Queen: Days of Our Lives Page #9

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I think we had a couple of meetings

and staff to discuss

were we still together etc, etc.

What to do if you're a member

of an internationally successful

rock band but want to

blow off creative steam

that doesn't fit the band's image.

Our next guest has faced that,

he is Roger Taylor.

He's just blown off some of his own

steam with his second solo album,

Strange Frontier. Let's look at it.

# Sometimes I feel

like a man on fire

# Sometimes I feel

like a man possessed

# Sometimes I wanna burn down

this crazy town... #

I think we decided we

needed a break.

Queen propelled us into the world

but also in a sense it confined us

into a very small space. We just worked with

each other, not the other fabulous musicians.

I ended up in LA

and one morning just got up

and rang up some mates there and

said, "Why don't we do something?"

And it led to

the Star Fleet Project.

# Star fleet, star fleet

# Star fleet, star fleet... #

At a certain point we were

all ready, there's no doubt.

We'd been off doing

our different things,

refreshing ourselves but we were

ready to get back in the studio.

This is the hardest time for us,

this is a big test, we've been

in the business 12 years and to keep

it going that much further is hard.

The Works was the next album.

We thought we wanted somewhere

nice and warm

and not freezing bloody cold Munich.

So that really made sense,

to go to LA to make that record.

And I think we got back on track

in The Works, actually.

They were a complicated

musical marriage.

They didn't have one room in

a studio, they had three or four.

Studio B, Studio C,

Studio D, Studio E.

But that was a good thing

cos it allowed everybody to

work on their individual songs.

In the early days it was

Brian and Freddie

who really used to write

most of the material

but over the last five years,

Roger and I have started to

contribute more.

I thought John Deacon was

kind of a secret weapon because

he would come up with these

major hits out of nowhere.

He had this track,

I Want To Break Free,

and it was pretty much there

except this big hole in the middle.

I mean, John did not want a guitar

solo so he asked Fred Mandel,

a very brilliant keyboard player,

to improvise something

around the main tune

and Fred did this brilliant take.

SYNTHESIZER ON "I WANT TO BREAK FREE"

You know, all their records used

to say prominently "no synthesizers"

then I come along

like another schmuck

and put synthesizers on everything.

I wasn't too happy at the time

but I gave it my blessing,

that's the deal.

The polarity of writing

within the band changed.

I think the time has come

where we actually...

in songwriting,

we're completely even.

Roger will come up with something

like Radio Ga Ga and it's perfect.

It was Sunday afternoon, my son

Felix came in, he was very young

and he just sort of went,

"Ah, radio, caca"

cos he's half French.

And, um, I just thought

that's quite nice, you know.

I put the backing track together

and presented it to Freddie

who really loved it.

We took it into the next room

and then Fred and I worked

on the vocoder parts.

# All we hear is

# Radio ga ga

# Radio goo goo

# Radio ga ga... #

If you listen,

several times it says "radio caca".

# Radio ga ga

# Radio ga ga... #

Radio Ga Ga brought Queen back.

# Radio... #

It came from a rock thing.

Radio Ga Ga combined the best

elements of

the '70s with the '80s.

That's where Queen had a strength

with The Works.

It was more of a substantial hit

even though it didn't actually make

the top 10 in America.

But it got played a lot

and the video made a big impact.

# Let's hope you never

# Leave, old friend

# Like all good things

# On you we depend

# So stick around

# Cos we might miss you... #

We had a killer video which we

put a lot of work into.

# You had your time

# You had the power

# You've yet to have... #

The whole thing just felt good,

of its time.

It felt a bit different.

It felt modern and it was very fresh.

# All we hear is radio ga ga

# Radio goo goo

# Radio ga ga... #

All of a sudden people,

would participate jointly

in Radio Ga Ga situations.

A collective statement

that was good on the radio,

or on a turntable.

In live, it really was

a unification.

# All we hear is radio ga ga

# Radio goo goo

# Radio ga ga... #

Freddie said,

"What we do is like the Olympics.

"It's people believing in you

and everyone behind you.

"Everyone doing the same thing.

"That's the Olympics. "

He said, "That's what we do. "

# Radio ga ga, radio ga ga... #

Suddenly the MTV generation grew up

and video became all-important.

The most enjoyable video was

I Want To Break Free

because we just laughed.

I was dying to dress up in drag.

Doesn't everybody?

And everybody ran into their frocks

quicker than anything.

It was their idea, basically,

and I said, "Yeah, let's have a go. "

# I want to break free

# I want to break free

# I want to break free

from your lies... #

That great video was a loving

reference to Coronation Street.

# I've got to break free... #

Americans didn't understand it. It just

looked like we wanted to dress up in drag.

It was unthinkable

to most of middle America.

# I've got to break free... #

It's a very British thing. Sometimes the humour

doesn't translate. I'm Canadian so I get it.

It was just a different

style of humour

and I don't think it went over

with the "MTV generation".

I remember this video being banned.

MTV were very quick on the

trigger to ban things then.

I mean, if you thought

Mary Whitehouse was bad,

you should have seen some of

the geezers running MTV

in the very early '80s.

Well, MTV were very narrow-minded.

It was Whitesnake,

and f***ing Whitesnake,

and then another Whitesnake track.

And they decided that

they didn't think men in drag

was rock enough for them, I guess,

so they didn't play the video.

Most Americans were deprived of my,

and Freddie's,

favourite moment of that video.

I said to Freddie, "I love

the way you double-step...

# But life still goes on... #

.. to get from one room to the other.

And he said, "I'm so glad you

noticed. That's my favourite part. "

#.. without you by my side

# I don't want to live alone

# Hey, God knows

# I've got to make it... #

The funny thing is, we became global

but we lost America.

And we kind of never got it back.

# I've got to break free. #

Freddie wouldn't go back

to tour America

unless they were touring a hit,

and of course

that's the chicken and egg

because the less you tour America,

the more you lose America.

It was sad, it's a shame, because

there's a whole catalogue of hits,

worldwide hits, but not in the

States, and that'll never come back.

Appearing at Sun City

never helped anybody's image,

and sometimes it hurt.

Sun City was this resort of

international standard in South Africa

and the position taken

by most of the rock community

was that if you went to South Africa

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