From Queenpedia.com

With their Sheer Heart Attack album finished and ready to be released, Queen were busy preparing and rehearsing a drastically different live show from their previous tour. Even they could not have predicted the amazing success that the first single from the album, Killer Queen, would provide, so it was during an already hectic schedule that they showed up to the Top Of The Pops studios to film an appearance on the show. Miming along to the standard backing track, the band put as much energy into the performance as they can, but it's clear that they're already starting to dislike the process of TV show appearances; indeed, a second version, taped later in the winter of 1974, was less well-received by the band, and it was this disdain for miming along for the sake of television cameras that spurred on the Bohemian Rhapsody promotional video.

In 1981, when it came time to collect videos for Queen's first video cassette compilation, Greatest Flix, an interesting predicament occurred: Killer Queen had not been given a proper promotional video, yet to leave off such a huge hit would be sacrilege to many Queen fans. (Presumably, the Top Of The Pops appearance(s) were either unavailable, or the band's management were willing to pay the BBC to have them on the cassette.) An easy solution was provided in the manner of a montage video, and while Queen's latter-day directors of choice the Torpedo Twins would very quickly turn this term into a foul word, here it is a refreshing change of pace to the other videos on the collection. Images of Queen, past and present, relaxed and on-stage, flew by as the song played, while vital stats (birth date, instrument, favorite musician, etc.) of each band member were periodically provided to spice things up a bit. (In a way, this is a precursor to the now-common "photo gallery" on music DVDs.)

For the band's subsequent video collections, it appears that Queen's management were willing to finally pay the BBC the rights to use the video from the single's first appearance on Top Of The Pops, and this has now become the "standard" video for the single. (The second performance has yet to be released on any video collection, while the 1981 video montage is exclusive solely to the original Greatest Flix video cassette.)

Credits

Version	Name	Artist	Recorded	Format	Length	Director	Filming Location
Montage Version	Killer Queen	Queen	n/a	Video	3.00	n/a	n/a
TOTP #1	Killer Queen	Queen	October 1974	Video	3.00	unknown	Top Of The Pops studio
TOTP #2	Killer Queen	Queen	autumn/winter 1974	Video	3.00	unknown	Top Of The Pops studio

Availability

• Montage Version - Greatest Flix VHS
• TOTP Version #1 - Greatest Hits VHS, Greatest Video Hits 1 DVD