Little Queen is the second studio album released by the American rock band Heart. It was released in May 1977 on Portrait Records, and re-released in 2004 with two bonus tracks.
The group intended Magazine to be the official follow-up album to the debut Dreamboat Annie. However, a contract dispute with their label, Mushroom Records, resulted in the group signing with the newly formed Portrait Records, a division of CBS Records (now Sony/BMG).
The Mushroom contract called for two albums and the label took the position that they were owed a second one. On that basis, Mushroom attempted to prevent the release of Little Queen and any other work by Heart. They took the five unfinished tracks for Magazine and added a B-side and two live recordings. The first release of the album in early 1977 came with a disclaimer on the back cover.
The dispute dragged on and ended with the court deciding that Heart was free to sign with a new label, but added that Mushroom was indeed owed a second album. So, Heart went back to the studio to rerecord, remix, edit, and resequence the Magazine recordings in a marathon session over four days. A court-ordered guard stood nearby to prevent the master tapes from being erased.
Little Queen was released 14 May 1977 and Magazine was re-released 22 April 1978. With the hit single "Barracuda", Little Queen outsold Magazine handily, eventually achieving 3X Platinum status. However, the almost contemporary release also gave the band the distinction of having all three of their albums on the charts at the same time
No comments:
Post a Comment