Queen Releases Single Digital Machines (Or Back To Humans)

Queen + Adam Lambert (Instagram @officialqueenmusic)

JAKARTA - A thrilling mix between voice and vision dubbed "masterclass" by USA Today, Queen + Adam Lambert's "Rhapsody" performance opens with a thrilling industrial rhythm and vocal harmony of Machines (Or Back To Humans) - a new rework from the cult's favorite song which opens the second side of the 1984 album The Works.

While immersive performances attract audiences into the world of dystopia with rotating gears and pistons, a battalion of CGI robots lined across the giant video screen accompanied by Machines' voices and looked down on the audience with harsh sulfur eyes just to be conquered with the help of Freddie Mercury's virtual vocals, the band then launched the technological but highly humanized Radio Ga Ga, which started the rollercurrency for more than two hours from Queen's heritage catalog.

In the opening of Rhapsody's new production, viewers heard the main vocals of the duo Freddie Mercury and Brian May from behind, raising the alarm (early in 1984!) that Machines would soon take over. Contrary to this, robotic voices are provided by vocals of Roger Taylor who support Machines' point of view. The theme of this conflict resurfaced at various points in the next set.

May, one of the creators (with Taylor) of the Machines song, and presenter of this new theme, said: "The Horde Robot provides a narrative for our new event. Currently artificial intelligence is starting to attack our entire lives, these mechanical people symbolize the robot insurgency. In our current growing event, Back To Humans is the soundtrack for us as humans who regain our control."

"Machines and Radio Ga actually had the same ancestors, the beginning of a collaboration between Roger and me in a session for the album The Works in 1984. However, we had different ideas about how it should be developed, and the song was divided into two songs in opposite directions Roger drove Radio Ga Ga to completion and became a hit worldwide, and I took the path to making Machines a kind of endless fight."

"By uniting this new event, I realize that Machines are becoming more relevant than ever. So the idea emerged to give the theme of the event with the 21st century version of this battle and, coincidentally, reuniting Ga Ga and Machines appropriately. And it is in good agreement with our old belief that rock performances must be live and dangerous rather than being shown with cliques and electronic support."

Taylor added: "Machines were born from electronics that we initially explored on Radio Ga Ga to create a sense of battle between the electric side and the human side. Now that the world is becoming a world of machines and we are all just trying to follow it, we feel this is the right time to revive the idea of returning to humans."

Introduced to Queen's setlist for today's US tour, a excited live reaction to Machines (Or Back To Humans) has now prompted Queen to release her original song as a digital single available on November 10.

Basically, it starts with everything electronic electron drum, everything, and what you have is a 'human' rock band that joins. What you ended up going through was a fight between the two," Taylor said.

Originally written by May and Taylor nearly 40 years ago and currently holding a core position in Queen's spectacular live production today, Machines undoubtedly are now becoming more precise than ever.