'39 is my absolute favourite song but I don't understand why it was dropped after the crazy tour? I know a short version was played in Germany in 1984 I think. I understand that they had a lot of new material for the game tour and maybe Freddie and roger's voices weren't up to it, but why drop '39, it was a live favourite.
It was last played in full at Hammersmith 1979.
Queen played parts of the song at the Leiden 1984 show (with the crowd taking over the lyrics), and Brian referenced the song at Cologne 1986.
All those 'why didn't they play this or that?', 'why didn't they release this or that?' and 'why didn't they include this or that on the album?' have the same reason: they made choices; choices with which some may agree or disagree, simple as that.
Why did Freddie wear a yellow jacket at Wembley? Is that a political stance? Did he hate green? Was he in a crusade against blue? Had he promised his dying gran never to wear grey? Was he allergic to purple? No - he chose one, that was it.
david (galashiels) wrote:
It was of course played on the q+paul tour
And if anything from those tours warranties being included along with the Freddie era dates then this could be, as Paul didn't appear on the live versions at all.
More to the point, it could be asked as to why WAS '39 ever played live at all? It wasn't a single (albeit it was a b-side), it wasn't the usual live type rock song typical of the era in which it appeared, and wasn't originally sung by the lead vocalist - these are all valid reasons as to why they might have never played it....(thankfully they did though!)
Sebastian wrote:
All those 'why didn't they play this or that?', 'why didn't they release this or that?' and 'why didn't they include this or that on the album?' have the same reason: they made choices; choices with which some may agree or disagree, simple as that.
Why did Freddie wear a yellow jacket at Wembley? Is that a political stance? Did he hate green? Was he in a crusade against blue? Had he promised his dying gran never to wear grey? Was he allergic to purple? No - he chose one, that was it.
Rick wrote:
It was quite a bitch to sing. On the contrary, Freddie sounded awesome in 1980-1982.
I can't sing myself but it doesn't strike me as an unusually hard song to sing. Especially when during the vocal-scales part Freddie usually let Roger take over when it got too hard.
david (galashiels) wrote:
It was of course played on the q+paul tour
And if anything from those tours warranties being included along with the Freddie era dates then this could be, as Paul didn't appear on the live versions at all.
More to the point, it could be asked as to why WAS '39 ever played live at all? It wasn't a single (albeit it was a b-side), it wasn't the usual live type rock song typical of the era in which it appeared, and wasn't originally sung by the lead vocalist - these are all valid reasons as to why they might have never played it....(thankfully they did though!)
They wanted a Led Zep-style acoustic passage in the show, to add a bit of variety. 39, LomL etc fit the bill.
Besides, it was either that or a 15 minute ukelele solo from Brian. The rest of the band threatened to beat him to death with his own clogs unless he chose 39.
The simple answer was that they had very tight time constraints.
Each concert would last between 90 - 120 minutes.
Fitting almost 12 hours of recorded material into such a time-frame is physically impossible.
Besides; Each new tour was the promotion of the new album - therefore old songs were dropped for new.
Everyone does it.
Common sense really.
Agree.. they couldn't just carry on the live show adding and adding until it was 5 hours long. New songs came in so older stuff had to be dropped. Much as I'm sure Roger loved being at the front of the stage, Freddie always sang it the lazy way (I hope you know what I mean by that) so to me its a naturally droppable song...
In addition to that - Queen's show also cut back in length after the Jazz tour, as they decided to take a support act with them again.
On the NOTW and Jazz tours their show averaged 2 hours a night (sometimes more), but by The Game it was 100 minutes. By US/Canada 82, it was 90 minutes.
This was likely to accommodate Freddie's voice. He just couldn't do it for 2 hours every night for years on end.
John S Stuart wrote:
Besides; Each new tour was the promotion of the new album - therefore old songs were dropped for new.
Everyone does it.
Common sense really.
I'm not sure that argument applies in this case, considering '39 wasn't added to the setlist until 2 years after the ANATO tour. Nor was Love Of My Life, I'm In Love With My Car or Death On Two Legs, oddly enough.
"'39" was a definite highlight of the Live Killers album, and I love Brian's rendition during the Q+PR period. One of the few songs that equalled(or surpassed) the studio version when played live. I usualy MUCH prefer Queen's studio output in comparison to their live performances...but not in this case.
is it because the time span difference was up by 79?
and so the theme would be less credible,?
like major Tom the character has already returned to earth by 79 and so ....