10 Greatest Queen Songs
6. I Want To Break Free
Early Queen record sleeves featured the proud boast, “and nobody played synthesiser”.
If that sounds a little bit luddite, Queen had squeezed some impressive sounds out of drum, bass, guitar piano and vocals. It would be a shame if fans assumed it was all just fancy keyboards.
But Queen were right to eventually ditch their self imposed synthesiser ban. The proof is I Want To Break Free. It’s a song with no chorus, built around a traditional, twelve bar blues chord progression. The trad blues template might sound a bit scholarly, even a little dull, but the result is far from it.
The synthesisers, enveloping a classic John Deacon bass line and Brian May’s trademark guitar sound, elevate I Want To Break Free into classic pop territory. The song feels weightless in the best sense of the word.
Over the top, Freddie belts out the romantically ambivalent lyric, adding a bit of emotional heft to this slice of perfect pop.