{"id":333971,"date":"2025-12-24T22:19:09","date_gmt":"2025-12-24T22:19:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/333971\/"},"modified":"2025-12-24T22:19:09","modified_gmt":"2025-12-24T22:19:09","slug":"listen-to-queens-previously-unheard-christmas-song-not-for-sale-polar-bear","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/333971\/","title":{"rendered":"Listen to Queen’s previously-unheard Christmas song ‘Not For Sale (Polar Bear)’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Queen<\/a>\u00a0have\u00a0released a never-before-heard Christmas song \u2018Not\u00a0For\u00a0Sale (Polar Bear)\u2019 \u2013\u00a0listen\u00a0below.<\/p>\n

The track was recorded in 1974 during the sessions for the band\u2019s second studio album \u2018Queen II\u2019, but it did not make the final cut. As\u00a0they\u00a0ready that\u00a0record\u2019s\u00a0reissue, which is due in 2026,\u00a0they have shared \u2018Not\u00a0For\u00a0Sale (Polar Bear)\u2019 in time for Christmas.<\/p>\n

Guitarist\u00a0Brian May<\/a>, who wrote the song for his\u00a0previous\u00a0band Smile,\u00a0gave the song its premiere during a stint presenting on the Planet Rock radio station<\/a>\u00a0on Monday (December 22), and has said that it \u201cgoes back a very long way, but to my knowledge no one has ever heard this version\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a work in progress and will appear on the forthcoming rebuild of the \u2018Queen II\u2019 album \u2013 coming next year \u2013 but I\u2019m sneaking this into my Planet Rock special because I\u2019m fascinated to know what people think about it,\u201d May added. \u201cI hope people have a wonderful Christmas and a great New Year!\u201d<\/p>\n

Listen to the song, a\u00a0slow-burner\u00a0that sees May and\u00a0Freddie Mercury<\/a>\u00a0trade lead vocals, here:<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

In other news, earlier this month May gifted\u00a0Black Sabbath<\/a>\u2019s\u00a0Tony Iommi<\/a>\u00a0with a left-handed replica of his\u00a0classic Red Special guitar.<\/a><\/p>\n

The original Red Special was assembled from\u00a0scratch\u00a0in the early 1960s by May with his father Harold, as he was unable to afford a major brand.\u00a0Built with mahogany from an old fireplace mantle and an oak fingerboard with mother-of-pearl buttons, it\u00a0remained\u00a0May\u2019s primary guitar on stage throughout Queen\u2019s success in the \u201870s and \u201880s and became synonymous with the band\u2019s sound.<\/p>\n

May\u2019s wife Anita Dobson implied that despite Queen working on\u00a0new music\u00a0with Adam Lambert, it was unlikely that they would resume full-scale touring<\/a>. \u201cThey will do little bits and bobs, but they\u00a0won\u2019t\u00a0do those big tours,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

May suffered a minor stroke last year<\/a>, which he said came on \u201call of a sudden, out of the blue\u201d.\u00a0He said it left him without any control over one of his arms and described it as \u201ca little scary\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Queen\u00a0have\u00a0released a never-before-heard Christmas song \u2018Not\u00a0For\u00a0Sale (Polar Bear)\u2019 \u2013\u00a0listen\u00a0below. The track was recorded in 1974 during the sessions…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":333972,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[96,128,3584,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-333971","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-music","10":"tag-rock","11":"tag-uk","12":"tag-united-kingdom","13":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/333971","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=333971"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/333971\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/333972"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=333971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=333971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=333971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}