WCSX Classic Cuts : Keep Yourself Alive
WCSX Classic Cuts
Queen: “Keep Yourself Alive”
The Hook: It was meant to be sarcastic.
Album: Queen
Year: 1973
Writer: Brian May
Stats: Queen’s first single on both sides of Atlantic never charted on either. In 2008, though, it ranked 31st on Rolling Stone’s list of the 100 Greatest Guitar Songs of All Time.
Background: Brian May says that he was never completely happy with the recording of “Keep Yourself Alive,” nor was he all that thrilled with his music and how his lyrics were interpreted either.
Queen guitarist Brian May on “Keep Yourself Alive.” OC:…I’d failed. :23
“It’s strange, it’s very often the things that you write and think are just a little aside that become important. Because that to me was a bit quirky and a bit poppy and it was meant to be ironical, really. I was meant to be saying that if all you can do in life is to keep yourself alive then there isn’t much hope for you. It was meant to be sarcastic, but strangely enough it was taken directly, which proved to me that I’d failed.”
