I recall answering their connection in a column or it being discussed in a thread on the board but frankly 505 results all entitles “what with the clock” don’t seem to be the results I wanted. Anyone know the connection between these two songs or can direct me to the column or thread they were discussed in?
They were the first two songs on Queen’s News of the world album, and were usually played one after the other on the radio when the album was current. I don’t know of any deeper connection.
It is too clear, and so it is hard to see.
The charted single from Queen was reported in Billboard as, “We Will Rock You/We Are the Champions.” See Joel Whitburn’s Top Pop/Rock Singles 1955-1989.
I would suggest that they are “connected” in the same sense that Aquarius and Let The Sun Shine are connected: two songs released, played, and charted as one single.
- Rick
You know… ( leaning back in chair )…I chose that album OVER Billy Joel’s “Stranger” at a sweet 16 party. Not only was I not a “Queen” fan, but within a year, I was A HUGE Billy Joel fan.
Live and Learn
Cartooniverse
" If you want to kiss the sky, you’d better learn how to kneel."
When written, the songs were never intended to play together. You have rock radio to thank for that. A couple stations started playing them back to back, and it just caught on. Simple as that.
–puff “I read the Queen biography” ington
The reason for this is that the '45 of “We are the Champions” had “We Will Rock You” as its B-Side (or it may have been the other way around. I’m not sure which was the “A” and which was the “B”)
These songs have a complicated history.
Going to the 1955-1996 (8th) edition of Top Pop Singles, in 1977 Queen’s We are The Champions reached #4 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 Chart, with We Will Rock You listed as the separate B side. The book includes the following note: “B-side did not chart, however, it received extensive airplay as both sides were segued together on the album News of the World, both sides charted as a medley in '92.”
As noted above, in 1992 Queen released a single with a medley of We Will Rock You/We Are the Champions, which reached #52 on the Hot 100, and #28 on the sales chart. The non-charting B-side for this single is listed as We Are The Champions/These Are The Days Of Our Lives.
I’ve wondered the same thing about INXS’ Need You Tonight/Mediate. They are almost definitely meant to be played together, as the bassline carries from one to the next with no interruption. I’ve heard Need played on its own, but never Mediate (which doesn’t really surprise me, given that it’s just a bunch of rhyming words).
He weathered a firestorm of agony and did not break.
And while Yori raged against his unbending
courage, we took Kyuden Hiruma back.
His loss is great, but so is the gift his suffering brought.
-Yakamo’s Funeral
Two other song amalgamations spring to mind: “Feeling That Way/Anytime” by Journey and “Heartbreaker/Livin’ Lovin’ Maid” by Led Zeppelin.
Curiously, the two songs were back-to-back on the Journey album, but were not on the Zeppelin album.
As previously mentioned in this thread, I think it was an influential DJ or two in some major markets that hit upon the fact that the songs sounded cool strung together, and it spread from there.
“I am a news-paper man, damn it! Come to the point with me, sir, or take your business elsewhere!” - T. Herman Zweibel, Publisher, The Onion
Yes, they are.
Other segues of two songs that are nearly always played together include “Going out of my Head/Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You” and various sections of the Beatles Abbey Road Medley (Mean Mister Mustard/Polythene Pam).
Part of this is because when two songs go together without a pause, FM DJ couldn’t easily stop (in the days before CDs).
“East is east and west is west and if you take cranberries and stew them like applesauce they taste much more like prunes than rhubarb does.” – Marx
Read “Sundials” in the new issue of Aboriginal Science Fiction. www.sff.net/people/rothman
There is also the case of the second side of “Fragile” by YES ( 1972, Atco Records for Atlantic, SD19132). The second track, " Long Distance Run-Around" almost always flows into the third- " The Fish", when aired. Again, a classic example. The Fish is a bass solo, which is then expanded upon by other instruments. It would have trouble standing alone ( unless you are, as I am, an insatiable Yes fan ). They flow together, and are almost always heard as such.
Cartooniverse
" If you want to kiss the sky, you’d better learn how to kneel. "
Don’t forget “Brain Damage” & “Eclipse” from Floyd’s “Dark Side of the Moon”
Scott
RealityChuck, every version I’ve had of Zeppelin II had the song “Thank You” between “Heartbreaker” and “Livin’ Lovin’ Maid.”
Admittedly, I only had this on cassette, never vinyl. Heartbreaker was on one side, Maid on the other.
The cassette tape version of Zep II mixed up the songs and disrupted the integrity of the album, presumably to more efficiently fit the music on the shortest length of tape possible… just my hypothesis, but I own the original vinyl, the tape, and the CD: the LP and CD agree; the tape is “fuera de serie”.
And, I’ve always thought that these “natural radio segues” have less to do with influential DJ’s who thought it sounded cool and more to do with the “Album” concept that, goddammit!, these songs were designed to be together. Pink Floyd albums probably best epitomize this concept (I can hardly stand to listen to a single, stand-alone Floyd song on the radio–not that that prevents me from turning it up), although Rush, Zep, et al., are in there, too.
Don’t forget Elton John’s “Funeral For a Friend/Love Lies Bleeding.” Dream Theater even covered them together.
It’s a long way to heaven, but only three short steps to hell.
Ummmm…way back in the day when Sublime was not quite as popular as it is now, they would play “Date Rape” on late night radio shows and it was always followed by a short and wierd cover of rawhide. Now that they have started to play “Date Rape” on main stream radio they leave off the Rawhide part. Just another example of how they try to keep the masses stupid…
you’re right. that’s how they keep the masses stupid. by playing Sublime.
i hate 'em.
I think We Are The Champions was originally released as the teaser single about a week or so before the album came out. The AOR stations usually put the two songs together because there was almost no filler between them on the LP. On CD, though, there’s about a 2-second gap.
One of my favorites is Whammer Jammer/Hard Drivin’ Man by the J. Geils Band.
Other “double songs” include :
The Happiest Days of our Lives/Another Brick in the Wall Part 2 by Pink Floyd (not always played together, though; often stations just play ABITW2 without the preceding song)
Chloe Dancer/Crown of Thorns by Mother Love Bone
I’ve never heard Living Loving Maid played with Heartbreaker. I guess it just depends on what station you’re listening to. I always hear Loving Loving Maid played right after Immigrant Song.
Also, I don’t personally own the album, but according to cdnow.com, the order of the songs on Led Zeppelin 2 is :
04. Thank You
05. Heartbreaker
06. Living Loving Maid (She’s Just A Woman)
Another example…“Brain Stew” and “Jaded” by Green Day. And this next one doesn’t really count because they were recorded as a medley, but do you remember “Just a Gigolo/I Ain’t Got Nobody” by David Lee Roth? That same combo had previously been recorded by the Village People.