{"id":305994,"date":"2026-07-26T16:27:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-26T16:27:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/305994\/"},"modified":"2026-07-26T16:27:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-26T16:27:08","slug":"queens-diversity-and-values-prove-they-were-prog","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/305994\/","title":{"rendered":"Queen\u2019s diversity and values prove they were prog"},"content":{"rendered":"

By the time Queen<\/a> became world famous for their pop anthems, most of their greatest expeditions into progessive territories were behind them. But in 2012 Yes<\/a>\u2019 Steve Howe<\/a> and Dream Theater<\/a>\u2019s Mike Portnoy<\/a> helped us argue the case that Freddie Mercury<\/a>\u2019s troop were always a prog band.<\/p>\n

On 9 January, 1971, Kevin Ayers<\/a> and Genesis<\/a> played a show together at the Ewell Technical College near Epsom in Surrey. Ayers was 18 months out of Soft Machine<\/a>, and making a name for himself as a psychedelically-inclined art-folk rake. Genesis had released their second album, Trespass, a few months earlier, and were carving out a place in the vanguard of the burgeoning progressive rock movement.<\/p>\n

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There was a third band propping up the bill that night: a bunch of transplanted Londoners calling themselves Queen<\/a>. In contrast to the wilfully artful approach of the headliners, their music was more straightforward \u2013 a heavy, if ornate blend of Led Zeppelin<\/a>\u2019s earthiness and the flights of fancy of Yes.<\/p>\n

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Not everyone in the small crowd watching them was impressed, but they caught the attention of one person. After the show, Genesis frontman Peter Gabriel<\/a> pulled Queen\u2019s blond-bombshell drummer Roger Taylor<\/a> to one side. Gabriel\u2019s band were about to dismiss their own drummer, John Mayhew, and were looking for a replacement. Was Taylor interested in joining Genesis? The reply was instant: thanks but no thanks. Taylor was utterly dedicated to Queen \u2013 there were gigs to play, places to go, and many musical adventures to embark on.<\/p>\n

Had Taylor accepted the offer, the course of music \u2013 and specifically prog \u2013 would have been very different. Genesis would have flourished with Gabriel upfront, though whether they would have survived and prospered as they did without Phil Collins<\/a> to step into the breach after their talismanic singer\u2019s departure is another matter.<\/p>\n

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Queen – Liar (1973 Promo video) – YouTube
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The knock-on effect on Queen would have been greater. Taylor was an essential part of their carefully-balanced four-way chemistry; a chemistry that would go on to throw up some of the most ambitious and game-changing music ever recorded. While Queen weren\u2019t a capital \u2018P\u2019 prog band, they were infused with the spirit of the movement, combining its forward-looking values with its absolute disregard for the existing rules.<\/p>\n

Taking their cues from the likes of Yes, Genesis, Van der Graaf Generator<\/a> and even Pink Floyd<\/a>, their flamboyantly cavalier approach would go on to inspire such modern masters as Dream Theater, Queensr\u00ffche<\/a> and Muse<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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And, in Bohemian Rhapsody, they ensured that one of the biggest-selling singles in history was, at heart, a prog song. Forget the luxuriant moustaches and sawn-off mike-stands that would come to define them: if the prog ethos meant avoiding the expected, then Queen were definitely a prog band.<\/p>\n

\u201cDiversity was probably their greatest asset,\u201d says Dream Theater drummer and confirmed devotee Mike Portnoy<\/a>. \u201cFrom song to song, they could be so different. You could have something that was folk followed by something that was rockabilly followed by something that was metal. And that\u2019s one of the biggest things about prog, having that open-mindedness.\u201d<\/p>\n

Queen\u2019s schooling in prog had come early on. Brian May<\/a>\u2019s very first band, 1984, played a 4am slot supporting Pink Floyd<\/a> at the Christmas On Earth Continued all-nighter in 1967. A year later, his next outfit, Smile \u2013 also featuring Roger Taylor \u2013 played with Floyd again, this time at London\u2019s Imperial College. By the time of their gig opening for Kevin Ayers, they\u2019d changed their name to Queen and recruited Freddie Mercury. Collectively, they admired Yes, Van der Graaf Generator<\/a> and especially Genesis. \u201cFoxtrot<\/a> is a prog rock classic,\u201d Taylor later wrote in the sleevenotes to Genesis box set 1970-1975. \u201cArrangements were highly complex in these early days, setting a benchmark for the style of the times.\u201d<\/p>\n

