One Way Ticket to Hell... and Back

One Way Ticket to Hell... and Back, the second album, came out in Britain on Atlantic on 28 November 2005 (the CD is 5051011 1218 2 1); the American release followed the next day, and Warner Music Japan's on the 30th (WPCR-12189), adding the new song "Grief Hammer". Roy Thomas Baker, Queen's producer, produced, engineered and mixed it. As Baker told Sound On Sound, writing began in late summer 2004 in a barn near the band's home town of Lowestoft; the backing tracks were cut at Rockfield in Wales in the first half of 2005 and the vocals and guitars over two summer months at Whitfield Street Studios in London. The orchestra, arranged and conducted by Paul Buckmaster, was recorded at Capitol in Los Angeles and the pan pipes in Peru, and thirty-seven songs on four hundred reels of tape were cut down to ten songs and thirty-five minutes. NME introduced Rockfield as the place where Queen had recorded "Bohemian Rhapsody". During the Rockfield sessions the bassist Frankie Poullain left. In May 2005 the band cited musical differences, as Billboard reported, while Frankie said he had been forced out against his wishes (NME). His place went to Richie Edwards, formerly of Onion Trump, who had spent two years as the band's guitar technician (Blabbermouth). The opening "One Way Ticket" follows a pan-pipe introduction with the sound of a line of cocaine being snorted; Justin Hawkins called it a song of redemption, about the slide into hell that drugs bring and how it is never too late to turn back (NME). By his account "Bald" is about losing one's virility and "Dinner Lady Arms" the story of an elderly couple who get back together after a long time. The album reached number 11 in Britain, 26 on Oricon in Japan and 58 on the Billboard 200, and was certified gold in the UK. The singles "One Way Ticket" and "Is It Just Me?" both reached number 8 and "Girlfriend" number 39. Ed Graham later called it the million-dollar failure (Classic Rock). The running order here is the original's as printed.