Brian May says that his reported comment about Queen ceasing touring was "a misinterpretation".
During an interview with The Sunday Times, published on October 4, May was quoted as saying that the legendary British band would not tour again in the wake of their acclaimed Rhapsody tour with vocalist Adam Lambert, which ran from 2019 to 2024.
"I made a decision 18 months ago that I didn’t want to tour again," the guitarist was reported saying to writer Will Hodgkinson, the UK newspaper's Chief Rock and Pop Critic. "A close family friend died when we were in the States, so I said to my tour manager, I’ll just nip home for a few days and come back. She looked me in the eyes and said, ‘You know you can’t do that.’ I love to play, I love to travel, but the trade-off is sacrificing your freedom. I have a wife [actress Anita Dobson], grandchildren and a lot of astrophysics I want to do, so I’m thinking maybe 50 years is enough."
May's comments were picked up by media outlets worldwide, including by Classic Rock, but the guitarist now says that this wasn't what he actually meant.
"This is a misinterpretation of what I actually said," he posted on Instagram. "I have actually never said Queen won't ever tour again. I could never say never. I simply made a personal decision last year to take a break from touring.
"I've been making lots of music, and Roger [Taylor] and I are constantly working together on Queen projects behind the scenes. I don't know what the future holds. I'm ever open to new adventures!"
Last month, May revealed that he and Taylor are still weighing up the pros and cons of developing an ABBA Voyage-style immersive avatar show for Queen.
In an interview with Absolute Radio, the guitarist was asked if he might consider working on a similar virtual concert residency for Queen.
"Yes, we looked at it very seriously,"he replied, "Particularly after I saw the [Las Vegas] Sphere and what the Eagles did with the Sphere, which I thought was amazing. And I spent a lot of time planning out what I thought could be a Queen show.
"I've kind of backed off now because you can't do it without massive use of A.I., with all the consequences of that," he continued. "Now, in some ways, I don't wanna be stealing the work of other people. If you're stealing your own work, I'm not quite sure where I stand on it, 'cause you would be stealing from the Queen oeuvre, you know, which maybe is okay because that's ours. But at the same time, you're adding to the stresses that A.I. is putting on the world.
"So, I don't know," May admitted. "I'm not so keen as I was. I think it would be great to have a permanent place where people could go and feel like they're seeing us play live in our peak, maybe all over the world, maybe at all points in time. The doors are open, but I don't know if we're gonna walk through."
Brian May and Roger Taylor are interviewed at length about their Queen: Budapest concert movie in the new issue of Classic Rock, which is published tomorrow (October 9) and available to order online now.
