QueenZone discussion #1006307
US Singles
| Armando Alejandro Estrada 08.06.2007 23:35 |
I'm wondering why Queen released different songs like It's late, Liar, Need your loving tonight in the US rather than the same as in the UK. None of these songs succeded in the US + except for Calling all Girls and Princes of the Universe there was no videos to accompany these songs. For me, it's like "we don't give a fuck" these songs will never work in the US, so why bother. |
| shammy 09.06.2007 00:31 |
Yeah, good point. The weird thing is that whenever I play NYLT to Americans, they always love the damn song and wonder why they never heard it before. That's a rockin, rockin Deaky tune |
| Armando Alejandro Estrada 09.06.2007 00:51 |
shammy wrote: Yeah, good point. The weird thing is that whenever I play NYLT to Americans, they always love the damn song and wonder why they never heard it before. That's a rockin, rockin Deaky tuneAnd the point is that it was released. This song is one of my favorite. Anyways, never understood why Queen was never that popular in the US while Freddie was alive. |
| Maz 09.06.2007 02:02 |
It's not uncommon to release different songs for different markets. The fact that they released those songs is probably because someone (record exec, band member, etc) thought it would work. I can not imagine Friends Will Be Friends getting anywhere near the top-40 in the US back in 1986. It was a better shot with Princes of the Universe. And I don't get the whole "no video to promote these songs" argument either. Is it really reasonable to expect a video for Liar back in 1973/1974? |
| whynot 09.06.2007 03:34 |
Normaly it's the record company who decides what singles to release. That may be the reason why the US record company of that time wanted it to be released. |
| lyricalassasin77 09.06.2007 04:42 |
shammy wrote: Yeah, good point. The weird thing is that whenever I play NYLT to Americans, they always love the damn song and wonder why they never heard it before. That's a rockin, rockin Deaky tuneIts a damn shame that song didn't go anywhere. It too is one of my favorites. Just a good feel good song. "If You Can't Beat Em" is kinda the same way....Anyways had HOT SPACE never happened then you would probably have seen greater chart success here. Let us remember they finally fired and got rid of their American company cuz they felt they wasn't gettin represented right over here. It just took them way too late in the game to realize it. I too think that the US should have gotten the same release as the UK....Peace |
| Armando Alejandro Estrada 09.06.2007 17:17 |
Maz wrote: I can not imagine Friends Will Be Friends getting anywhere near the top-40 in the US back in 1986. It was a better shot with Princes of the Universe.Why in your opinion that song wouldn't have worked? |
| Winter Land Man 09.06.2007 20:07 |
lyricalassasin_77 wrote:And that company was a division of EMI I think.shammy wrote: Yeah, good point. The weird thing is that whenever I play NYLT to Americans, they always love the damn song and wonder why they never heard it before. That's a rockin, rockin Deaky tuneIts a damn shame that song didn't go anywhere. It too is one of my favorites. Just a good feel good song. "If You Can't Beat Em" is kinda the same way....Anyways had HOT SPACE never happened then you would probably have seen greater chart success here. Let us remember they finally fired and got rid of their American company cuz they felt they wasn't gettin represented right over here. It just took them way too late in the game to realize it. I too think that the US should have gotten the same release as the UK....Peace |
| Winter Land Man 09.06.2007 20:08 |
shammy wrote: Yeah, good point. The weird thing is that whenever I play NYLT to Americans, they always love the damn song and wonder why they never heard it before. That's a rockin, rockin Deaky tuneNeed Your Loving Tonight used to be played on the radio a lot on a local classic rock station until the mid '90s |
| Armando Alejandro Estrada 09.06.2007 21:16 |
By the way, Bohemian Rhapsody was supposed to be the video that started the trend of promo clip, but it was not their first videos, Liar and Keep yourself alive were their first clips. What else could it be? It was the same type of video as Save Me or Don't stop me now. But I was wrong, there were no videos for every songs. No video for SSOR for example. By the way, some of you know why the video of KYA at Brewer Street studio in 1973 (Freddie in white) was not included on the GVH1 DVD? |
| Maz 09.06.2007 23:20 |
Armando Alejandro Estrada wrote: Why in your opinion that song wouldn't have worked?Friends Will Be Friends is a song that only works because a popular band put it out and all of its fans like it. It is neither an exciting song, nor a great song; but because Queen released it in countries where they were popular, it worked (moderately). With Queen's popularity waning by 1986 in the US, they needed a bigger song than the kitschy feel-good FWBF. |
| Armando Alejandro Estrada 10.06.2007 00:21 |
