Credits

• Written by: Brian May
• Produced by: Queen, Roy Thomas Baker, and John Anthony
• Musicians:

Freddie Mercury - lead and backing vocals

Brian May - guitars, backing vocals

John Deacon - bass guitar

Roger Taylor - drums, tambourine, backing vocals

• Length: 3:47

Discography

Albums:

	Queen, 1973
	Live Killers, 1979
	Queen At The Beeb, 1989
	Classic Queen, 1992
	Queen At The BBC, 1995 USA
	Queen Rocks, 1997

Singles:

	Keep Yourself Alive, 1973 A-side
	Keep Yourself Alive, 1975 A-side (reissue)
	Now I'm Here, 1976 Japanese B-side
	The Show Must Go On, 1991 B-side
	Heaven For Everyone, 1995 CD single

Alternate Versions:

• US 7" Edit (3:29)
• De Lane Lea Original Demo (3:40)
• BBC Sessions (05.02.1973) (3:51)
• BBC Sessions (25.07.1973) (3:40)
• Long Lost Re-take (4:05)
• Long Lost Re-take Edit (Acetate promo only) (3:29)
• Karaoke Instrumental Edit (3:15)
• Karaoke Instrumental (Unreleased)

Compilations:

21 Years of Alternative Radio 1, CD, 1988

Harley-Davidson Cycles: Road Songs, Vol. 2, CD, 1998

Forever Changing: The Golden Age of Elektra 1963-1973, CD, 2006

Soundtracks:

• Encino Man (featured in the movie but not on the soundtrack CD)

Queen Talks

"The first recording of it ever was in De Lane Lea when we did it ourselves and I’ve still got that recording and I think it’s very good and has something which the single never had. But THEY pressurised us very strongly to redo all the tracks and we redid ‘Keep Yourself Alive’ with Roy and it was pretty awful, actually. I thought it was terrible and I was very unhappy about it and I thought the De Lane Lea one was better and I eventually managed to persuade Roy that it was better as well. So, we went back in and did it again in a way that was a bit more true to the original. But there is no way that you can ever really repeat something. I have this great belief that the magic of the moment can never be recaptured and, although we ended up with something that was technically in the playing and perhaps even in the recording a bit better than the De Lane Lea thing. I still think that the De Lane Lea one had that certain sort of magic, so I was never really happy. As it turned out no one else was ever really happy either and we kept remixing it. We thought that it’s the mix that’s wrong, we kept remixing and there must have been, at least, seven or eight different mixes by different groups of people. Eventually we went in and did a mix with Mike Stone, our engineer, and that’s the one that we were in the end happiest with. That’s the one we put out.

But, to my mind ‘Keep Yourself Alive’ was never really satisfactory. Never had that magic that it should have had."

Brian May - 1983, BBC Radio One

Interviewer: How did you process the rhythm strums on the version of 'Keep Yourself Alive' on the Queen album?

"That was real tape phasing. This was in the days when you took the tape off the synch head, put it though a couple of other tape delays, and then brought it back with the play head. There is no processing whatsoever on the solo in that tune, as far as I remember. I used John Deacon's small amplifier and the Vox AC-30 to do those little three-part chorus thing behind, as well as the fingerboard pickup on the guitar. There is a bit more tape phasing on the end of that track."

Brian May - 1982, On The Record

Covers

Cover Versions

Chords & Tabs

• Keep Yourself Alive tab, transcribed by PD

Lyrics