In 1983, the two biggest voices in popular music sat down together in a home studio in Encino, California, and started making an album. Michael Jackson had just released Thriller. Freddie Mercury was fronting Queen at the height of their powers. They liked each other enormously; they had been to each other’s shows, and they got as far as recording demos for three songs. Then the whole thing collapsed, and the reason has become one of the most beloved stories in music. It was a llama.
The admiration between them was completely genuine. Jackson had been a Queen fan since their American breakthrough and had turned up to see them play at the Forum in Los Angeles again and again. There is a lovely account from a 1983 Rolling Stone piece describing Jackson arriving backstage, standing quietly by the door, being shy, until Mercury spotted him and leaped up to gather him into a hug. When a reporter asked Jackson if he could tell viewers that Michael Jackson was a Queen fan, the answer was better than that. “I’m a Freddie Mercury fan.”
Freddie Mercury and Michael Jackson – There Must Be More to Life Than This Golden Duet
So they went to work. The three tracks they demoed were “There Must Be More to Life Than This,” “State of Shock” and “Victory.” Sources disagree about whether it was meant to be a Queen record, a Jackson’s record or a full album of duets. What nobody disputes is that they were good. Mercury later said they were great songs and that the real problem was time, as both were extraordinarily busy.
But time was not the only problem. Michael Jackson had a pet llama named Louie, and he brought Louie to the studio. Not as a one-off gag. Every single day.
Freddie Mercury to His Manager: ‘Get Me Out — Michael Jackson’s Llama Is in the Studio!
Freddie Mercury was a man comfortable with almost any form of chaos. He drew the line here. Queen’s manager, Jim “Miami” Beach, has told the story on record in the documentary The Great Pretender. He got a frantic phone call from Freddie asking to be got out of the studio. When Beach asked why, the answer was perfect. “Because I’m recording with a llama.” Michael, he explained, was bringing his pet llama in every day; he was really not used to it, he had had enough, and he wanted out.
Worth noting, there is a rival version of the story. Author David Wigg says the offending animal was actually Jackson’s chimpanzee Bubbles, and that Michael would sit the chimp between them and then turn to him between takes asking whether he thought that one was lovely, or whether they ought to do it again. After a few days of that, Freddie apparently exploded.
The two men never got back in the studio. But the songs did not die. Mercury reworked “There Must Be More to Life Than This” into a solo track for his 1985 album Mr. Bad Guy. Jackson took “State of Shock” and re-recorded it with Mick Jagger instead, and it became a hit for the Jacksons. And in 2014, more than thirty years later, Brian May and Roger Taylor went back to the original tapes and finally released the Mercury and Jackson duet version on the album Queen Forever.
“Victory” has never been released. It is still sitting in a vault somewhere.