ROGER TAYLOR
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ROGER TAYLOR
Aside from the Mercury yodel and the warm May guitar tones, one of the other notable ingredients in the magic mix that was the Queen sound was Roger Taylor's harmonies. Who can forget Taylor's ear piercing shrieks at the climax of "Bohemian Rhapsody"? Together with Brian and Freddie, Roger was the third part of the awesome Queen vocal sound, showcased on tracks such as the gospel influenced "Somebody To Love".
Roger has added his personal touch to extra Queen recordings dating back to Al Stewart's "Past Present And Future" album in 1973. The Queen drummer has also appeared on Gary Numan's "Dance" in 1981, Elton John's 1987 album "Leather Jackets" and - bizarrely - Shakin Stevens' "Radio" single in 1992. Taylor has also twiddled the knobs on albums by rockers Magnum, ex-Undertones man Feargal Sharkey, and the 1985 Top 5 hit for Jimmy Nail, "Love Don't Live Here Anymore".
ACETATES
However, the rarest Roger Taylor solo rarities stem from his time before Queen: two 7" acetates recorded when he was with 60s beat combo the Reaction in his native Cornwall. The full story of the Reaction was told back in RC 196 in 1996, but suffice it to say the outcome of an impromptu recording session held in an old cinema in Wadebridge was this pair of historical artifacts.
The young Roger pounded the drums in his own unmistakable style as the Reaction performed four tracks for an EP: Acker Bilk's "Bona Serra", Rosco Gordon's "Just A Little Bit", Shelley Smith's "What's On Your Mind" and the James Brown number "I'll Go Crazy". Organist Mike Dudley recalled that after the four tracks were completed, the engineer approached the group and said: "Slip us £20 and you can make a 45". The Reaction eagerly accepted the offer, and the result was the coupling of the standard "In the Midnight Hour" and another Brown song, "I Feel Good (I Got You)". These two archive gems from 1966 are now extremely scarce and can now command around over £1500; it's thought that no more than half-a-dozen copies of each disc were made, and only three have since surfaced.
Even though Taylor was given plenty of scope during the Queen years to write his own material - witness group classics such as "Radio Ga Ga", I'm In Love With My Car" and "A Kind Of Magic" - the drummer was actually the first member of the band to embark on a solo project. "I Wanna Testify" was a gospel song made famous by the Parliaments, and was reworked by Roger as a single in August 1977. Taylor performed the song as a solo piece, and stumped up the money for recording and pressing costs himself. The single didn't chart, but warranted a performance on Marc Bolan's TV show Marc, nevertheless. Standard UK copies are worth around £60 but you can pay over £1000 for original acetates, which were allegedly packaged in a picture sleeve.
All was quiet on the Taylor front
until March 1981, with the release of the "Fun In Space" album, another
virtually solo performance. The record was recorded at Mountain Studios
in Montreux, and critical response was less than enthusiastic: the NME
called it "a rich man's self-indulgence run riot". However, the Queen fanbase
ensured a No. 18 chart placing for the LP, although the reggae tinged single
"Future Management" only made No. 49, and "My Country" didn't even come
within sight of the Top 40. Early test pressings of the album came with
slightly different artwork (note the cover of the magazine the alien is
reading).
Taylor's next album was "Strange Frontier" in June 1984, which included covers of Bruce Springsteen's "Racing In The Streets" and Bob Dylan's "Masters Of War", along with writing collaborations with Freddie Mercury on "Killing Time" and Status Quo's Rick Parfitt on "It's An Illusion". The single "Man On Fire" was described as "Meat Loaf and Bruce Springsteen chucked into the blender" by the press, and was accompanied by a video directed by Tim Pope (famous for Queen's "It's A Hard Life" clip and films for Talk Talk and the Cure), which was banned by MTV for apparently depicting a little girl trapped in a burning building.
While the album made No. 30, "Man On Fire", unfortunately stalled at No. 66, while the follow-up single, the rockly title track off the LP, didn't even register at all, which was probably due to the huge public profile that Queen were enjoying that year thanks to the massive success of "The Works".
