The story behind Queen’s lost collaboration with Rod Stewart
14 July 2021, 11:40 | Updated: 27 July 2021, 15:13
Rod Stewart recorded a track for Queen called ‘Another Piece of My Heart’ back in 1995, but it was never used.
Queen collaborated with huge stars such as Elton John, David Bowie and Paul McCartney over the years.
And it turns out they almost made music with Rod Stewart, but the song they created was shelved.
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Back in 1995, four years after frontman Freddie Mercury died due to AIDS complications, the band used recordings sung by the late singer to make their final studio album, Made in Heaven.
This included the single ‘Let Me Live’, which originally started out as a collaboration with Stewart called ‘Another Piece of My Heart’.
But this never made it to the final cut and the band decided not to use it.
Instead, they removed Stewart's contribution and reworked the lyrics, while guitarist Brian May and drummer Roger Taylor added their own vocals to the new version of ‘Let Me Live’.
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It is actually the only Queen song in which all three members sing lead parts.
And that’s not all, as according to Rod there were even talks about forming a new supergroup with Queen and Elton John, but sadly, this never happened.
Meanwhile, all the songs on Queen’s final album Made in Heaven were made using Mercury’s vocals.
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The star had been in the studio constantly after the release of the album Innuendo to make sure there was enough material for Queen to continue without him.
He even moved to Montreux, where Queen owned Mountain Studios, so that he could work up until his last days.
Brian May previously revealed: "By the time we were recording these other tracks after [1991 album] Innuendo, we had had the discussions and we knew that we were totally on borrowed time because Freddie had been told that he would not make it to that point.”
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Speaking in 1995 documentary, Champions of the World, the 73-year-old added: "I think our plan was to go in [the studio] whenever Freddie felt well enough, just to make as much use of him as possible.
“We basically lived in the studio for a while, and when he would call and say, 'I can come in for a few hours,' our plan was to just make as much use of him as we could. He told us, 'Get me to sing anything. Write me anything, and I will sing it, and I will leave you as much as I possibly can.'"
