work. Two early versions were included on The Solo Collection: the first, initially titled ‘Spanish Song’ and recorded on 26 January 1987, contains a set of lyrics largely improvised by Freddie, with drum-machine programming, that turns it into a more contemporary late 1980s arrangement; fortunately, this was abandoned as the song was developed further. The second version, recorded nearly a month later on 19 February 1987, features a more muted instrumental performance suitable to the released version, though the lyrics still hadn’t been finalized, with Freddie providing appropriate falsetto vocalizations where he intended Montserrat would feature. Shortly after this basic run-through was recorded, he presented the work-in-progress to Sir Tim Rice, who wrote a set of lyrics; thus, the retitle to the more dramatic and ominous ‘The Fallen Priest’.
‘The Fallen Priest’, a highlight of the Barcelona album, was also issued as the B-side of ‘The Golden Boy’ in October 1988, edited down to nearly half the length of the original. Surprisingly, this unique edit was not included on The Solo Collection, despite the copious room on the companion disc ‘The Singles 1986–1993’; even in its heavily edited state, the song deserves to be heard since it is a considerable variation, no matter how inferior it may be to the original.
FAT BOTTOMED GIRLS (May)
• AA-side: 10/78 [11] • Album: Jazz • CD Single: 11/88 • Bonus: Jazz • CD Single: 10/91 [16] • Compilation: Hits1, HitsUS • B-side: 6/96 [9] • Live: On Fire • Live (Q+PR): Return, Ukraine
For the first time in Queen’s history, the lead-off single from their latest album blatantly tackled an issue that they’d previously avoided: sex. “We lost some of our audience with that,” Brian said in 1982. “‘How could you do it? It doesn’t go with your spiritual side.’ But my answer is that the physical side is just as much a part of a person as the spiritual or intellectual side. It’s fun. I’l
l make no apologies. All music skirts around sex, sometimes very directly. Ours doesn’t. In our music, sex is either implied or referred to semi-jokingly, but it’s always there.”
Centred round a memorable chorus with a slight country & western feel to it, ‘Fat Bottomed Girls’ features a jangly guitar line and some gloriously tubthumping double-tracked drumming from Roger. It’s clear that the band, but Freddie most of all, is having a good time, which Brian confirmed in a 2008 Mojo interview: “I wrote it with Fred in mind, as you do especially if you’ve got a great singer who likes fat bottomed girls ... or boys.” The 1991 reissue of Jazz features a subtle remix by Brian Malouf, with a different intro and a more muted mix, but concludes with Freddie crying, “They getcha every time – them dirty ladies!”, which was flown in from an alternate take.
The song was issued, in edited form, as a double A-sided single with ‘Bicycle Race’ in October 1978, as a precursor to Jazz. It peaked at a respectable No. 11 in the UK, but charted no higher than No. 24 in the US; that it failed to hit the UK Top Ten suggests that the world wasn’t quite ready for ‘Fat Bottomed Girls’. Regardless of its commercial failure, it still became a live favourite between 1978 and 1982, with a boisterous version appearing on Queen On Fire: Live At the Bowl. The song was resurrected in 1998 and was performed by The Brian May Band on his Another World tour, and was later reprised for the Queen + Paul Rodgers 2005 touring band, becoming an early staple of the set, allowing Paul a chance to relish in the unbridled boyish glee of fat bottomed girls making the rockin’ world go ‘round.
