What might have been... (aka Alternate album track listings)

In answering a post on the Serious thread, I played out what might have happened if Freddie had offered "We Are The Champions" up during the Opera sessions, when he claims he wrote it. That got me thinking that in the early days, Queen could have put out very different albums if only one or two circumstances had been slightly different. Let's take a look...

Given when we know songs were written (or at least started), some even predating Queen, if they'd been used at that time, here's what we might have seen: 

Queen (1972):
Keep Yourself Alive
Doing All Right
Great King Rat
White Queen (As It Began)
Hangman
Liar
Polar Bear 
Son And Daughter
Jesus
See What A Fool I've Been

Queen II (1973):
Tie Your Mother Down
(Edit) Step On Me *
My Fairy King
Mad The Swine
The Night Comes Down
Ogre Battle
Modern Times Rock 'N' Roll
Feelings
Stone Cold Crazy
The Seven Seas Of Rhye

* I previously had this as "Great King Rat," accidentally placing it on two albums (serves me right posting at 1 AM)

Queen III (1973):
Procession
Father To Son
Brighton Rock Solo
Loser In The End
The Fairy Feller's Master-Stroke
Nevermore
The March Of The Black Queen
Funny How Love Is

Sheer Heart Attack (1974):
Now I'm Here
Killer Queen
Tenement Funster
Flick Of The Wrist
Lily Of The Valley
In The Lap Of The Gods
Sheer Heart Attack
Dear Friends
Misfire
Bring Back That Leroy Brown
She Makes Me (Stormtrooper In Stilettos)
In The Lap Of The Gods...Revisited
God Save The Queen

A Night At The Opera (1975):
Death On Two Legs (Dedicated to...
Lazing On A Sunday Afternoon
I'm In Love With My Car
You're My Best Friend
'39
Sweet Lady
Seaside Rendezvous
The Prophet's Song
Love Of My Life
Good Company
Bohemian Rhapsody
We Are The Champions

A Day At The Races (1976):
A Day At The Races Fanfare
White Man
You Take My Breath Away
Long Away
The Millionaire Waltz
You And I
Somebody To Love
Let Me Out*
Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy
Drowse
Teo Torriatte (Let Us Cling Together)

* I'm not sure when Brian wrote this, but he's said it was an old song when he used it on the Star Fleet Project, so I'm guessing he had it written by 1976. I may be wrong.

News Of The World (1977):
We Will Rock You
Turn On The TV
Feelings, Feelings
All Dead, All Dead
Spread Your Wings
Fight From The Inside
Get Down, Make Love
Sleeping On The Sidewalk
Who Needs You
It's Late
My Melancholy Blues
We Will Rock You (Fast)

hahaha Queen III.....  ..

Actually... There doesnt appear to be many a song on this Queen III cut... Which, by Queens standards they would of tried to make an even better album than the first two., 

But, in a another world.... eh em.... Queen III would of been pretty cool, even just as an album title.

Good thread! I've been thinking about this quite a bit with these reissues.

Yep - cracking thread RhyeKing.

Early Queen were simply unstoppable - doing something that no other Glam Rock bands had even tried to do - be taken seriously as rock bands in competition with the established Zeppelin, Who, Stones etc.

You've missed out "Silver Salmon" which would sit in place of "Feelings" IMVHO; "Feelings" has always sounded to me as if it was nothing more than a studio jam based on an improvised riff as opposed to being the basis for an actual song.  Freddie's just scat singing lyrics as he was prone to do but there's nothing there in terms of structure - all very loose and brilliant.  So for "Queen" I'd tack "Feelings" and "Silver Salmon" together where the bootlegged tracks have been split and have them on as a single track under the title "Silver Salmon".

I'd happily leave out "Polar Bear" as Freddie was never really going to get to grips with that key at that stage and nothing but a perfect vocal would have been released for a song that delicate.  Having said that, all bootleg copies of the track run W A Y too fast to make a decent judgement.

"Stone Cold Crazy" is also missing from the first two albums and I'd slot it in there on "Queen II".

You also have "Great King Rat" on both "Queen" and "Queen II" - that's an interesting one because the versions we have available to us are quite different as opposed to the various versions of "Keep Yourself Alive" and "Liar" on the BBC Sessions.  Therefore, I'd have "GKR" from the BBC Session 3 on "Queen II" and then the version of "Son And Daughter" from the BBC Session 2.

"Queen"

Keep Yourself Alive
Doing All Right
Great King Rat
White Queen
See What A Fool I've Been - 2011 Remaster Bonus Track Version
Hangman
Liar
Silver Salmon
Jesus
Son And Daughter - BBC Session 2 Version

"Queen II"

The Seven Seas Of Rhye - "Queen" version.
Tie Your Mother Down
My Fairy King
Stone Cold Crazy
The Night Comes Down
Ogre Battle
Modern Times Rock And Roll
Mad The Swine
Great King Rat - BBC Session 3 Version
The Seven Seas Of Rhye

To me, "Queen II" is then a slightly disappointing follow-up to the debut album and doesn't carry the drama the version they released does.  However, what it *DOES* do is display a different Queen in terms of there being an overall lighter feel to the material on the LP.

