Back another ten years, and this was at the top.
Title: “Under Pressure”
Artist: Queen and David Bowie
Nationality: English
Genre: Pop, Rock
Written by: Freddie Mercury, Roger Taylor, Brian May, David Bowie, John Deacon
Original release date: October 25 1981
Progress to the top: Two weeks after release it entered the top 10 at number 8 and hit number one the next week, spending two weeks there before sliding fairly quickly down. By January it was out of the top forty, and fell off the chart two weeks later.
Weeks spent at number one: 2
From the album: Hot Space (Queen)
What do I know about this artist? Know both of them very well; who doesn’t? This was the first and only time Bowie duetted with Queen and the only time Queen teamed up with another star, so far as I know.
What do I think of this single? Always liked this one, both as a Bowie fan and as a Queen one. Hypnotic bassline, both singers at the very top of their game, a powerful and poignant song, the more now that its two vocalists have both passed on.
What have I learned about this single? Not much I didn’t already know. Bowie and Queen were recording at the same studio, met up and decided to work a few songs together, this being the best of them. Sampled later, without permission from either, by Vanilla Ice, which put him in the spotlight for probably the only time in his life due to a major lawsuit which he lost. Well how could he not? Sandwiched in between two of Bowie’s last great albums,
Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps) and
Let’s Dance, after which he virtually vanished from the charts, and bridging an uncomfortable gap for Queen after the somewhat embarrassing soundtrack to the movie
Flash Gordon (which nevertheless gave them a big hit) and their comeback in 1984 with
A Kind of Magic.
My rating: A+++
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a01QQZyl-_I[/youtube]