If the walls of the UK's now famous Rockfield Studios could talk, they'd tell of the fabled sessions of late-1975, when Queen arrived in South Wales to record the album that would explode the possibilities of rock 'n' roll.
"We wanted it to be eclectic," says Roger Taylor. "We wanted different styles. We had things like "Seaside Rendezvous," which was a lot of fun. But we also had this monumentally long song, "The Prophet's Song." Brian had a field day on that one."
As Brian May admits, he initially struggled to tame that eight-minute opus, whose endless twists include a vocal canon treated with tape delay.
"I have a massive insecurity about myself as a songwriter," remembers the guitarist. "And with 'The Prophet's Song,' it was right on the edge. I could hear something in my head, but I couldn't quite grasp it. I remember wrestling with all the different pieces - how each chorus ends in a different way, and where does it go - but it was a wonderful challenge to get Freddie to do that canon stuff, which he does in the middle. Freddie was very supportive in getting into those experiments."
Having bent to the will of their studio bosses while recording 1973's self-titled debut, Queen had fought hard to achieve total creative control over their output. Now, with "A Night At The Opera" complete, the band stuck to their guns as talk turned to the release schedule.
"We never thought of ourselves as a singles band," says Roger. "Remember, this is the '70s, and in the '70s, particularly the BBC with Top Of The Pops, they thought everything was about singles. Well, it wasn't. Everything was really about albums. Dark Side of the Moon, The Beatles White album, a wonderful album of different, eclectic material. That's what we wanted to do.
"We never thought about making singles, or 'This one's a single.' We'd just make an album then think, 'Oh, let's try that one as a single,' because a single was like a flag, like "Killer Queen" was the flag for 'Sheer Heart Attack', and the album was consequentially very successful."
Pick up some Queen for your collection here.