With the remixed, remastered and expanded version of Queen's classic 1973 debut album now available, The Greatest goes behind the scenes with Brian May and Roger Taylor to explore the creation of this landmark album.
In 1972, having had their first taste of professional recording at De Lane Lea studios for a demo reel, the band were understandably excited when they were given access to the famous Trident Studios to start work on their first album. However, they quickly discovered that their idea of how Queen should sound was at odds with that of the studio bosses, and for Roger, it posed a particular challenge.
Taylor's status amongst the all-time greats of rock drumming is cast in stone. But when it comes to the original pressing of their self-titled 1973 debut album, the Queen co-founder's masterful drum parts were the cruellest casualty of studio sessions that saw the young band struggle to reconcile their vision with the sound foisted upon them by their original label, Trident Audio Productions and for Roger, it posed a particular challenge.
It's only now, with the release of the newly remixed, remastered and expanded Queen I boxset, that fans can hear Roger's stellar percussion live and breathe as it should have back in 1973. And in this final episode of this Queen The Greatest Special series, Roger Taylor looks back on the half-century road to this acclaimed restoration.
As Roger explains, the creative freedom he enjoyed while tracking Queen's demos at De Lane Lea Studios in December 1971 ended when album sessions proper began the following year at Trident Studios in Soho. "At De Lane Lea, we'd just turn up and do what we can - and quickly. At Trident, it did feel like, 'OK, now we're in it,' but I didn't really get on with their ideas. They had a drum booth and it was a well-known sound: very dry and dead, which is not what I wanted. I wanted to hear the drums resonate. I didn't want it to go 'thud, whack.' But that's what they wanted. There was cloth over everything, and everything was taped down."
Adding insult to injury, Roger found himself forced onto the stool of a flavourless Hayman acrylic drumkit. "I didn't even have my proper kit in there. I had to play this sh***y little kit. It was just awful. We were told: 'This is the Trident sound.' But we didn't want the Trident sound. We wanted our sound. I really had a bad time playing that kit, which is why, actually, if you listen to the demos - which I played on my relatively cheap kit in De Lane Lea - it's a higher standard of drumming. It's quite busy, but it makes sense. And it's just better to listen to."
Closing the series, this week's episode of Queen The Greatest lets you be the judge - with A/B/C samples of the flat Trident drum sound, the sparkier beats from De Lane Lea, and finally the thrilling remastering heard on the new boxset. "What we've done now with Queen I is we've used all the actual recordings but made it sound more like we wanted it to sound at the time," explains Roger. "So it's 'liver', the drums are more alive and more ambient. So, for me, it's a significant improvement, and I know Brian feels the same."
And in this final episode of this Queen The Greatest Special series we get to witness the evolution of the drum sound and compare the three versions of the opening to Liar - the first recorded at De Lane Lea, the second the original Trident recording, and finally the new 2024 remix.
Pick up some Queen for your collection here.
See also:
Queen stream 1975 performance of Keep Yourself Alive
Queen upgrades cover art for 1973 debut album reissue
Queen revisits early promo videos on The Story Of Queen 1
Queen stream remastered official video for 1973 classic Liar
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