Maz wrote:I wouldn't call PISCTP or POTU bigger songs. They both were released and never charted. Anyways, at this point in time, the US was a lost cause anyway.Armando Alejandro Estrada wrote: Why in your opinion that song wouldn't have worked?Friends Will Be Friends is a song that only works because a popular band put it out and all of its fans like it. It is neither an exciting song, nor a great song; but because Queen released it in countries where they were popular, it worked (moderately). With Queen's popularity waning by 1986 in the US, they needed a bigger song than the kitschy feel-good FWBF. |
| louvox 11.06.2007 12:49 |
Armando Alejandro Estrada wrote:Queen were very big in the USA from 1973-1980. It wasn’t until they released “Hot Space” that their popularity started to decline. Most Queen fans here really didn’t care for “Another one bites the dust” despite its chart success. Just a hiccup on what is a fine album (The Game). By 1983 disco was pretty much dead was in this country. It was a shock to say the least to most fans in this country when they released “Hot Space”. Radio stations ignored it and laughed at it. Most everyone thought it was a joke. Their subsequent releases didn’t help matters either. Most fans here felt they turned into just another Eruo-pop-synth band. There was plenty of that crap being played on the radio here at that time. Most fans outside of the USA were led to believe that the video for “I want to break free” was a huge down fall for them. Not true. Although American TV is conservative for the most part, even on cable most Queen fans sought that video because it was not shown here originally. Queen was also partly to blame. Not touring here and then just offering a flipped answer like “We were to busy elsewhere”.shammy wrote: Yeah, good point. The weird thing is that whenever I play NYLT to Americans, they always love the damn song and wonder why they never heard it before. That's a rockin, rockin Deaky tuneAnd the point is that it was released. This song is one of my favorite. Anyways, never understood why Queen was never that popular in the US while Freddie was alive. |
| Micrówave 11.06.2007 17:00 |
Yes, Louvox, finding Queen on MTV in the mid 80s on was next to impossible. I never saw half the videos until the actual video was released by Hollywood. While you may not like HS, you are correct, disco was dead here. Thus, Hot Space went directly into the cut-out bin. I think there are still copies there. Sometimes you can get some really good albums out of the cut-out bin. |
| goinback 11.06.2007 18:50 |
Yep, Queen was one of the biggest bands in the US around 1980. I think they would have been considered THE biggest band around summer/fall 1980, because CLTCL and AOBTD and The Game were all hitting #1. Also NYLT *was* released as a single in the US (unless I'm misunderstanding what people have said). I live in the US and bought the 45 when it came out and it got a decent amount of airplay on Top 40 stations, but people just apparently didn't like it too much. I think the rockabilly style was too similar to Crazy Little Thing Called Love and it was released too soon after that. Plus everyone already had The Game by then so there was no reason for most people to buy the single. A lot of big songs in the early '80s by other artists didn't have videos either ("Holiday" by Madonna, "Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'" by Michael Jackson, etc.) so I think sometimes it just had to do with scheduling and all that. And yeah thank God "Friends Will Be Friends" wasn't released...the sappiest, cheesiest song ever IMHO :) I think after Hot Space, the record company was trying to prove Queen were still a hard rock band and thus appropriately released the harder One Vision and Princes Of The Universe songs as singles. But in the UK they didn't really have that hurdle. |
| shammy 11.06.2007 22:54 |
Those are some interesting opinions. I don't think FWBF is a deadful song but it's not exactly an exciting one by the band's standards. Pretty boring actually. Even Freddie's magnificent voice couldn't bring that song to life. I always rue Queen's wane in popularity stateside though because there were some absolute classic tunes released between the Works and Innuendo eras. I actually loved the energy of Breakthru. The tempo and melody are awesome in that song. I see that train thumping the tracks as I type here... I just think they were led on by crappy record companies. Let's face it, silver-tongued American executives could convince some members among their record buying public that a fresh dog turd is an updated version of the modern day Mona Lisa. That's not an insult either - more a comment about the persuasive powers of corporate America to have things their own way. |
| Maz 12.06.2007 01:23 |
goinback wrote: Yep, And yeah thank God "Friends Will Be Friends" wasn't released...the sappiest, cheesiest song ever IMHO :) I think after Hot Space, the record company was trying to prove Queen were still a hard rock band and thus appropriately released the harder One Vision and Princes Of The Universe songs as singles. But in the UK they didn't really have that hurdle.Yeah, the point I wanted to get across, but better stated and thought out. |
| Armando Alejandro Estrada 12.06.2007 19:04 |
Frankly, it makes common sense when we get the notion that you have to release singles thinking about the "psychology" of a country. |