The Solo Collection
The Solo Collection, 2000
Released	23 October 2000
Recorded	1969 - 1988 at various studios
Length	10+ hours
Label	Parlophone (UK)
Producer(s)	various producers
Freddie Mercury chronology
Solo 2000 The Solo Collection 2000 Lover Of Life, Singer Of Songs: The Very Best Of Freddie Mercury 2006

As far back as 1996, reports had circulated that work was progressing on a Queen box set that trawled the archives for any rare and unreleased material that had been widely reported yet didn't circulate on bootlegs. (Unlike The Beatles, whose archives were often raided by ambitious and hungry fans, providing collectors with literally hundreds, if not thousands, of hours' worth of unreleased material, Queen were always far more tight-lipped about what existed and what didn't, and very few, if any, unreleased songs wound up on bootlegs.) While it seems that the Queen archives set has been put on the backburner, seemingly forever, a rare treat that few knew about at the time was released instead in October 2000: a sprawling, 10 CD, 2 DVD box set that neatly wrapped up the recording career of Freddie Mercury's solo output.

Casual fans – and maybe even several die-hards – had little clue that Freddie was so prolific in the studio, and many presumed that the 19 album tracks and handful of singles was all that he produced. However, the box set contains a plethora of studio outtakes, unreleased works-in-progress, and full-fledged songs that didn't make the cut, most that few collectors even knew about. The luxuriant packaging – sepia-toned box encasing a book of meticulous, well-annotated liner notes, a complimentary essay by journalist Séan O'Hagan (not the musician), full lyrics, rare photographs, and original handwritten lyrics – is of an extraordinarily high standard, and puts other box sets (even many of Queen's previous and successive attempts) to shame.

With all that is included, surely there must be something huge to criticize? Well, there are a few notable omissions: live renditions of the Time musical songs (Born To Rock'n'Roll, It's In Everyone Of Us, In My Defence, and Time), the single version of The Fallen Priest, and Montserrat Caballé's vocal version of Exercises In Free Love are the notable ones, as well as a handful of other minor edits and versions. Um, what else? Maybe ... maybe the documentary was too good? Or the promo videos DVD was too complete? How about the price? Over $150 for this thing ... well, actually, that's more than justified, considering the quality and quantity of material and the excellent presentation. So really, a few tracks here and there that are missing is like complaining about a cloud almost obscuring the sun for 30 seconds while on a perfect seven day tropical vacation.

What The Solo Collection is is designed for the die-hard fans, the ones who thought they had everything that Freddie ever did, and yet can still be genuinely surprised at the contents of the box set. Unfortunately, QPL have set such impossibly high standards, that every attempt at an archival release will be judged against this box set. Judging by the recent travesty of The Singles Collection - Volume 1, QPL has a long way to go to match The Solo Collection.

Tracklists

Credits

• Musicians:

Freddie Mercury - instruments

other musicians

• Produced by
• Engineered by
• Recorded at

Charts

Charts

Liner notes

Liner notes

Freddie talks

Reviews

Reviews

Sleeves

Mr. Bad Guy	Barcelona	The Great Pretender	The Singles, 1973 - 1985
The Singles, 1986 - 1993	Instrumentals	Rarities 1: Mr. Bad Guy Sessions	Rarities 2: Barcelona Sessions
Rarities 3: Other Sessions	The David Wigg Interviews	The Freddie Mercury Video Collection	The Untold Story

Promotional Material

UK promo poster