The Reason Queen’s John Deacon Didn’t Make A Solo Album

It’s not that much of a surprise that the lead singer often gets all the attention and becomes the face of a band. For instance, Robert Plant, Jim Morrison, and James Hetfield are the first names that come to mind when thinking about their respective bands. While their bandmates made crucial contributions to their sound, these frontmen’s names and faces flash in our minds whenever we come across their efforts.

When it comes to Queen, Freddie Mercury and Brian May were constantly under the spotlight, stealing the show. Queen has been identified with Freddie, and thanks to his showmanship and astonishing singing talent, he was a hard-to-replace figure. However, as in most cases, the bassist and drummer were overlooked. John Deacon had his share of it as he was overshadowed by Brian May and Freddie Mercury’s presence.

According to John Deacon, he was the quiet one in Queen, and the bassists were often the ones who remained in the background. Although bassists are responsible for creating the crucial bridges between guitar solos and the rest of the instruments, Deacon had argued there were many other names in the scene like him, such as John Entwistle. Perhaps because of his shy and reserved personality, the bassist stayed away from conflicts in Queen and focused on improving his sound.

However, John Deacon realized his bass-playing talents weren’t enough during Queen’s time off. Following the release of ‘Hot Space,’ which featured a sound the Queen fanbase wasn’t familiar with, they decided to embark on a tour to promote the album. However, as it marked a departure from their seventies sound, ‘Hot Space’ wasn’t well-received by the fans. Queen wasn’t happy with fans’ reaction during the Hot Space Tour, and their popularity began to wane.

Queen decided to take a long time off when the tour concluded. During that period, there was a distance between band members, and each explored solo projects. Roger Taylor released his second solo effort ‘Strange Frontier,’ Brian May released ‘Star Fleet Project,’ and Freddie Mercury came up with his ‘Mr. Bad Guy.’ However, John Deacon had nothing to do — as he couldn’t sing.

“I can’t make a solo album because I can’t sing,” John Deacon told Martin Townshend during a 1985 interview. This issue caused the bassist to fall into a pit of depression, and he was pretty bored during that time. Although he opened a new studio in London with Henry Crallan and worked on a new single with Errol Brown, titled ‘This Is Your Time,’ Deacon wasn’t happy that Queen was inactive and he couldn’t come up with a solo effort.

“We’re not so much a group anymore,” Deacon reflected on those times. “We’re four individuals that work together as Queen, but our working together as Queen is now actually taking up less and less of our time. I mean, basically, I went spare, really, because we were doing so little. I got really bored and became quite depressed because we had so much time on our hands.”

So, the bassist was unhappy that they had lost so much time not working on a new effort. While his bandmates focused on solo works, Deacon couldn’t embark on any solo projects because he couldn’t sing. This caused him to get depressed and bored, but Queen reconvened nine months later to record ‘The Works.’ So, the shy and quiet bassist had a chance to play his bass in peace with this album.