POLITICAL
While Taylor saw out the 80s from within the group format of the Cross, 1994 saw the now ex-Queen sticksman return with another solo album, "Happiness?" Taylor's most political album so far, it included a pop at Sky TV supremo Rupert Murdoch and the single "Nazis 1994", which bitterly denounced the rise of Hitler sympathizers in Europe and elsewhere: "They're saying now it never happened," spat the lyrics, "We gotta stop these stinking Nazis!" The track was Taylor's most successful solo single to date, making a respectable No. 22, which was nearly equaled by the follow ups "Foreign Sand" (performed with Japanese keyboard wizard Yoshiki, and which reached No. 26) and "Happiness" (No. 32). The Japanese CD edition also included the Cross track "Final Destination".
Taylor's latest solo excursion was 1998's "Electric Fire", another collection of self-penned songs, except for the inclusion of John Lennon's "Working Class Hero". The launch of the album successfully saw the musician enter the Guinness Book Of Records. On 24th September 1998, Roger and his band established a new world record for the largest internet audience by performing an exclusive online concert to an incredible 595,000 fans.
Say what you like about Roger Taylor
- he's not short of ambition, a trait that should see the man with the
distinctive falsetto working hard well into the new century...
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THE CROSS
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After the success of Queen's final gig at Knebworth in1986, the group took an extended break, partly because of Freddie's refusal to tour again due to the tragic effecs of the debilitating AIDS virus. While Brian May took on a number of production duties and Freddie dabbled with opera, Roger Taylor decided to form his own band in the summer of 1987.
He had already recorded the majority of a new album earlier in the year, and now needed a group to perform the songs live. To recruit members, Roger placed an advert in the British music press, stating "Drummer of a top rock band looking for musicians."
CANDIDATES
After a lengthy selection process, Taylor whittled the candidates down to twenty bass players, twenty guitarists and twenty drummers, which were auditioned at the Paramount City club in soho over three days. As the hopefuls played along to a backing track, they had no idea who was behind the project, nor that they were performing to a tape featuring Brian May!
The final line-up of the group featured of Clayton Moss on guitar, Peter Noone on bass (no relation to the Herman's Hermits singer), Josh Macrae on drums, and Queen's live keybordist Spike Edney. Noone's identical twin brother was also up for the gig but didn't quite make the grade.
The band was given the name of the Cross (a title which Taylor insisted had no religious meaning), and the new group immediately headed for Ibiza to rehearse and remix some of the album's songs. Boasting a hard rock sound bolstered by the twin guitars of Taylor and Moss, the first release from the Cross was the dance-influenced "Cowboys And Indians" single in September 1987, followed by the charmintly-titled LP "Shove It", named after a phrase frequently used by Roger's personal assistant, Chris Taylor.
POSTUMOUS
The LP included the track "Heaven For Everyone", with vocals by Freddie Mercury, who was replaced on the single version by Taylor's gruff tones. The track was later issued as a preview for the 'posthumous' Queen album, "Made In Heaven". Brian May also lent a hand, adding guitar to "Love Lies Bleeding".
The follow-up album, the rocker "Mad, Bad And Dangerous To Know", named after the poet Lord Byron, appeared in 1990. The group had moved to Parlophone (home of Queen), and the LP was promoted with a box set including an electronic press kit, and a 4-track sampler CD. This time around, Edney was replaced by Mike Moran on keyboards (who had worked with Mercury), and the album was largely written by the other band members as Taylor was also working on Queen material. Two tracks in particular demonstrated Taylor's interest in politics. "Old Men (Lay Down)" and "Final Destination". While the album didn't sell particularly well in the UK, it was a success in Germany.
Unfortunately, the third Cross album, "Blue Rock", was not issued in the UK, and the record was only released in Germany and Japan. After the death of Freddie in November 1991, a German single release of "Life Changes" was cancelled and the Cross pretty much folded, with Roger Taylor going solo again. The band placed a gig at London's Marquee Club in December 1992, which was effectively their farewell show.
Special thanks to James Moran, Joe
Demelio, Paul Bird and Christian Haudaum's website at http://hch.virtualave.net/index.htm.
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THE CROSS TOP 20 WORLDWIDE RARITIES
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