Queen‘s 1978 album Jazz wasn’t exactly a critical darling when it came out, and commercially, it didn’t fare much better. The record stalled at No. 6 on the Billboard 200, and its singles struggled to catch on stateside — “Don’t Stop Me Now,” now considered one of the band’s signature anthems, limped to just No. 86 on the Hot 100 when it was released. The album’s biggest showing came from the double A-side “Fat Bottomed Girls” and “Bicycle Race,” which topped out at No. 24.
Chances are, though, that single wouldn’t have climbed nearly that high without the scandal trailing behind it. The video for “Bicycle Race” turned into one of the most talked-about — and banned — clips of the era, and it left Queen with a bill nobody could have predicted.
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To promote the song, the band staged an actual bicycle race at Wimbledon Greyhound Stadium in London, filmed by director Denis de Vallance. Rather than hire dancers or actors, Queen brought in 65 professional models to pedal around the track completely nude.
“We were sitting there and the Tour de France — the cycle race — came through and inspired Freddie [Mercury] to write ‘Bicycle,'” guitarist Brian May said in the Queen: Days of Our Lives documentary. However, the video took the concept in a new direction.
The finished product used visual effects to obscure the nudity, but that didn’t stop television networks and censors worldwide. Several countries banned the video outright or refused to air it until it was re-edited, and it picked up an age restriction in the process. Promotional posters featuring one of the nude riders caused their own uproar, and the image eventually got a hastily painted-on bikini bottom before it could be used on the single’s cover.
Then there were the bicycles themselves. It was widely reported that Queen and their production team had rented dozens of bikes for the one-day shoot, but once the rental company realized exactly how those bikes had been used, they wanted nothing to do with the original seats. According to reports, the company demanded the band pay to replace every single saddle before they’d take the bicycles back.
Queen leaned into the controversy rather than running from it. At a Madison Square Garden show that same year, the band restaged a version of the scene live, with scantily clad women cycling across the stage while they played. Fans, for their part, embraced the song’s playful bicycle-bell breakdown, ringing their own bells at concerts for decades afterward.
Whatever critics made of Jazz at the time, “Bicycle Race” has outlasted the album’s rocky reception — helped along, no doubt, by a video that proved you don’t need a hit record to make headlines.
This story was originally published by Parade on Sep 17, 2026, where it first appeared in the Entertainment section. Add Parade as a Preferred Source by clicking here.