Freddie Mercury – Well Eye Never

Queen Album Review – Queen II – Collector’s Edition

Back in 2024, Queen released a collector’s edition of their debut album with new mixes, session outtakes, backing tracks and live performances, which I reviewed at the time.

And now, as has been long anticipated since then, they’ve brought out a collector’s edition of Queen II, their fantastic and highly complex second album, in much the same vein. So naturally I’ve been looking forward to checking that out as well.

Once again, there are multiple formats available from various retailers, including a big box set with 5 CDs and 2 LPs, a much simpler 2-disc CD edition with the new mixes and the sessions material, and others.

And just like last time, I’ve plumped for the digital download instead. It’s just £17.99 for the contents of all 5 CDs compared to the frankly ludicrous £194.99 for the physical equivalent, which has 2 vinyl records I’d have no use for and 2 of the CDs contain live tracks I already have from older releases. Sure, the book and photo prints look really nice, but I can live without them in the circumstances.

Considering the 6-CD box set for their previous album was an already steep £149.99, I’m baffled as to how this new 5-CD set is £45 dearer! Maybe it’s because it has 2 LPs rather than 1 like the previous set, one of which is white vinyl rather than black (as the album has ‘Side White’ and ‘Side Black’ instead of Sides 1 & 2). But it’s a lot extra just for that. If there had been a similar set without the vinyl LPs for a much cheaper price, I’d have been tempted to get it, but it’s quite common for box sets these days to have vinyls I don’t want. It always bugs me when artists do that.

Anyway, back in lockdown I wrote an extensive post reviewing the tracks on Queen II, along with related live performances and covers, so I’m not going to repeat that kind of thing here. Instead, I just want to compare the new mixes to the originals and look through the bonus material, and I’ve added the new tracks to my Queen II playlist as well. Nothing here is sponsored or gifted, because I bought the new download myself, and I hope you enjoy!

Queen Album Review – The Game

Way back in lockdown, to fill some of the time, I wrote in-depth reviews of the 1970s studio albums by Queen, my favourite band, which took me from their self-titled debut up to the Jazz album. And they’re about to release a new deluxe edition of Queen II, which I’m looking forward to downloading and reviewing, just like I did for their Queen I box set.

However, it’s long been my intention to review the rest of their albums as well, and now I’ve got more time on my hands, I’m going to delve back into them at long last.

So we’ll kick off the 80s with The Game, the album that produced Queen’s best-selling single of all time, and the only two number 1 hits they ever had in America (where it was also their only number 1 album, selling over 4 million copies). The Game also reached number 1 in the UK for 2 weeks, and stayed in the top 40 for 15 weeks altogether. Overall it sold over 12 million copies worldwide.

Freddie Mercury, sporting a moustache and wearing a black leather jacket over a red top, leaning back against a railing overlooking a snowy landscape with trees and a couple of buildings.

Brian May, with his hands in his light brown jacket pockets, leaning back against a railing overlooking a snowy landscape with trees and a couple of buildings.

It’s also the first Queen album to feature a synthesizer (an Oberheim OBX), with their previous releases proudly stating that they never used them. Plus they had a new producer (Reinhold Mack, known simply as Mack), and they recorded the songs in a new location, at Musicland Studios in Munich. It therefore marked a new period of experimentation for the band, as they were persuaded to shift towards a more pop-friendly sound, although still infused with rock of course and it still sounds unmistakably like Queen.

It wasn’t always easy, with arguments in the studio as the band members were keen to be represented fairly on the record. But ultimately they were able to reach suitable compromises and produce another decent album with several great tracks. And as shown by the chart positions above, it enabled them to maintain their popularity in an era where other rock veterans were struggling, and even have their peak of success in the USA. The music scene was changing significantly in the 80s, but Queen were still very much in the game and still winning, at least for now.

So here are my reviews of all the songs, along with alternate versions, music videos, live performances, and a small selection of the many covers and remixes out there. And there’s lots more to see on my Queen & Covers playlists for this album as well that I haven’t mentioned here. I hope you enjoy!

January 2026 Favourites

Hello again, I hope your year’s got off to a good start. For me, as noted in my recent update about my career and being a carer, my circumstances are set to change due to my mother’s ongoing support needs and funding cuts for my current job role. But Mum is much better than she was last year, I’ve already secured a new freelance position, and I have other financial support, so there’s good reason to be positive and hopeful about the year ahead.

I’m also celebrating 10 years of blogging and YouTubing, and that decade has really flown by! Thank you so much if you’ve played any part in that, whether it’s quietly reading my posts or interacting with me in some way, I really appreciate it!

But to focus on January, I have started going out and about more again, now that my mother’s situation has eased a bit. So I’ve met a couple of friends, eaten some delicious food and taken a few nice walks. Meanwhile at home, alongside my usual favourite TV programmes, I’ve been having a stand-up comedy binge by watching several specials and finishing an autobiography. So there’s quite a bit to mention as usual, none of which is sponsored to appear here, and I hope you enjoy!

