Hot Space as EP

What tracks would you choose if you had to rewrite history and make Hot Space a 3 or 4 track EP?  Ideally it has some kind of theme, and is not so much of a blight on their career.  As a bonus, you can optionally roll one track back for The Game and one track ahead to The Works if you think you can make them fit.  So the goal is to rescue between 3 and 6 tracks from Hot Space and make them work.

OK, I'll play along. Well, unfortunately, I don't think anything on side 1 of Hot Space is salvageable - and, to be honest, I'm not very thrilled about side 2 either.  However, if I had to select a 3-4 track EP, I would choose: Put Out the Fire, Calling All Girls, Las Parablas de Amour, and Under Pressure. I wouldn't move ANY songs onto the previous or subsequent LPs, because they were not specifically recorded for those LPs.

I suppose 'Pressure' doesn't count as it was already a single, so there'd be no point in having it in the EP.

So, I'd choose: 'Staying Power' (with the Mardin intervention being marketed in their benefit), 'Action This Day', ''Put Out the Fire' and 'My Boy' (is that the title? I'm not sure). Nothing for The Game and nothing for The Works.

Best four tracks are Staying Power, Backchat (which has one of Brian's best guitar solos), Las Palabras and Life is Real, but a themed EP should probably have the four funk/dance tracks Staying Power, Backchat, Dancer and Cool Cat. I can feel my feet tapping already. Probably.

Honestly, the 1980s have a lot to answer for. It's the era whan a lot of great rock bands collectively commited suicide.

If they had changed the following:

- Guitar solo on Staying Power, like on the demo
- Scrape Cool Cat and Body Language, in favor of Soul Brother and I Go Crazy

 No-one would be complaining about the album I think, would be quite a logical follow up to The Game.

Interesting matter, yet I think no EP can be forged from Hot Space since we know it as an album. It would feel incomplete if I would have to select only four tracks from the album. Of course, if it would have been a 4-track EP from the beginning I would feel different about this, and my suggestion would be to include either Action This Day, Calling All Girls, Put Out the Fire and Las Palabras de Amor (Pressure not since it was a single already), but as said by someone else perhaps it is a better idea to put the disco/funk tracks on the EP instead of my personal favorites. That would make:
1. Staying Power (with guitar solo!)
2. Dancer
3. Back Chat
4. Body Language

No Cool Cat for me, I really don't like that one. But in the end, I'm happy they released it as a full-length LP instead, with both the disco/funk tracks and my Hot Space favorites. In the end it makes a pretty funny album after all, don't you all think?

I would have Calling All Girls, Put Out The Fire, Las Palabras De Amor, Staying Power with guitar solo.  Wouldn't have Under Pressure because it was released already.

I hate The Works and A Kind of Magic more than Hot Space.  For the Works I think if it were an EP I would have: Hammer To Fall, I Want To Break Free, I Go Crazy and Radio Ga Ga.

AKOM was crap also.  Wouldn't include One Vision because it was a single released earlier.  An AKOM EP would include: AKOM, Princes, Who Wants To Live Forever, and I can't think of a third one.  Granted, I know this is a 'soundtrack'.

GratefulFan wrote: "What tracks would you choose if you had to rewrite history and make Hot Space a 3 or 4 track EP? Ideally it has some kind of theme, and is not so much of a blight on their career."


I don't see it a a blight upon Queen's career at all; I think it's a terrific album. However, if I were to creat an EP, I would choose the following four songs from Hot Space:

1)Staying Power
2)Dancer
3)Put Out The Fire
4)Las Palabras De Amor.

I would also add Soul Brother which IMO should have been on the original album. I would have it as the fourth track, with Las Palabras De Amor ending the album:

1)Staying Power
2)Dancer
3)Put Out The Fire
4)Soul Brother
5)Las Palabras De Amor.

Regarding the other songs, none IMO should be lost to history. I can't say which I would add to The Game or The Works, as most of them don't really fit either album, but I would hope that all of them would be released in some format.

One last comment; while I'm not a massive fan of Under Pressure, it did go to number 1. in the UK, and so, if the HS EP had six tracks, I would include it as the final track. Although, to be honest, I think that a five-song EP probably works best, so I would leave off UP.

It's hard in a way because it can be a subtly different question than 'what are the best 3 or 4 tracks on Hot Space?'  There would have to be some reason for an established album band to suddenly put out an EP and it would have to hang together somehow.  My initial thought was to salvage the dance songs or the songs that would best go over in a club or bar atmosphere and circulate them to clubs with a wink and without fanfare.  The hope would be that they catch on and are appreciated by people in that millieu who didn't go out and buy the album expecting one thing and finding another.  Could be spun as Queen inspired by Munich night life or something, having some limited fun with some new sounds in between 'real' albums.

The four I'd pick to that end for the club oriented EP are, in track order:

Dancer
Body Language
Calling All Girls
Las Parablas

Pressure must not be lost, so I'd roll that back to The Game. That would be kind of epic anyway.

So that's my answer.  And I've probably screwed something up somehow because we've now lost Back Chat and Staying Power which worked well live.   And if I can't have 'Life is Real' I at least want 'Guilt stains on my pillow...' used somewhere else.  Great lyric.

Many of the responses' track listings flow better than mine.  I had a really hard time picking my 3rd track, and in the end it's probably a little jarring.  But for me Hot Space was such a shitfest for the most part that it was a matter of picking the least offensive material from a highly insulting album. LOL  The new wavey vibe of Calling All Girls competed slightly better with the other new wavey stuff going on than the funk tunes did with the funk influenced artists of the era. Being sandwiched between people like Rick James and Prince and others in the early 80's made the studio versionds of the funk stuff on Hot Space the proverbial whiter shade of pale.

If "Hot Space" would have been an EP - in form of a vinyl Maxi single - I guess something like this already given 
suggestion would have been the most likely. 

1. Staying Power
2. Dancer
3. Back Chat
4. Body Language

Cause that was the mission they were on in those days. And it was the rejection of the fans during the first live concerts, that made them rethink their strategy and finally release "Las Palabras". 
If the audiences had demanded for "Body Language" and danced along to "Staying Power"....well, the Queen story might have taken a very different path..
I think the success of "Another one bites the dust" has confused them, which is easy to understand. I mean we are looking back being wise after the event...

GratefulFan wrote: Many of the responses' track listings flow better than mine. 

You still rock though ;)

Stop talking and send me concerts! :)

I've always wondered too if it wasn't just the success of AOBTD, but the American success of AOBTD. Perhaps is was lunging for the golden ring that screwed up their instincts.

Am I really the only person here who not only doesn't regard Hot Space as a mistake, but who loves the album? :D