From Queenpedia.com

After the release of Queen's fourth album, A Night At The Opera, and the resulting tour that ran from November 1975 until April 1976, the band had a new management (John Reid) and decided to take some time to enjoy everything that being world famous rock stars had to offer; for Brian, this meant marrying his long-standing girlfriend, Chrissy Mullen, on May 29th, over a month after the band's last live date. Clearly, they weren't in any rush to be back on the road or in the studio; in July, they finally began work on the follow-up to A Night At The Opera, recording material at three studios (compared to its predecessor's seven): The Manor, Wessex Studios, and Sarm Studios.

Unlike the sessions for A Night At The Opera, the band weren't under any pressing schedules to quickly record an album and go out on the road to promote it; in fact, apart from four concerts in September, the band wouldn't tour again until January 1977. Three of those four concerts (two at the Playhouse Theatre in Edinburgh on September 1st and 2nd, and one at Cardiff Castle on September 10th) were as part of festivals, while the fourth date, on September 18th (coincidentally, the sixth anniversary of Jimi Hendrix's untimely death), was held at Hyde Park, organized by the band to be a free event to thank their British fans for being so loyal to them, even as Queen's popularity grew exponentially.

Because these live dates came midway through the recording sessions, it only made sense that some of the new songs be incorporated into the set: Tie Your Mother Down and You Take My Breath Away were both played, becoming one of the rare times when new material would be performed live before being officially released; also new to the set was an acoustic interlude, with the latter new song as well as Brian's '39, performed by the band at the front of the stage with Freddie on lead vocals and Roger banging away on a bass drum and tambourine. Apart from a minor snafu that threatened to become a major headache (the band's set overran by half an hour, and because of strict time restrictions, the police were called to make sure the band didn't go back out; the band reluctantly agreed not to, particularly Freddie, who wouldn't have been much pleased being hauled away to jail wearing his white spandex suit!), the night was a success, and the band would speak highly of the gig for years after.

Following the concerts, it was back to work on the new album. For the first time, Queen were unassisted by a producer, evidently feeling that they had done all they could do with Roy Thomas Baker, preferring to work on their own (as ever, Mike Stone helped engineer the album). The sessions finally concluded in November, and the following month, A Day At The Races was released to much acclaim, though some critics were quick to point out that the band were merely rehashing a formula which had worked so well on the previous album, sighing that the formula had become stale and didn't work on the new album. Unlike A Night At The Opera, the material isn't as diverse here, though it's easy to see the parallels between the two similarly-themed albums: You Take My Breath Away is an update of Love Of My Life, while The Millionaire Waltz takes the studio trickery and adventurousness of Bohemian Rhapsody, though critics claimed that Somebody To Love was the new Bohemian Rhapsody. John Deacon gets another lovely pop song in the form of You And I, which could be seen as a superior rewrite of You're My Best Friend, while Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy was written in the same vein as Freddie's previous vaudeville / music hall-inspired material like Seaside Rendezvous, Lazing On A Sunday Afternoon, and Bring Back That Leroy Brown. However, that's where the similarities end; the material on A Day At The Races is heavier and more deliberate, preferring performance and atmosphere over perfection.

The first single from the album, Somebody To Love, reached #2 in the UK and a respectable #13 in the US, while subsequent singles didn't perform as well: Tie Your Mother Down peaked at #31 in the UK and #49 in the US, and Queen's First EP, with Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy being the main track, reached #17 in the UK (the EP wasn't released at all in the US; instead, Long Away was released, but failed to chart due to an absence of a performance video and Freddie's instantly recognizable lead vocals). Like its predecessor, the album sailed into the UK charts at #1 and reached #5 in the US. In 1991, the album was re-released on CD in the US with two remixes of Tie Your Mother Down and Somebody To Love, featuring only minor, subtle differences to the originals.

Vinyl Side 1 01. Tie Your Mother Down (May) - 4:46 02. You Take My Breath Away (Mercury) - 5:08 03. Long Away (May) - 3:33 04. The Millionaire Waltz (Mercury) - 4:55 05. You And I (Deacon) - 3:26 Side 2 01. Somebody To Love (Mercury) - 4:57 02. White Man (May) - 4:59 03. Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy (Mercury) - 2:54 04. Drowse (Taylor) - 3:45 05. Teo Torriatte (Let Us Cling Together) (May) - 5:53

1991 Hollywood Records CD 01. Tie Your Mother Down (May) - 4:46 02. You Take My Breath Away (Mercury) - 5:08 03. Long Away (May) - 3:33 04. The Millionaire Waltz (Mercury) - 4:55 05. You And I (Deacon) - 3:26 06. Somebody To Love (Mercury) - 4:57 07. White Man (May) - 4:59 08. Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy (Mercury) - 2:54 09. Drowse (Taylor) - 3:45 10. Teo Torriatte (Let Us Cling Together) (May) - 5:53 11. Tie Your Mother Down (remix) (May) - 3:44 12. Somebody To Love (remix) (Mercury) - 5:00

Credits

• Musicians:

Freddie Mercury - vocals, piano, choir meister, tantrums, choir vocals on Somebody To Love

Brian May - guitars, vocals, leader of the orchestra, introduction on Tie Your Mother Down, lead vocals on Long Away, guitar orchestrations on The Millionaire Waltz, choir vocals on Somebody To Love, slide guitar on Drowse, harmonium, piano and plastic piano on Teo Torriatte (Let Us Cling Together)

Roger Taylor - drums, vocals, percussion, pandemonium, choir vocals on Somebody To Love, rhythm guitar and lead vocals on Drowse

John Deacon - Fender bass, acoustic guitar on You And I

Mike Stone - additional vocals on Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy

• Produced by: Queen.

• Recorded: July - November 1976 at The Manor, Oxfordshire; Wessex Studios, Highbury; Sarm Studios, Aldgate.

Charts

• #1 (UK), #5 (US).

Liner notes

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Additional info

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Reviews

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