April
6th marks the 40th anniversary of Roger Taylor’s first solo LP, Fun In
Space, which was released on this day in 1981. As well as being his
first solo album, it was also the first solo release from any member of
Queen. Roger had previously only released a solo single, I Wanna
Testify b/w Turn on the TV, back in 1977.
The album was recorded
during downtime between Queen recording and touring beginning in 1978.
For this album, in addition to writing all the songs and co-producing,
Roger handled nearly all the performance duties including drums,
guitars, bass, vocals and the majority of the keyboards. The remainder
of keyboard contributions came from co-producer, David Richards, who
would become a frequent collaborator with Queen on several of their
albums throughout the 1980s. Though Queen were notorious for their “NO
SYNTHESIZERS” proclamations on all their albums in the 1970s, up until
The Game, Fun In Space counters with the tongue-in-cheek joke, "P.P.S.
157 synthesizers”.
The front cover design was inspired by a Jim
Laurier cover of Creepy from the July 1980 issue. In that respect, it
shares a similar origin story with the cover of Queen’s News of the
World (1977), which was based on a 1953 cover of Astounding Science
Fiction. The alien font shown on the front is mostly upside-down
Hebrew, though it does not actually spell anything. On the rear, the
artwork is reversed to show Taylor holding the original Creepy cover.
The cover design was handled by Hipgnosis with photography by Peter
Christopherson.
While the album just managed to scrape the
lower reaches of the UK top 20 album charts, it went largely unnoticed
across the pond in the North American markets. Even though I was a
massive Queen fan throughout the latter half of the 1970s, by the time
this came out, I was very much onto more progressive avenues and didn’t
bother to check out this album at all until some 30 years after its
release. That’s kind of a shame as I suspect I’d have enjoyed it if I’d
given it a chance earlier. Roger’s songs with Queen have often been my
favorites with tracks like Drowse, Tenement Funster, Loser In the End
and Sheer Heart Attack being only a few of the standouts he contributed
to the band. There are good songs to be found on this solo album, but I
do have to say they never quite reach the heights of his Queen
classics. Still, it’s an LP that is worth a listen.
Taylor
would eventually compliment this album in 2013 with a sequel solo album,
Fun on Earth, which was the album that reminded me that I should
backtrack and spend some time with its 1981 companion. The two albums
taken together offer a wonderful set of “then and now” music showcasing
Roger Taylor outside the often overshadowing sphere of Queen.
