{"id":302708,"date":"2025-12-07T05:32:11","date_gmt":"2025-12-07T05:32:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/302708\/"},"modified":"2025-12-07T05:32:11","modified_gmt":"2025-12-07T05:32:11","slug":"the-one-queen-song-brian-may-thought-was-too-overdone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/302708\/","title":{"rendered":"The one Queen song Brian May thought was too overdone"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Brian<\/p>\n

(Credits: Raph Pour-Hashemi)<\/p>\n

Sat 6 December 2025 17:15, UK <\/p>\n

There\u2019s no such thing as going too over the top when it comes to Queen<\/a>. <\/p>\n

The entire process of layering different tracks on top of each other was all in service to creating the most theatrical experience possible, and there was never a sense that any of them knew what the word \u2018subtlety\u2019 meant when they made tracks like \u2018Bohemian Rhapsody\u2019. They had their sombre moments, but even when painting their masterpieces, Brian May felt that there was a line that they crossed a few too many times.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Then again, May has a hand in making a lot of Queen\u2019s tracks so epic. It\u2019s easy to focus on what Freddie Mercury did with those mountains of vocal harmonies, but May\u2019s focus on treating the guitar solo like a second voice meant layering even more guitar harmonies on top of everything. But that\u2019s not to say that they couldn\u2019t strike the right balance every now and again as well.<\/p>\n

May\u2019s guitar might be the perfect complement to Mercury\u2019s voice on many of the band\u2019s classic tunes like \u2018We Will Rock You\u2019, but when listening to \u2018Love of My Life\u2019<\/a>, hearing him turn the guitar into a violin on many of the solo moments is absolutely gorgeous when offsetting Mercury\u2019s powerhouse voice. But even after thinking outside the box on \u2018Bohemian Rhapsody\u2019, getting the whole band together to make the song \u2018We Are the Champions\u2019 was bound to be a sticking point with May.<\/p>\n

As much as he loved the tune, the idea of his guitar overpowering the voice was always going to be a sore spot for him. After all, the whole track is about Mercury telling the world that they have become champions of the universe, and when you have May fighting his way through many of the choruses, he was worried that it would only distract people from the rest of the chorus when they played.<\/p>\n

It was Mercury\u2019s song at the end of the day, but the frontman insisted that the guitar solos stay in the final mix, with May remembering<\/a>, \u201cFreddie had his hand on my guitar, and I had my hand on his vocals. He\u2019s pushing up the guitar more and more, and I\u2019m going, \u2018Freddie, are you not overdoing it?\u2019 [He said], \u2018No. The guitar is fighting with the vocal here, and that\u2019s the way it should be.\u201d<\/p>\n

And what\u2019s remarkable is how no part of the tune ever seems cluttered. May\u2019s leads could have easily been mindless shredding for the hell of it, but the more you listen to it, you can\u2019t think of any piece of the chorus without him being able to answer the rest of the band. If you think about what the tune is about, there\u2019s also a little bit of tone painting going on whenever the chorus rolls around.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s break this down for a second. This is a song about victory after a long battle. No one gets people to relate to something like that if you don\u2019t at least imply that it was a struggle to get there, and hearing May\u2019s guitar fighting against the rest of the band is the musical version of that battle taking place before the chorus finally hits that triumphant climax when Mercury and the guitar start harmonising with each other on the final section.<\/p>\n

So that by the time that the song fades into oblivion, the audience hasn\u2019t only listened to a song that they could play every single time their local sports team wins a game. It\u2019s a song that they can appreciate because they are literally listening to a music battle taking place across both sides of the speaker. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Related Topics<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"(Credits: Raph Pour-Hashemi) Sat 6 December 2025 17:15, UK There\u2019s no such thing as going too over the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":302709,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[1005,96,128,1006,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-302708","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-brian-may","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-music","11":"tag-queen","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom","14":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302708","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=302708"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302708\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/302709"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=302708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=302708"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=302708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}