Queen — Scandal

Scandal is the fourth single from Queen's 1989 album The Miracle. The single was released in the United States but failed to chart, possibly due to the fact that it was released on some formats with a Capitol Records sleeve, instead of the Queen sleeves.

"Scandal" was written by Brian May about the British press, which had been controversial about his recent divorce and his relationship with actress Anita Dobson. May played keyboards and did the guitar solo as a first take. Mercury's lead vocals were a first take too. Synth-bass is played by the producer, David Richards. Brian has since commented that the song is very close to his heart in spite of his life at the time going through a difficult phase.
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"I have kept the first take, as Freddie did for the vocals. In one evening, the song was finished, because we couldn't do a better take." - Brian May (1989)

"This is something from me, obviously. The idea for this song happened in the studio, but thematically, it's very close to all of our hearts – particularly Freddie and particularly me, and a little later, Roger, as we were pursued by the media to a destructive point. It was very painful, we did get very hurt – these paparazzi invading our lives. There's money to be made trashing peoples' lives in newspapers, and it's probably never going to change in England." - Brian May - 2003, Greatest Video Hits 2 DVD commentary :

"Not one of my favorite songs, one of the most boring videos we ever made. Don't remember much about it, I just remember being bored. Didn't do anything for me, and for something called 'Scandal', it wasn't very scandalous. I think we were going through the motions here." Roger Taylor - 2003, Greatest Video Hits 2 DVD commentary :

"For me, it was a pretty serious song – not serious in the sense that I think it's that great (laughs), but in that there was a lot of reality in the lyrics for me... I don't think it's totally successful, this video, as a portrayal of what's in the song. It's a kind of brave attempt, but it's a little cold, and you don't really see the band interacting as a band. It's a bit stagey.

The Queen — Scandal clip can be downloaded for free and without registration.