BEEP

I'm going a bit crazy with making new topics lately, partially because the number of topics featured on the front page is making me kind of sad. Anyway, I have a quick question. I'm sure you've heard the beeping sound at about the 1:30 in Friends Will Be Friends (right after Freddie says "It's so easy now," for the second time). Anyone have any idea how that got there? Is it just some random feedback that never got edited out, or is there a story behind that.

There also appears to be a similar, softer beep in Great King Rat at about 1:37, though that could be just a weird guitar noise.

Are you referring to when Brian plucks the strings between the tremolo and bridge rollers on his guitar? Not sure I hear anything else otherwise that would sound like a beep.

That beep sounds very intentional to me (if its the one I am thinking of), there is a beep in Drowse (just before the vocal comes in) that no one here has an explanation for though... it sounds electronic, like none of the instruments from the song could have made it...

I agree with Mooghead, that beep sounds like Brian's guitar playing something intentional, like the way he played in Bohemian Rhapsody after "Sends shivers down my spine".

The one from 1:37 at GKR seems intentional too, and its repeated again at 1:48, but lower. Is the way Brian played.

There are accidental beeps in other Queen songs. Like it was said before, Drowse might be the most known case, like Innuendo (5:26, when Freddie sings "Releeeease") or IiLwMC (0:38, when Roger sings "hubcaps"), trough this last one is in the guitar track.

Is fun to find this things in the songs. There are a lot, which I can't remember now all of them. Another sound is like drum sticks falling to the floor in 'Mother Love' at 1:37, immediately Freddie sings "game".

*ahem* You might want to re-read who said the bit about Brian's guitar, ciber_mato ;-)

I can't hear the drowse one, but i'm sure the other 2 are just harmonics being played in the guitar. Nothing special

Sorry Inu-liger! Hahaha, you're right :P I agree with both then.

Ozz, Drowse's one is right here, I raised the beep up so you can hear it:

All good :)

I thought this was about mastering errors and such. Oh man, that click in the intro to Fat Bottomed Girls drove me crazy. For years I wasn't sure if my head was playing tricks on me because I heard it some times and other times I didn't. Then I noticed it's on the 1994 remaster and on Queen Rocks but not on the Hollywood Remasters. That ended my agony.

Amazing that that appalling mistake appeared on so many issues. Shocking lack of quality control.

Double

And they still continue to make mastering mistakes. 2011's "Let Me Live", anyone? (though thankfully not AS obvious as the 1994 FBG remaster!)

My guess for the "beep" in Drowse is that it's a clipped beginning or end to an unused (or earlier take of a) guitar track. That sounds like the red special to my ears....

There are lots of unused parts / bad takes / clips of erased takes on the BoRhap multitrack. And before the days of unlimited tracks, they often had to bounce tracks and/or "fly in" parts from other sections of a song that there were no open tracks for.

For a band like Queen, constantly re-doing their parts to improve them, there were bound to be some little bits showing up on the master mixes. Honestly, i'm surprised there aren't far more...

Wow. Amazing. I've never scrutinized them so much. Will have to double check my formats

"That sounds like the red special to my ears.... "

Its pretty astounding how you can identify Brian's guitar in literally a fraction of a second, not even sure if BM could do that.. :/