"Don't Stop Me Now" is a song by the British rock bandQueen from their 1978 album Jazz that was released as a single in 1979. Written by lead singer Freddie Mercury, it was recorded in August 1978 at Super Bear Studios in Berre-les-Alpes, France, and is the twelfth track on the album. Musically, the song builds on Mercury's piano playing, with John Deacon and Roger Taylor providing a bass guitar and drums backing track. The song also provides an example of Queen's trademark style of multitrack harmony vocals for the chorus lines. The song also appears in the band's 1981 compilation albumGreatest Hits, and in June 2011, as part of Queen's 40th anniversary celebrations, an old take of the song containing more guitar parts was included on the bonus EP of the re-released and remastered Jazz album. Featuring in films, commercials, and television shows, the song has grown in popularity in the four decades since its release. Bobby Olivier of Billboard attributes its initial rebirth to its appearance in the 2004 cult classic zombie apocalypse film Shaun of the Dead. In 2014, Rolling Stone readers voted it their third favourite song by Queen.
Reception
The single reached number 9 in the UK charts but only number 86 in the US; as the album was a top-10 hit, the song got some airplay on U.S. album-oriented rock stations despite its low chart ranking as a single. Despite this the song has grown in stature with time and has been popularised not only by consistent airplay, but by its use in advertisements, television programmes and films, and through cover versions. It has subsequently become one of Queen's most popular songs. The song was voted as the third best Queen song by readers of Rolling Stone, who noted that "time has also been very kind to it and it's widely seen now as one of the group's best works." The single also has reached Platinum status in the United Kingdom. In a March 2019 Billboard magazine article titled, “The Evolution of Queen's 'Don't Stop Me Now': How a Minor Hit Became One of The Band's Most Beloved Songs”, Bobby Olivier writes, Alexis Petridis of The Guardian wrote that the "astonishing" song "may be Queen’s greatest song of all." He felt it was "a direct product of hedonism and promiscuity: an unrepentant, joyous, utterly irresistible paean to gay pleasure-seeking. You find yourself wondering if its title might not have been aimed at his censorious bandmates." Mike Orme of Stylus Magazine ranked it the 7th greatest penultimate track on an album, calling it Queen's "most flamboyant and energetic single" and commenting: "Essentially three and a half minutes of Freddie Mercury jacking the mike from the rest of the world, the song offers him a chance to let us know just how much fun he’s having in the spotlight." Billboard Magazine praised Brian May's guitar solo and also stated that "less gimmick laden" than Queen's previous single from Jazz, "Bicycle Race"/"Fat Bottomed Girls," "while still retaining the brazen braggadocio of Freddie Mercury's lead vocals." Despite its popularity, Brian May was not a fan of the song as he felt it was celebrating the hedonistic and risky lifestyle of Mercury. He added that he struggled with the lyrics at the time, because it was about a difficult period in Freddie's life when the singer was "taking lots of drugs and having sex with lots of men."
Viewed at the time of release as one of the lesser songs in the Queen canon, it was only performed live during 1979, with the last performance in the Crazy Tour. On the studio version, Brian May's only guitar playing is in his guitar solo, but on live versions performed on the band's 1979 Jazz and Crazy tours, May would also play rhythm guitar throughout the rest of the song to give more of a rock feel. A live version of the song features in the band's 1979 album Live Killers.
Sales and certifications
Personnel
Queen:
Freddie Mercury – lead vocals, piano
Brian May – electric guitar, backing vocals
Roger Taylor – drums, percussion, tambourine, triangle, backing vocals
Foxes covered the song on the 11 October 2014 "Mummy on the Orient Express" episode of Doctor Who. A music video was subsequently released by the BBC to publicize series 8 of the rebooted show.
