Hot Space

Here, here to the Rhyeking!  Maybe a new career working for the United Nations is on order!  Very well expressed and true.  A band like Queen attract (and polarise) divergent opinions by the very diversity of their music.  Therein too, lies the basis of their popularity, there is something in there for most tastes.  The same illustrious support for the comment on the the 'biggest, 'better' or 'true fan'; nicely said!

Hot Space is great! It is just different.

Every  Iconic Band has tried an experiemental sound out of their signature sound if you will some got away with it Especially Rod Stewart and The Stones. Rather quickly i might add.. however queens record sales coupled with shiity label promotion by capitol wasnt a shadow of what was being sold at the beginning of the decade

Another Hot space thread.....The most discussed album on queenzone.   It's not the greatest, nor the worst album in the world.    An inconsistent album for me,  but has some good moments.  Aside from under pressure it doesn't have any legendary moments either.   The songs i don't like are dancer,  body Language, Put out the fire, and calling all girls.  The rest is either good or decent.

Not that my opinion is of any importance to anyone but me but I like Hot Space.

When it came out, I bought it and was taken aback at how different it was to anything Queen had done before. I stopped trying to get into it after a week or so, as I found it pretty weak and insipid. Consequently, I didn't play it for years. I even bought the 1990's remaster on CD but didn't listen to that either.

A couple of years ago, I started listening to it and now it's probably my favourite 80's album by the band. It has a warmth that is lacking in the digitally produced albums that followed it and has more sincerity than the Queen album by numbers approach of The Works. As somebody else said here, it is the last time the band tried to do something new with their music. For me, the weakest songs are the more "traditional Queen" songs. My faves are all the first side (though I much prefer the 12" remix of Back Chat) and the wonderful Cool Cat. The rest just sounds like watered down Queen to me...

mike hunt wrote: Another Hot space thread.....The most discussed album on queenzone.   It's not the greatest, nor the worst album in the world.    An inconsistent album for me,  but has some good moments.  Aside from under pressure it doesn't have any legendary moments either.   The songs i don't like are dancer,  body Language, Put out the fire, and calling all girls.  The rest is either good or decent.
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Funny how the great albums are hardly discussed past comments like "Queen II is awesome!" And something like Flash Gordon is practically ignored on the forums. Yet, as you rightly point out, Hot Space is possibly the most hotly debated album on here. 30 years on we're still analyzing and dissecting it.

Which is great. What it couldn't achieve via musical quality, was balanced out by controversy.

Only 4 out of 11 tracks are "dancey"

1 Staying Power
2 Dancer
3 Back Chat
4 Body Language (always thought this was influenced by Human League's Being Boiled)

5 Action This Day is a rock song
6 Put Out the Fire - a Brian rocker
7 Life Is Real is a balled at the same pace as It's A Hard Life
8 Calling All Girls is pop
9 Las Palabras de Amor is a typical harmony laden Queen epic 
10 Cool Cat is almost jazz. I can imagine Manhattan Transfer doing a version
11 Under Pressure is rock

What's not to like?

As Fred said "People get so excited about these things".

splicksplack wrote: What's not to like?

Looking to the list of those songs apart from the arrangements most songs themselves are pretty weak compared to what they wrote on earlier albums. There is nothing apart from "Under Pressure" that comes near the quality of former songs like "Somebody to Love" or rockers like "Now I'm here" or "It's late"....  

Looking back knowing what we know today "Hot Space" was an important step for the band to find out, that even for them there were some musical borders they could not cross successfully. Until then they thought they could do everything. 

I remember the Hot Space concert in Dortmund, where the few new songs sounded horrible and were greeted with an ice-cold reception. And after the show I left the building with the thought that this might be the beginning of the end. Usually bands only had 3 or 4 big years before it went down again.... 

So "Hot Space" is a strange and controversial album to this day and I can understand that even today people who discover it, are a bit confused.

I agree it's confusing.

I can't imagine a non-Queen fan picking it up and enjoying both Put Out The Fire and Body Language. Unles of course they have a broad taste base (which , unfortunately, not many do).

I also agree the songs aren't that strong.

I believe Hot Space was one of Freddie's strongest vocally. So a modern slant on some of the dancey tracks will give these songs new life, as the production overall could do with more work.  Not Mack's fault technology and recording techniques not so complex.

Those Horns on Staying Power were pile of shite and ruined the song imo. The Demo sounded much better and catchier. Btw loved the bass and drums on this track even though they were obviously synth.

Slightly off topic, but here are a few rarities I'd expect to see on the Hot Space Deluxe Edition:

Soul Brother (I know it's not that rare, but I see it being the first thing they'll go for, being a non-album B-Side)
Cool Cat (Original Bowie Version) (Bowie may veto this, as he did 30 years ago, so 50/50 chance we'll it. It would be nice though)
I Go Crazy (Original 1982 Instrumental Demo) (Apparently this has been played at a convention. I'd love to get an official copy.)
There Must Be More To Life Than This (Queen Version) (It exists, according to the FM Solo Collection boxed set)
Sex Show (Demo) (According to Brian's Queen Rock Montreal commentary, this was recorded around that time)

Any other unreleased period demos would be fine, too, except maybe the ones already leaked. I know "Cool Cat" with Bowie is out there, but still, a good clean remastered copy would be nice.

Re:  Cool Cat with Bowie

This track with Bowie caused the band so much trouble when Hot Space was about to be released.  QPL cannot be bothered to do so many of their own productions such as Hammersmith 1975, 1979 etc, so I doubt they can be bothered to go through the trouble with Bowie again for a bonus track !

According to Freddie, the album was ready to go when Bowie called them up at the last minute and said not to use his vocals on that song because he didn't like them or wasn't happy about his performance. Either way, yes, it caused considerable headaches for everyone, having to re-mix the track, taking Bowie's parts out, and that delayed its release.

You could be right, QP may not bother trying, but I'd think it would be little more than a phone call to the man asking his permission. The worst he could say is no, but who knows, he may have mellowed on it 30 years later. Bowie himself has been involved with issuing plenty of his own rarities and b-sides and demos over the years, so he's hardly stingy about that sort of thing. The situation is different now, too, as this version isn't being considered the album version, but an extra track, not meant to be taken too seriously. I'd hope he'd see that way and say yes.

He has a good relationship with Queen still, allowing the Rah Mix and such to be issued with his name and vocals, plus he still performs "Under Pressure" live, so who knows? Maybe it's wishful thinking, but we'll find out eventually.