I'm then not sure that the next release could have gotten away with being called "Queen III" - the comparisons to Zep would have been too easy to hold against Queen and the content of the album being that much "riffier" would have lead them down a tricky path.  "Monkey Business", "Horse Feathers" or "Duck Soup" would have kicked off the Marx Bros. link, but I'm not certain Freddie would have been thinking along those lines at that stage

I did also have a track list somewhere for a double album of the material that made up "A Night At The Opera" and "A Day At The Races" - will try to dig it out if I can, but I always thought they'd have done something along the lines of what Zep did with "Physical Grafiti" and put out a really grand LP of material.

Oops, yes, I did put GKR on two albums. That's what happens when I shuffle around tracks and forget to delete one. I just changed it to "Step On Me."

The title Queen III was just sort of a place holder really for whatever such an intermediate album could have been called. And yes, it has 8 tracks instead of 10, but the Brighton Rock Solo could be long enough to push the album to about 40 minutes.

It's interesting that there might have been enough material for a whole album, or maybe an EP, with the stuff they didn't record or were B-sides:

Hangman
Mad The Swine
See What A Fool I've Been
Step On Me
Polar Bear
Feelings
Green
Vagabond Outcast
or any of the other songs from the Ibex/Wreckage days.

I was also stretching reality to the point where I'd assume each song (outtakes particularly) would be completed properly, as opposed to appearing as the unpolished versions we have.

I didn't put "Silver Salmon" on any of them because as it's a Tim Staffell-penned track, along with "Earth," and figured that Queen would draw the line at a song not at least co-authored by one of them (hence the Brian/Tim songs getting a pass). I also didn't put on the "Rock And Roll Medley," "April Lady," "If I Were A Carpenter," or any of the others.

And obviously the whole thing is to spark discussion. The possibilities are many and I'd love to see what other people come up with.

You missed Silver Salmon, which I think it's from the NOTW sessions....And I would put Stone Cold Crazy On the "Queen" album

I listened to the Queen I version of SSOR for the first time in ages last night, and it's quite interesting to think we've had a demo of a great track under our noses all these years. Imagine if they didn't release it and we'd just heard it now. There must be LOADS of stuff like that in the vault.

Wait... Tie Your Mother Down is from 1973?

Supposedly earlier - '68?

Wow... Well, you learn something new everyday!

Isn´t " Turn On The TV" only a work tittle for "Sheer heart attack" ?? i guess if they would put "sheer heart attack" in SHA -album- they don´t need to re-work the song,so "Turn on the tv" must not exists....

or  are you saying that Turn on the TV would be a song very similar to Sheer heart attack (in NOTW album) and Sheer heart attack (in SHA album) would be a complete different song??

sorry if i confused the post too much!
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to MadTheSwine7973: Tie your mother down was written by brian in a clasical guitar when he was doing one of his degree in astrophysic (or something like that) so probably is a song wich could has been added tothe Queen II album

"Turn On The TV" is the B-side to the "I Wanna Testify" single, written by Roger and recorded during the NOTW sessions, so I felt it appropriate that it could be a candidate for inclusion either as is or with the other three members of Queen on it.

And I believe Brian wrote TYMD from between September and October, 1971, during his time on the mountainside of Mount
Teide, Tenerife, in the Canary Islands of Spain, at the Observatorio del Tiede at Izana (altitude of 7,770 feet).

aarongtz wrote: You missed Silver Salmon, which I think it's from the NOTW sessions....And I would put Stone Cold Crazy On the "Queen" album
queenqueenqueenqueenqueenqueenqueenqueenqueenqueenqueenqueenqueenqueenqueenqueenqueenqueen    

I thought SS was written way back before the NOTW sessions. Even Freddies voice sounds like its from the early days.

rhyeking wrote: "Turn On The TV" is the B-side to the "I Wanna Testify" single, written by Roger and recorded during the NOTW sessions, so I felt it appropriate that it could be a candidate for inclusion either as is or with the other three members of Queen on it.

And I believe Brian wrote TYMD from between September and October, 1971, during his time on the mountainside of Mount
Teide, Tenerife, in the Canary Islands of Spain, at the Observatorio del Tiede at Izana (altitude of 7,770 feet).
----------
Thanks for the info! as you could see i not know much about Roger taylor work without Queen (i must say i don´t like his solo work too much)...
Yes! there in the Canary islands Brian learned some of the Spanish that he speaks (and he speaks spanish very well)

It's interesting allright.

How about if we had got one album instead of The Works, Strange Frontier and Mr. Bad Guy?

Say:

Radio Gaga
I Want to Break Free
It's a Hard Life
Hammer to Fall
Strange Frontier
Man on Fire
Killing Time
I Cry For You
I Was Born to Love You
Made In Heaven
Living on my Own
Love Kills

Now that's a strong listing and a few quality b-sides available too!

Cheers!