Rock and roll icon Sir Brian May has reflected on the legacy of Queen’s music and revealed his reservations over one of the group’s most famous songs.
Guitarist and singer Sir Brian formed Queen in 1970 alongside lead vocalist Freddie Mercury and drummer Roger Taylor, before bass player John Deacon joined the following year.
Charting for the first time in 1974 with their second album Queen II and the single Seven Seas of Rhye, which reached number 10 and was their first hit, the band quickly gained momentum thanks to the likes of Bohemian Rhapsody in 1975 and later Somebody to Love and mega-anthems We Will Rock You and We Are the Champions.
However, Sir Brian was initially not a fan of the group’s 1979 single Don’t Stop Me Now because he did not approve of Freddie’s lyrics, which celebrated his hedonistic lifestyle.
But the 77-year-old’s opinion on the song has since changed because of how fans and the wider public embraced and interpreted the track.
Asked if he felt protective of Queen’s songs after they have entered the public domain, the musician replied: ‘At the time, I didn’t feel comfortable about Don’t Stop Me Now, probably for all the right reasons and the wrong reasons.’
He continued to Mojo magazine in a recent interview: ‘I think I resisted realising why people liked it for a long time. Now, I think people love it because it contains all their dark dreams of hedonism – and that’s fine.
‘I hear it all the time, though. People say to me, “Who Wants to Live Forever feels like it was written for me, or my mum or my dad…” It’s in people’s hearts and minds and becomes personal to them.’
Sir Brian observed that it was exactly that which ‘makes a song live on’.
He also revealed that Queen banned ‘gangster rap’ artists from sampling their back catalogue amid fears it would ‘promote violence or abuse’.
Sir Brian May said the British rock band took a stance to say no to certain sample requests because they believed it was the right thing to do, morally.
The 77-year-old guitarist revealed the band refused one specific request because they thought the lyrics of the song were ‘abusive to women’.
‘But otherwise, our songs are for everyone. All art is theft,’ he added.
Sir Brian and his drummer bandmate Roger Taylor continue to tour as Queen with American Idol star Adam Lambert on vocals instead of Mercury, who died in 1991 at the age of 45 from medical complications related to his AIDS diagnosis.
Deacon retired from the band in 1997, after recording Sir Brian’s song No-One But You (Only the Good Die Young), released by Queen in tribute to the late Mercury.
Lambert joined the group initially in 2012 for their first touring collaboration, which continued over the following years and into the worldwide Rhapsody Tour, which ran from 2019 until February 2024.
Discussing his relationship with the legendary rock band ahead of them finishing off the tour in the US, Lambert joked that ‘we just kind of keep going, don’t we?’.
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‘I know when I first performed with them, I thought it was probably going to be a one-off and then one thing led to another and it just snowballed and it became this beautiful relationship that we’ve continued over the past 10 or so years. And I’m delighted, I’m so excited to get back on the road in the States,’ he told Metro in May 2023.
Addressing their future, he added: ‘And I don’t think that’s the end. I think there’s probably more where that came from.’
Queen is one of the most successful acts in the history of music, having sold roughly 300million records.
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