Queen launch 50-week YouTube series celebrating live legacy
Queen have launched a 50-week Youtube series called Queen: The Greatest Live, which is set to offer fans an insight into their live on the road.
It is the sequel to their previous YouTube series Queen: The Greatest, which was announced in March 2021 and told the band’s story from their earliest shows to their return with Adam Lambert. The new series promises “rare archive live footage, contemporary performances and behind-the-scenes interviews from across Queen’s five decades”.
The series was put together by longtime band associate Simon Lupton, who produced Queen: The Greatest and also worked on the documentaries Queen: Rock the World, Queen: Behind the Rhapsody, Queen: Days of Our Lives, Queen on Fire: Live at the Bowl and Queen Live at Wembley ’86.
In the first episode of the new series, Brian May and Roger Taylor talk about the process they go through in rehearsals and how they put setlists together. “Rehearsing with Roger is always a bit of a surprise because you don’t know how much you’re going to remember and you don’t know if it’s still going to feel the same,” said May [transcribed by Classic Rock]. “But it’s surprising how stuff does flow back into you, into your veins once you start kicking stuff around.”
“Normally we play a song through and see if it works, if we think it’s going to work live, and they don’t always work live,” added Taylor. “Some of them just, they’re not suited really for an exciting or involving, engaging performance, a live performance. So there’s quite a few songs we’ve never played live that have been on albums and probably for good reason.”
Check out the first instalment of Queen: The Greatest Live below:
May hinted at the possibility of new live shows with Adam Lambert in an interview with Variety back in November. “There’s a strong possibility that we’ll be going out together again. We’re talking about that as you and I speak, making those decisionsm,” he said. “Now, it does get to be more of a decision as you get older. I’m not 35 anymore, and leaving home for two months is not easy.
“But we feel as like if we’re all fit and well, that we’d like to go out there one more time. It would probably be in the United States in 2023 at some point. I’m hoping that happens, but it’s a strong possibility.”
Elsewhere, Che Lingo recently released a song called ‘My Radio’ that reimagined Queen’s hit ‘Radio Ga Ga’ through a contemporary hip hop lens and featured a guest turn from Roger Taylor.
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Emma Wilkes
NME
