Brian May and Roger Taylor have worked together for over 50 years, having been in bands together before the formation of their chart-topping group Queen. However, it hasn’t always been plain sailing for the pair as Brian admitted to resentment about the financial arrangements following one of the band’s biggest singles. While it is common knowledge that the band’s frontman, Freddie Mercury, wrote their 1975 magnum opus, Bohemian Rhapsody, it was the band’s drummer, Roger Taylor, who wrote the B side of that single, I’m in Love With My Car. The band’s attitude to that song was lampooned in the 2018 Freddie Mercury biopic Bohemian Rhapsody.

Due to the way profits were distributed, Roger made as much money from the B side as Freddie did from the chart-topping iconic A side—something that still grates on Brian. Speaking to MOJO magazine alongside Roger recently, he described it as “an injustice.”

“We were aware of the injustice of I’m in Love With My Car making as much money as Bohemian Rhapsody.

“It was a real sticking point for the band and it’s good we got through it,” Brian said.

“I think our sense of humour saved us. How long did it take me to get over it? Oh, quite a while.”

Roger confirmed: “He’s (Brian) never forgiven me. And I’ve never stopped laughing about it!”

It would be another 14 years before the royalties issue was resolved when the band decided to split them equally, irrespective of who wrote a track.

All songs from The Miracle album onwards are credited to ‘Queen’ rather than individual members, beginning in 1989.

In the same interview Roger explained: “It was Freddie’s idea, bless him, to split everything equally after a while.

“He was very generous that way. You win and you lose, but it felt like the grown-up thing to do,” he said.