Format 7"/12" vinyl single | Genre Rock | |
B-side "A Dozen Red Roses for My Darling"
"Gimme the Prize (Kurgan's Theme)" (US) Released 17 March 1986 (UK)
4 June 1986 (US) Recorded September 1985 – January 1986 Length 4:25 (Album version)
3:37 (CD bonus track: "A Kind of 'A Kind of Magic'")
6:23 (12" extended version)
4:10 (Original Highlander version) | ||
"A Kind of Magic" is the title track of the 1986 album of the same name by the British rock band Queen. It was written by the band's drummer, Roger Taylor, for the film Highlander. The single reached number three in the UK Singles Chart, top ten in a number of European countries, and #42 on the US Billboard Hot 100. The song is the opening track on the band's compilation albums, Greatest Hits II, and Classic Queen.
Contents
Name
The phrase "a kind of magic" is used in Highlander by Connor MacLeod (Christopher Lambert) as a description of his immortality. Roger Taylor liked the phrase so much that he used it as inspiration for the song. There are references to the film in the lyrics: "one prize, one goal"; "no mortal man"; and "there can be only one".
Composition
Taylor wrote the melody and chords for the version that appeared in the film, which Brian May described as "quite lugubrious and heavy". Freddie Mercury composed a new bass line, added instrumental breaks, and changed the song's order to make it more chart friendly. Mercury and David Richards produced this new version. The song was still credited only to Taylor. Whilst Taylor's version is at the end of the film, Mercury's version appears on the album. Taylor's version of A Kind of Magic did not see official release until it was included on the extra EP for the 2011 special edition of the album.
Live performances
The song was a live favourite on The Magic Tour of the same year, which proved to be Queen's last tour before the death of Freddie Mercury.
Taylor often included the song in solo set lists, and those with his band The Cross. On the Rock the Cosmos Tour of Europe, Taylor took lead vocals for the song at some concerts.
Music video
The music video for this song was directed by Russell Mulcahy, director of Highlander. Notable is that Brian May did not use his famous Red Special guitar in the music video, but instead a 1984 copy. In the video, Mercury is dressed as a magician type figure. He enters an abandoned theatre (The Playhouse Theatre in London) where May, Taylor and John Deacon (all dressed as stereotypical tramps) are asleep until awakened by Mercury's entrance. Mercury transforms the hobos into the Queen members, dressed regularly with their instruments, then back to hobos again as he leaves. Throughout the video, cartoon images dance to the beat of the song which was produced by the Walt Disney Corporation. As May later remembered, the theater was old and derelict, and lacking central heating, so the band were quite cold during the March filming.
Legacy
The single was certified platinum in Brazil for more than 100,000 digital downloads of the single. On Last.fm the song has more than 48,000 hits and is the sixteenth most listened Queen song ever.
Queen's compilations The Platinum Collection, Classic Queen, and Greatest Hits II all make an unsubstantiated claim that the song reached #1 in 35 countries around the world, but to date, there is no known territory where the song did reach the top position.
Musical theatre actress Elaine Paige recorded the song on her album of Queen covers The Queen Album in 1988.