“I feel despondent about the world of humans.” Queen legend Brian May reveals the fears that keep him awake at night

The dawning of a new year is often accompanied by new hopes, and the prospect of new possibilities. Or, as Queen guitarist Brian May declares in his annual new year message to fans, "new opportunities - new dreams - new challenges - new fulfilments."

"The FUTURE is still out there!!," May states. "Let's go find it!!"

But in a new interview with the Radio Times, the 78-year-old musicians admits that he's finding it hard to stay optimistic about the future given the state of the world at present.

"I feel despondent about the world of humans," May admits. “It keeps me awake at night. The cruelty, the ignorance, the lies, the rewriting of history. I think an understanding and love of art and music make it impossible to be the kind of person who wants to go out and be cruel to others.

"There’s so much suffering in the world," he continues, "why would we want to add to it? We’ve lost the ability to discuss things and respect other people’s point of view, we have a horrendous polarisation."

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One thing that Queen fans can look forward to, at least, is the forthcoming reissue of the band's acclaimed second album, Queen II.

On December 22, May gifted fans a pre-Christmas treat with the broadcast of a never-before-heard, unreleased song from Queen that will be included in the forthcoming box set.

The song, Not For Sale (Polar Bear), actually pre-dates the 1970 formation of Queen, and was co-written by May and vocalist/bassist Tim Staffell for Smile, a power trio completed by drummer Roger Taylor. According to the Queen Vault fan website, the song was first recorded by Smile during a session at De Lane Lea studios in London in September 1969.

Following Smile's break-up, May brought the song to his new band Queen, and the quartet reworked the song with the guitarist singing lead vocals on the verses, and frontman Freddie Mercury singing the chorus.

May shared what he described as a "work-in-progress" version of the song at the close of his Dec 22 show on Planet Rock radio.

"My final choice is going to confuse you, probably," he said while introducing the song. “Because you might possibly have heard a kinda bootleg version of this by Smile, it’s a song that goes back a very long way, but to my knowledge no one has ever heard this version, which is kinda a work in progress and it will appear on the forthcoming rebuild of the Queen II album next year, but I’m sneaking this in because I’m just fascinated to know what people think about it. It's a very, very ancient song called Polar Bear."

Listen to the song below.

Queen - Polar Bear (2025 Planet Rock Broadcast) [Work In Progress Mix] - YouTube

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A music writer since 1993, formerly Editor of Kerrang! and Planet Rock magazine (RIP), Paul Brannigan is a Contributing Editor to Louder. Having previously written books on Lemmy, Dave Grohl (the Sunday Times best-seller This Is A Call) and Metallica (Birth School Metallica Death, co-authored with Ian Winwood), his Eddie Van Halen biography (Eruption in the UK, Unchained in the US) emerged in 2021. He has written for Rolling Stone, Mojo and Q, hung out with Fugazi at Dischord House, flown on Ozzy Osbourne's private jet, played Angus Young's Gibson SG, and interviewed everyone from Aerosmith and Beastie Boys to Young Gods and ZZ Top. Born in the North of Ireland, Brannigan lives in North London and supports The Arsenal.

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