Queen II

Queen asked David Bowie to produce, but he was busy with Pin Ups and Diamond Dogs. Roy Thomas Baker produced with Robin Geoffrey Cable, who helped on The March of the Black Queen, and the sessions began in August 1973. Mick Rock's cover photograph shows the band in a diamond formation, inspired by a picture of Marlene Dietrich, and the same pose opens the Bohemian Rhapsody video. The LP sides were labeled Side White and Side Black. Four of the five songs on the White side were by May, while Mercury wrote and sang all six on the Black side, among them Ogre Battle and the Richard Dadd-inspired The Fairy Feller's Master-Stroke. Mercury said the sides had simply evolved from a batch of aggressive songs and a smoother set. The sleeve noted that nobody played synthesiser, again.

It reached number five in Britain and 49 in the United States. Reviews at the time were mixed. Record Mirror called it the dregs of glam rock, while Rolling Stone gave two and a half stars. Pitchfork later rated it 8 out of 10 and called it arguably the band's most underrated record. The 1001 Albums book describes it as a distinctly dark album. A remixed Collector's Edition was released on 27 March 2026.