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When it came to finding someone to produce their debut album<\/a>, Queen\u2019s first choice was John Anthony, who\u2019d worked with both Genesis and Van der Graaf. With Anthony and co-producer Roy Thomas Baker behind the desk, the eponymous album trod heavily in Led Zeppelin\u2019s footsteps. But there was another, altogether more visionary band straining to spread their wings: My Fairy King was a filigreed slice of flamboyant rock\u2019n\u2019roll, while Liar metamorphosised through several different time changes and timings.<\/p>\n

Those wings were fully unfurled on the follow-up, 1974\u2019s Queen II<\/a>. The title was the most prosaic thing about the record: the music inside was as fevered and baroque as rock gets, informed equally by Zeppelin, Yes and crazed Victorian artist Richard Dadd, whose 1864 painting The Fairy Feller\u2019s Master-Stroke inspired one of the album\u2019s most prog-leaning tracks. It may have been rooted in the heavy rock of the times, but its cavalier approach and sheer sense of scale pegged the band as a defiantly progressive proposition.<\/p>\n

Every song was so diverse\u2026 you had this giant multi-layered epic like Bohemian Rhapsody next to something like Seaside Rendezvous or Love Of My Life<\/p>\n

Mike Portnoy<\/p>\n

\u201cQueen weren\u2019t like Yes, who had a dualistic role of guitar and keyboards, where both shared the terrain,\u201d says Yes guitarist Steve Howe, whose band were supported by Mercrury and co at Kingston Poly in 1971. \u201cBrian had the terrain to himself. The remarkable thing was that he was the front and the back man. It required him to come up with more than guitar solos\u2026 He had to come up with a semi-thematic approach to play the guitar. And what he did was keep colouring.\u201d<\/p>\n

Prog inclinations were deeply woven into the fabric of their early albums, from the audacious multi-part theatrics of Queen II\u2019s March Of The Black Queen to the schizophrenic assault of the two-part Lap Of The Gods from 1974\u2019s Sheer Heart Attack<\/a>. Even in their more commercial moments, they marched to the beat of their own drum. What other band would have dared serve up something so unusual as Killer Queen?<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was their diversity,\u201d says Portnoy, who first heard them as an eight-year-old in the mid-70s, and covered many of their songs with Dream Theater. \u201cTheir albums took the prototype that The Beatles<\/a> laid down with the White Album<\/a>, where you had four different artists bringing in very different styles. Every song was so diverse. You get to A Night At The Opera, and you had this giant multi-layered epic like Bohemian Rhapsody next to something like Seaside Rendezvous or Love Of My Life.\u201d<\/p>\n

A Night At The Opera<\/a> was Queen\u2019s grand artistic statement and their most unashamedly prog album. Pitched around the epic twin tentpoles of The Prophet\u2019s Song and Bohemian Rhapsody<\/a>, it married their far-reaching vision to a distinctly British barminess. Taken on its own, the eight-minute The Prophet\u2019s Song, with its incredible ornate a cappella middle section, would be enough to grant Queen access to the Prog Hall Of Fame. But even that sits in the inescapable shadow of Bohemian Rhapsody. Time and success might have lessened its impact, but that song remains the most dazzlingly unique piece of music ever to sell five million copies.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are epic things that come along every so often,\u201d says Steve Howe. \u201cThere\u2019s Sgt Pepper<\/a>, there\u2019s Bridge Over Troubled Water<\/a>. And there\u2019s Bohemian Rhapsody. I don\u2019t know when I first heard it, but once it was there, it was such a formidable thing. You\u2019re thinking: \u2018How many tracks did they need to do those vocals? How did they write it? Who invented it? It really was astounding.\u201d<\/p>\n

When I think of my favourite prog music, it\u2019s always the musicianship that draws me. But with Queen, it was the vocals\u2026 it was so deep<\/p>\n