Freddie Mercury’s World – Part 10 – The Performer

We got there in the end. To conclude my series of photos that I took at the Freddie Mercury: A World Of His Own exhibition at Sotheby’s in 2023, we’re paying close attention to what the Queen frontman was best known for – his songwriting and performing.

There are some very significant items here, most of which are from the On Stage auction, but there are a few pieces from other auctions thrown in too. It all depends on how Sotheby’s had things on display in the galleries.

As has been the case in all the previous posts, clicking on the images will blow them up and the item links will take you to the description pages. So I hope you enjoy!

Freddie Mercury’s World – Part 9 – Stage Fashion

Here’s the penultimate collection in my series of amazing items that I saw on my visit to Freddie Mercury: A World Of His Own, the exhibition that took over Sotheby’s in 2023.

We’re now turning our attention to the On Stage auction, where items relating to Freddie’s songwriting and performing – some of which are very recognisable and important to big Queen fans like myself – sold for a total of £9,476,740! Most of the clothing shown here is from that auction but, as with previous posts, there are a few pieces from other auctions mixed in as well.

As ever, you can click on the images to enlarge them and the item names to read more, and I hope you enjoy seeing the wide selection I’ve included here.

Freddie Mercury’s World – Part 8 – Little Things

Here’s the next part of my in-depth series about my visit to the exhibition Freddie Mercury: A World Of His Own at Sotheby’s in 2023. And we’re continuing on from my previous post about the Crazy Little Things gallery.

This time I’m going to show you a wide selection of mostly smaller items that were sold in the first and second Crazy auctions, and occasionally some of the other auctions, from jewellery to various random objects.

As always, to enlarge the images you can click on them, and to read more about each item you can click on its name. Enjoy!

Freddie Mercury’s World – Part 7 – The Collector

Freddie Mercury was an avid collector of objects, who had a real eye for beauty, loved all things feline and had a great sense of humour. And that’s clearly in evidence here, as we continue looking back at my photos from the 2023 A World Of His Own exhibition that took place at Sotheby’s.

This time we’re looking at items to do with cats, clothing, books and music that he collected. Most of them are from the auctions Crazy Little Things 1 and Crazy Little Things 2, which raised £10.3 million altogether! But there are a few bits and pieces from other auctions mixed in too, just as there were some items from the Crazy auctions in my previous posts.

So there’s plenty to look through, and as before you can click on the images to enlarge them and the item names to learn more. Hope you enjoy as always!

Freddie Mercury’s World – Part 6 – Awards

We’ve crossed the halfway point in my look back at the 2023 Sotheby’s exhibition Freddie Mercury: A World Of His Own. I hope you’re finding it interesting so far.

For this post we’re going to look at a whole bunch of awards, because Freddie and Queen were honoured with a deluge of well-earned accolades during and after his lifetime, so there were lots on display in the exhibition. I’m not going to list them all, obviously, but I’m going to present a big selection that I took photos of, to give you a thorough sense of what was there. Most were sold in the Crazy Little Things 2 auction while a few were in the On Stage sale.

A wall filled with disc sales awards for Queen and Freddie Mercury albums and singles.

The vast majority of the sales awards adorned the walls of a room featuring Freddie’s royal cloak and crown (which you’ll see in a later post in this series). There were a huge number of silver, gold and platinum awards there, for the sales of singles and albums, and occasional awards for videos. But there were also some awards scattered around elsewhere too. A lot of the awards for disc sales look very similar by their nature, but there are a few more striking ones in amongst them.

So let’s crack on with it. As before you can click on the images to enlarge them and the award names to find out more, and I hope you enjoy!

Freddie Mercury’s World – Part 5 – Art

Freddie Mercury didn’t just love the art of music, he was also a keen fan of paintings and prints. For example, in the first part of this series looking through the photos I took at the 2023 A World Of His Own exhibition at Sotheby’s, we saw some of the Japanese imagery that he had in his collection.

So now it’s time to dig deeper and see more of the art that he owned and had on display at Garden Lodge, his residence from which I recently shared many images of his furniture here and here. Most of these pieces were therefore sold in the At Home auction, but there are some from the Evening Sale and Crazy Little Things auctions too.

Towards the end of this post you’ll also see the famous door to the house, which itself is a work of art due to the fan tributes that completely cover it. And on a related note I’ll also show you my own visit to the property – not that you can see anything from the outside, but it still feels nice to say I’ve been there.

So with a reminder that you can click the names of the artworks to read more about them and the images to enlarge them, I hope you enjoy looking through it all!

Freddie Mercury’s World – Part 4 – More Furniture

Hello again. Yesterday I presented many items of furniture and accessories from Freddie Mercury’s home at Garden Lodge, which I saw at Sotheby’s in the exhibition A World Of His Own in August 2023.

But there were so many things to see on that theme alone that I had to split them up. So here’s another batch of beautiful and interesting items, where you can click on the names to read more about them and on the photos to zoom in. Enjoy!

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