Made In Heaven (Queen album) - Queenpedia.com - Freddie Mercury, Brian May, Roger Taylor, John Deacon, Discography, Bibliography, Charts

Recorded: January - June 1991 at Mountain Studios, Montreux; late 1993 - early 1995 at Allerton Hill and Cosford Mill Studios, Surrey, and Metropolis Studios, London.

Charts

#1 (UK), #58 (US).

Liner notes

All tracks arranged and produced by Queen

Mixing supervision by David Richards

Additional material recorded by Mack

Extra backing vocals on 'Let Me Live' by Rebecca Leigh-White, Gary Martin, Catherine Porter and Miriam Stockley

Excerpt from 'Goin' Back' courtesy of Gerry Goffin and Carole King

Mastered by Kevin Metcalfe

Management: Jim Beach

Queen Office: Julie Glover and Sally Gallagher

Studio equipment co-ordination: Martin Groves, Peter Malandrone and Steve Prior

Artwork: Richard Gray

Sleeve design: Richard Gray and Queen

Cover photograph: Richard Gray

Other photographs: Douglas Puddifoot and Neal Preston

Sculpture: Irena Sedlecka

Publicity: Phil Symes, Cowan Symes & Associates, 35 Soho Square, London W1

Queen International Fan Club: Jacky Smith, The Old Bakehouse, 16a Barnes High Street, London SW13

The Queen longform video - directed by Rudi Dolezal and Hannes Rossacher

The Queen short films produced by Janine Marmot for Queen Films and The British Film Institute

Dedicated to the immortal spirit of Freddie Mercury

Additional info

The vast majority of the recording work finishing off the tracks for the album was recorded in Allerton Hill and Cosford Mill studios, which share one thing in common, they're both home studios belonging to Queen band members.

From deciding to start work on constructing MIH to it's release date took nearly eighteen months as a concerted effort from Brian, Roger and John. Brian later said that although making the album was a task that had to be done, he wouldn't want to go through it ever again.

The sound-bursts you hear on the end of Mother Love, are apparently a few seconds of every Queen track ever recorded, put together, and then rapidly sped through a tape machine.

The two covers are not genuine original photographs, but a pair of composite shots. The two different cover shots of the view across Lake Geneva, were of one of sunrise and the other of sunset. Brian, Roger and John were photographed in a London studio, and the statue was still in it's sculpturer's/maker's studio for it's part of the photo session. The building on stilts, otherwise known as the duckhouse, is at one end of the lake shore at Montreux, and Freddie's statue is pretty much at the other, and just a short distance from the band's studios there.

Reviews

Entertainment Weekly, 1995

Initially recorded while the singer was suffering through the worst stages of AIDS (and completed in the four years since he succumbed), the album represents the last public words from a man approaching his last breath.

But fear not! Mercury--arguably rock's campiest performer--would never let anything (even death) turn things dreary. Made in Heaven depicts an almost Disneyesque view of the End, opening with the sound of tweeting birds and winding through ballads beaming with gooey wonder. Given its halting construction, it also makes for a surprisingly organic work with no shortage of highlights, from the rock version of Mercury's solo dance hit "I Was Born to Love You," to the wonderfully schmaltzy title song, to a fascinating jaw dropper of an unlisted finale. This last track, a 22-minute wash of celestial ahhs and twinkle, presents what could be rock's first-ever depiction of the afterlife, with heaven presented as some flouncy Hollywood epic. It's the perfect theatrical epitaph for a life dedicated to gorgeous artifice.

Additional Reviews