"I Want It All" | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Single by Queen | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
from the album The Miracle | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
B-side | "Hang On in There" | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Released | 2 May 1989 (UK) 11 May 1989 (US) |
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Recorded | 1988 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Genre | Hard rock | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Length | 4:41 (Album Version) 4:01 (Single Version) |
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Writer(s) |
Queen (Brian May) |
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Producer(s) |
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Queen singles chronology | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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"I Want It All" is a song by British rock band Queen, featured on their 1989 studio album The Miracle. Written by guitarist and backing vocalist Brian May (but credited to Queen) and produced by David Richards, it was released as the first single from the album on 2 May 1989. "I Want It All" reached #3 on both the UK Singles Chart and the American Billboard Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks chart, #50 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and #1 in other European territories, including Spain, where Los 40 Principales regularly played the song during the month of July 1989.
The song was first played live on 20 April 1992, three years after its release, during The Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert, performed by the three remaining members of Queen, with Roger Daltrey singing lead vocals and Tony Iommi playing rhythm guitar. Mercury himself never performed the song live, as he died in November 1991 from AIDS at the age of 45, and his final performance with Queen was at the end of The Magic Tour, in 1986. The song is sung mainly by Mercury, with May singing on the choruses and middle eight.
There are at least two versions of this song. The longer one is the album version, while the shortest one is used in the music video and in the Greatest Hits II compilation. Compared to the album version, the video version features a different beginning, omitting the acoustic/electric guitar part and the short rhythmic-electric guitar part immediately following. It starts with the band singing the chorus a cappella, and then, after a 1/8 + 2/4 A5 power chord, it picks up on the first electric guitar riff by May that follows the short rhythmic guitar part mentioned before. The guitar solo section is different as well: the album version features an extra solo, done at the same tempo as the rest of the song, just before the faster main solo. Mercury's vocals after the middle eight are also slightly different and are positioned on the "extra" solo on the album version, and on the main solo on the video version.