Queen is a name synonymous with musical excellence, anthemic hits, and groundbreaking performances. But even the greatest bands in history have their growing pains. A Queen member trashed an awful performance in a video. And according to drummer Roger Taylor, the early days of recording were nothing short of a nightmare.
In the latest episode of Queen The Greatest, Taylor didn’t hold back—calling one of their first studio experiences ‘awful’ and ‘just terrible’. Before Queen became stadium legends, they were just four ambitious musicians trying to make a name for themselves. After recording a demo at De Lane Lea Studios, the band finally secured a record deal and was sent to Trident Studios in Soho, London, to re-record their first album. But for Roger Taylor, the excitement quickly turned into frustration.
Taylor remembered (via Classic Rock):
“At De Lane Lea, we’d just turn up and do what we can – and quickly. At Trident, it did feel like, ‘OK, now we’re in it’, but I didn’t really get on with their ideas. They had a drum booth and it was a well-known sound: very dry and dead, which is not what I wanted.”
“I wanted to hear the drums resonate. I didn’t want it to go ‘thud, whack’. But that’s what they wanted. There was cloth over everything, and everything was taped down. I didn’t even have my proper kit in there. I had to play this sh*tty little kit. It was just awful.”
Taylor continued:
“We were told: ‘This is the Trident sound’. But we didn’t want the Trident sound. We wanted our sound. I really had a bad time playing that kit, which is why, actually, if you listen to the demos – which I played on my relatively cheap kit in De Lane Lea – it’s a higher standard of drumming. It’s quite busy, but it makes sense. And it’s just better to listen to.”
