“The single biggest leap we ever made. That's when we really started making music the way we wanted to”: Brian May reflects on Queen II, as it's confirmed that the 1974 album is about to get a lavish reissue

The Queen heritage industry is gearing up again with the announcement of another big reissue.

Following hot on the heels of the 50th anniversary reissue of Bohemian Rhapsody comes another excavation from the band’s archives. This time it’s the band’s second album, Queen II, that’s being given the repackaging treatment.

The album – first released in March 1974 – will come out next month in a “lavish” 5-CD or double vinyl collector’s edition. It will include a brand new 2026 mix, as well as previously unheard studio outtakes, live tracks, demos, BBC sessions and a 112-page book of photos, handwritten lyrics and memorabilia.

The works, in other words (though not The Works – that was ten years later…)

The remixing has been done by the same team that worked on the Queen I reissue a while back: Justin Shirley-Smith, Joshua J Macrae and Kris Fredriksson, with Roger Taylor and Brian May acting as executive producers.

In a statement, Shirley-Smith that: “The idea was to reveal more of the clarity of the songs. Rather than add anything, we wanted to reveal more of what was there and get that desired sound.”

“The lengths the band went to achieve what they achieved with the technology they had at the time was incredible,” says Joshua J Macrae. “Some of it is so ahead of its time. Working on this was like entering a room of fabulousness.”

Queen II was a breakthrough in many ways for the band, who even at this early stage were adeptly straddling the barriers between glam, prog and pop. It was their first album to go Top Ten, reaching Number 5 on the UK album chart, and it contained their first hit single, the closing track Seven Seas Of Rhye. Intriguingly, the original vinyl was divided not into an A and B side, but a ‘White’ and ‘Black’ side.

It also came with that iconic Mick Rock sleeve, which the band recreated for the Bohemian Rhapsody video, and a decade later for the promo for One Vision.

“Queen II was the single biggest leap we ever made,” said Brian May in a statement. “That’s when we really started making music the way we wanted to, rather than the way we were being pushed into recording it.”

“With Queen II, I couldn’t believe how much work we put into it,” added Roger Taylor. “I think we felt we were evolving our own sound. We were pioneering this sort of multitracking thing. It gave you a tremendous pallet, massive choral effects with just three of us singing.

“I don’t think the album sounds like anyone else. We gained a mental identity, a group identity and we were just doing what we did.”

Queen II: The Remixed, Remastered & Expanded Collector’s Edition will hit record shops on March 27.