Queen have released a lost song recorded with late frontman Freddie Mercury more than 30 years ago.
Originally recorded in 1988 during the British band’s sessions for their 13th album The Miracle, Face It Alone did not make the final cut and was later forgotten.
The song was rediscovered when Queen’s archive and production team returned to the sessions to work on an upcoming reissue of the album, which will also include some of the band’s studio conversations in London and Montreux, Swiss.
It will be the rock group’s first new song with Mercury to be released in more than eight years, following 2014’s album Queen Forever, which included three unreleased tracks with the singer: Let Me In Your Heart Again, Love Kills and There . There has to be more to life than that.
“I’m glad our team was able to find this song,” said Brian May, the band’s guitarist.
“After all these years, it’s great to hear the four of us … working in the studio on a great song idea that was never finished … until now.”
Formed by Mercury, May, Roger Taylor and John Deacon, Queen was founded in 1970 and became one of the world’s best-selling music groups, with hits such as Don’t Stop Me Now, Under Pressure, Somebody To Love, Another One Bites The Dust, We Will Rock You, I Want To Break Free and Bohemian Rhapsody.
Mercury died of AIDS-related complications in 1991 at the age of 45.
May and Taylor continue to perform as Queen, with American Idol star Adam Lambert on vocals.
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The release of Face It Alone comes ahead of the reissue of the band’s 13th album, The Miracle, first released in 1989, in November. With tracks including I Want It All, Breakthru, Scandal and The Invisible Man, the album reached number one in the UK at the time.
“We had forgotten about this track, but there it was, this little gem,” Taylor said. “It’s wonderful, a real discovery. It’s a very passionate piece.”
The Miracle reissue will be available in an eight-disc collector’s edition box set format that also includes The Miracle Sessions, an hour-long disc of additional previously unreleased recordings featuring six previously unreleased songs.