Fun In Space

  • 1. No Violins
  • 2. Laugh or Cry
  • 3. Future Management
  • 4. Let's Get Crazy
  • 5. My Country I & II
  • 6. Good Times Are Now
  • 7. Magic Is Loose
  • 8. Interlude in Constantinople
  • 9. Airheads
  • 10. Fun in Space

In the summer of 1980, during a break in Queen’s mammoth tour of the USA, Roger began work on a solo project. It would become the first solo album from a Queen band member.

“I’d had these ideas for years, and I just thought the time was right to start putting them into some sort of order. I’d had a go with the Testify single, but I had an album full of songs that I knew couldn’t be done by Queen. I don’t really know why they were not suitable for us as a band, they just weren’t”.

The album was recorded at Mountain Studios in Switzerland, which was then owned by Queen, and featured ten tracks all written, arranged, produced and played by Roger. Additional keyboard parts were played by engineer David Richards.

The album cover was conceived by Roger and designed by Storm Thorgerson at Hipgnosis, the company that also designed artwork for artists such as Peter Gabriel, Pink Floyd, Genesis and Bad Company.

Roger’s liner notes on the album include the line “P.P.S. 157 synthesizers“, a light-hearted reference to the early Queen albums which proudly announced, “No synthesisers”.

‘Fun In Space’ was released in the UK in April 1981, and reached number 18 in the charts, with the ‘Future Management’ single released a week earlier. Although no video was made for the single, Roger did appear on ‘Top Of The Pops’ and other TV shows in Europe. An edited version of ‘My Country’ followed in the UK, while in the USA and Japan ‘Let’s Get Crazy’ was the chosen single.