Queen’s ‘The Miracle’ Album Is Revisited In A Lavish New Box Set

When the announcement of a new box set devoted to Queen’s 1989 album The Miracle was made last month, fans must have thought Christmas came early. Not only were the British rock legends revisiting perhaps one of their strongest albums from the 1980s, but the new set will finally reveal a number of previously unreleased tracks from the sessions—songs that have been either bootlegged and/or talked about among the die-hard fans on the Web over the decades.

Queen members Brian May and Roger Taylor didn’t hold back when it came to assembling The Miracle Collector’s Edition (Hollywood Records), which has been released Friday. The super deluxe eight-disc set is a treasure trove containing the 2011 remastered version of the album; B-sides, extended and single versions, and alternate takes and demos along with six previously unheard non-album songs—including the recently unveiled “Face It Alone”; instrumentals and backing tracks; radio interviews with Queen promoting The Miracle‘s release at the time; a DVD/Blu-ray featuring music videos from the album as well as related featurettes; and a special vinyl edition of The Miracle containing the track “Too Much Love Will Kill You,” which was intended for inclusion but was removed from the final track list due to publishing issues.

Prior to the writing and recording of The Miracle, Queen—May, Taylor, Freddie Mercury and John Deacon—were coming off the successful 1986 Magic Tour, which also turned out to be the final tour featuring the classic lineup). But the period also saw some of the members experience personal turmoil that became tabloid fodder in the British press—particularly the breakup of May and Taylor’s respective marriages and speculation surrounding Mercury’s health (Those trials and tribulations would form the basis of the song “Scandal,” which later appeared on The Miracle).

Amid all this, however, Queen put up a united front not only with the vibrant performances on The Miracle, but all four members shared songwriting credit for the first time on a band album. In all, about 30 tracks were recorded during the sessions that were whittled down to 10 for the official release. At that point, The Miracle was Queen’s most pop-oriented and accessible effort: among the tracks included the punishing “I Want It All,” which has become one of the band’s best rockers; the hopeful and unifying title song; the rap-rock hybrid “Khashoggi’s Ship”; the seductive soulful ballad “My Baby Does Me”; the tropical funk stylings of “Rain Must Fall”; and the anthemic “Was It All Worth It,” a homage to the 1970s classic Queen sound.

When The Miracle was originally released, the band had been together for almost 20 years. And yet one couldn’t really tell that they took an extended time off between studio albums as they sounded reinvigorated on The Miracle, with Mercury’s commanding vocals, Taylor and Deacons’ driving rhythm work, and May’s dazzling guitar heroics—particularly his astounding solos on “The Invisible Man,” “Was It All Worth It” and “I Want It All.”

The main highlight of this Collector’s Edition set is without a doubt is the alternate takes and demos, which really offer a glimpse into the band’s working process during the sessions. And for fans who have lived and breathed the original album for more than 30 years now, these unearthed extra tracks are a revelation. For instance, the original take of the album’s title song features different lyrics and a buoyant rhythmic ending; the fragment of the piano-dominated ballad “When Love Breaks Up” would later be tacked on at the beginning of “Breakthru”; and an alternate version of “Was It All Worth It” features more of May’s rip-roaring guitar playing. It’s fascinating and fun to compare these early versions of The Miracle’s 10 songs with the finished ones and see what ideas worked and weren’t kept.

Additionally, it’s the other non-album compositions that are also a real treat: “I Guess We’re Falling Out” (from which a snippet was later borrowed for the B-side “Hang On in There”); the May-sung ballads “Water” and “You Know You Belong to Me”; and the rocking “Dog Without a Bone,” a rare duet between Mercury and Taylor on lead vocals. And the haunting and melancholy “Face It Alone,” which was released ahead of this box, could arguably be the most emotionally intense track that the band had ever put out in their career—thematically, it would have been a perfect song for 1991’s Innuendo, Queen’s brilliant and final album with Mercury that was released during his lifetime.

With plenty of music along with the visual components, artwork and liner notes in one lavish set, The Miracle Collector’s Edition is a deep dive into a record that—while it was commercially successful and yielded hits in Queen’s native U.K.—is somewhat of an underrated work here in America. Hopefully this expanded release will serve as the template for future Queen archival releases: plenty of never-heard-before tracks from the vaults put together in a great package.