10 Songs That Changed Music Forever

‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ doesn’t lay claim to having the first ever pop video - bands had been filming promo clips, as they were called, for years, and Queen themselves were by then more than used to the format. It’s not even spectacularly original, bearing a suspicious resemblance in many ways to the clip for The Moody Blues’ version of ‘Go Now’ from a decade earlier.

Created to promote an unedited six minute song that everyone of note had assured the band was commercial suicide, ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ was rushed out to be played on that week’s Top Of The Pops TV show, as the band were booked to play in Scotland that night and couldn’t appear live.

The single, a majestic cod-operatic rock epic, was a huge hit thanks to radio support: it’s difficult to say whether the iconic video contributed to that. However, thanks to the song’s worldwide longevity, that video was played countless times, becoming synonymous with the song itself. From that moment on, it became standard procedure to release a promotional video alongside singles in the UK.

The increasing popularity of the video led to the creation of MTV in 1981. Because the UK music industry had pioneered the format for years thanks to ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’, the newborn cable channel, hungry for content, broadcast a disproportionate number of British bands in its early years, which led in turn to the second British Invasion of the US pop charts.