Robbed hit of the week 12/22/14 - Queen's "A Kind Of Magic"...

Queen - "A Kind Of Magic"
from the album A Kind Of Magic (1986)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #42

This week's "robbed hit" comes from the British rock group Queen, who was last seen climbing the top-40 in 1984 with their "Radio Gaga" single, and almost nicked that level with the follow-up "I Want To Break Free". After their showstopping performance at the Live Aid charity concert, the band released their twelfth studio album A Kind Of Magic. Partly a soundtrack of sorts to the sci-fi movie Highlander, a song from another film, Iron Eagle, was the first single released from the project but even though "One Vision" was an anthemic rock classic, it stalled out at #61. Next they released the album's title track, which was featured in the Highlander movie. Written by band drummer Roger Taylor, the song's title came from one of Christopher Lambert's lines in the film...

While "A Kind Of Magic" was a worldwide success, peaking at #3 in the UK, #5 in France, and #6 in Germany, the single stopped two notches short of the top-40 in American at #42 in August of 1986.

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Here's the band performing the song live at Wembley in London in 1986...

..next up, the original "movie version" that appeared in the Highlander...

...and finally, Queen on their recent tour with Adam Lambert with Roger Taylor singing "A Kind Of Magic" for a late Freddie Mercury..