I Want It All

"I Want It All" is a song by British rock band Queen, featured on their 1989 studio album The Miracle. Written by guitarist and backing vocalist Brian May (but credited to Queen) and produced by David Richards, it was released as the first single from the album on 2 May 1989. "I Want It All" reached number three on the UK Singles Chart, the Irish Singles Chart, the Finnish Singles Chart, the New Zealand Singles Chart and the US Billboard Album Rock Tracks chart. On the Hot 100, the song reached number 50. Elsewhere, it reached number two in the Netherlands, number four in Italy and Norway, and the top 10 in Australia, Belgium, Germany and Switzerland. With its message about fighting for one's own goals it became an anti-apartheid protest song in South Africa.

The song was first played live on 20 April 1992, three years after its release, during The Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert, performed by the three remaining members of Queen, with Roger Daltrey singing lead vocals and Tony Iommi playing rhythm guitar. Freddie Mercury himself never performed the song live, as he died in November 1991 from AIDS at the age of 45, and his final performance with Queen was at the end of The Magic Tour, at Knebworth Park on 9 August 1986. The song is sung mainly by Mercury, with May singing on the choruses and middle eight.

There are at least three versions of this song. The longer version is in The Miracle, while the shortest version is used in the music video and in the Greatest Hits II compilation. Compared to the album version, both the single version and video version features a different beginning, omitting the acoustic/electric guitar part and the short rhythmic-electric guitar part immediately following. It starts with the band singing the chorus a cappella, and then, after a 1/8 + 2/4 A5 power chord, it picks up on the first electric guitar riff by May that follows the short rhythmic guitar part mentioned before. The guitar solo section is different as well: the album version features an extra solo, done at the same tempo as the rest of the song, just before the faster main solo. Mercury's vocals after the middle eight are also slightly different and are positioned on the "extra" solo on the album version, and on the main solo on both the single version and video version.