Mike Portnoy<\/p>\n

Bohemian Rhapsody encapsulated one of the key things that gave Queen such a distinct identity. Like The Beatles<\/a> and Beach Boys<\/a> before them, they used the studio as an instrument \u2013 not least when it came to their vocals. And Bohemian Rhapsody raised the bar about as high as it could go.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey sang each of those parts and triple-stacked them,\u201d says Portnoy. \u201cYou heard all three of their voices singing in all three vocal ranges. That\u2019s what made the depth of their music so complex. It wasn\u2019t the instrumentation, it was the vocals. That\u2019s unusual for prog music. When I think of my favourite prog music, it\u2019s always the musicianship that draws me. But with Queen, it was the vocals. It was so deep.\u201d<\/p>\n

For all its success, A Night At The Opera would be Queen\u2019s grand kiss-off to their prog roots. Later albums streamlined their sound into a more conventional format. Much like Genesis, the 80s found them swapping experimentalism for chart rock.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t until the end of their career as an active band that Queen would again sound so adventurous. During 1989 and 1990, the band began work on their penultimate album, Innuendo<\/a>, in London and Montreux. In the summer of 1990, Steve Howe paid a flying visit to the Swiss city, where a chance encounter with a former guitar tech found him being invited to Queen\u2019s studio to hear the album as a work-in-progress.<\/p>\n

\u201cInside, there\u2019s Freddie, Brian and Roger all sitting together. They go: \u2018Let\u2019s play you the album,\u2019\u201d says Howe. \u201cOf course, I\u2019m hearing it for the first time: I Can\u2019t Live Without You, I\u2019m Going Slightly Mad. And they saved Innuendo itself until last. They played it and I was fucking blown away.\u201d<\/p>\n

They all chimed in: \u2018We want some crazy Spanish guitar. Improvise!\u2019 \u2026After a couple of hours I thought, \u2018I\u2019ve bitten off more than I can chew here\u2019<\/p>\n

Steve Howe<\/p>\n

If that was surprising, then what happened next was utterly out-of-the-blue. The members of Queen asked if Howe wanted to play on the title track. The Yes man politely suggested they\u2019d lost their minds. It took the combined weight of Mercury, May and Taylor to persuade him.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey all chimed in: \u2018We want some crazy Spanish guitar flying around over the top. Improvise!\u2019\u201d recalls Howe. \u201cI started noodling around on the guitar, and it was pretty tough. After a couple of hours, I thought: \u2018I\u2019ve bitten off more than I can chew here.\u2019 I had to learn a bit of the structure, work out the chordal roots were, where you had to fall if you did a mad run in the distance; you have to know where you\u2019re going.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut it got towards evening, and we\u2019d doodled and I\u2019d noodled, and it turned out to be really good fun. We have this beautiful dinner, we go back to the studio and have a listen. And they go: \u2018That\u2019s great. That\u2019s what we wanted.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Released as a single in January 1991, Innuendo gave Queen their third Number One single. Like Bohemian Rhapsody 25 years before it, it was as unlikely as hit singles get: a six-and-a-half minute musical jigsaw, complete with flamenco runs, classically-inclined orchestral overloads and maverick 5\/4 timing. Queensr\u00ffche covered the song on 2007\u2019s Take Cover album, while you can hear its echo in Radiohead<\/a>\u2019s Paranoid Android and Muse<\/a>\u2019s more elaborate sci-fi epics.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the world of rock, Queen stands out as a good example of the clash between guitar and piano in songwriting,\u201d Muse\u2019s Matt Bellamy<\/a> has said. \u201cI think that\u2019s where you stumble across those more unusual arrangements and chord structures.\u201d<\/p>\n

Today, Queen have left a bipolar legacy. They\u2019re arguably best known for their pop hits \u2013 Radio Gaga, I Want To Break Free \u2013 and of course, Bohemian Rhapsody, that ultimate prog Trojan Horse. But their spirit of adventure remains unmatched by all but the boldest of their peers.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was no rule book for Queen,\u201d says Portnoy. \u201cThey broke most of the rules that existed, and then they wrote a new set.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By the time Queen became world famous for their pop anthems, most of their greatest expeditions into progessive…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":305995,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[9,24,63,122,124,123],"class_list":["post-305994","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305994","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=305994"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305994\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/305995"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=305994"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=305994"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=305994"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}