Queen to reissue debut album in new edition
Queen are set to reissue their debut album in a new light. The surviving members of Queen have been cynically exploiting both the brand and the band's legacy for years. And yet Igor Gavrilov believes that the re-released album will be a fair success.
The first album by Queen, Queen, was released in 1973, three years after the group was founded. At first, the young band was in the shadow of the already established leaders of British rock - Led Zeppelin, The Who, Deep Purple and Uriah Heep. Later, in 1981 and 1991, while compiling their famous collections of Greatest Hits, the musicians of the quartet left the first album behind. In the blockbuster Bohemian Rhapsody, the Queen album is represented by the first single, Keep Yourself Alive, and the song Doing All Right, which migrated to Queen's repertoire from the catalog of Brian May and Roger Taylor's early group Smile. For several generations of listeners who got to know Queen primarily in its most popular and commercial manifestations, the Queen album seemed not to exist.
Its extended version will go on sale on October 25. It includes six CDs and one vinyl LP. In total, the reissue contains 63 tracks, 43 of which are new mixes of familiar songs. Of course, this is a pleasure primarily for lovers of alternative takes and concert rarities. For those who value the original order of songs on the album, manuscripts of lyrics and rare photos, fortunately, Queen's archives are bottomless.
Commenting on the reissue, Queen guitarist Brian May notes that this is not just a remaster, but a “rebuilding” of the entire album. Brian May and Roger Taylor, who are responsible for Queen’s legacy, did not finish playing the new instrumental parts and change the old ones, as The Beatles did when releasing the songs “Real Love,” “Free As A Bird,” and “Now And Then” (see Kommersant, November 3, 2023). However, as the guitarist says, each part is placed in the space of live sound with the help of modern technology and looks the way the band wanted it to from the very beginning.
The phrase “the way the band wanted it from the start” is often used to describe all sorts of reissues and reworkings of classic rock, be it Kino tracks in 2020s versions (see Kommersant of May 17, 2021) or Pink Floyd’s Dark Side Of The Moon album, reimagined in 2023 by Roger Waters (see Kommersant of October 11, 2023). The surviving rockers try to paint the following picture: in the 1960s, 1970s or 1980s, when they composed their legendary works, they had a completely different musical idea, but in order to implement it, they lacked studio devices or software for processing sound. It is worth remembering that some methods of working with sound did not exist then, and it was impossible to dream, say, about how artificial intelligence could refine what the musicians had come up with. It was also impossible to dream about the Internet or cellular communications. Even if their descriptions existed, it was only in science fiction books.
However, in the case of Queen's first album, the wording "the way we wanted" seems to be true. The fact is that the band recorded this album in the expensive Trident studios, where David Bowie had just finished recording two of his albums. The young, unknown group was given night time and limited in using the studio's facilities. The drums did not sound at all like Roger Taylor wanted, the sound was "American rough, even dead." The musicians wanted the sound to "hit you in the face," but they were able to achieve this, according to them, only in 2024.
Restoring justice to Queen's debut album is both in the sound and in giving the songs the attention they deserve. The first single from the album, which will be released under the name "Queen I", is "The Night Comes Down". The video for it was created from Queen footage from the period, and visuals in the style of early 1970s psychedelia were created for the instrumental coda during the reissue process.
After the musical We Will Rock You, the film Bohemian Rhapsody and the big tours with Adam Lambert at the mic, new generations of listeners are trying not to miss news from Queen. And after the huge success of the reissue of Oasis' debut album Definitely Maybe, against the backdrop of the band's reunion, we can expect the success of the reborn Queen album. Old rock brands continue to bring in profits, and, in the opinion of many experts, the music industry largely survives thanks to them.
