According to blabbermouth.net, musician Brian May has mentioned that he and the rest of Queen are not behind the recent increase in copyright strikes issued against their fam filmed concert videos posted on YouTube and other social media platforms. Earlier today May shared a screenshot of a message from a Queen fan who allegedly claims to have gotten a “strike” from Universal and YouTube over Queen’s videos she posted on the platform. The fan wrote: “Hi guys, it looks like Universal and YouTube are now coming for everyone who posts concert videos of Queen and Adam. I got a strike and deleted most of my concert videos. If you get multiple strikes you may lose your channel. Be careful!”

In his response, May states: “I’ve been watching this for a few days, and I’m very concerned. I’ve asked our management to look into it, and try to figure out if there is a reason for Instagram and Universal suddenly becoming so Draconian. The decision to take these videos down certainly hasn’t come from us, the band. hopefully we will get an answer soon. Meanwhile, be extra careful and I’m sorry you good folks of good intentions have been put in this position.”

When people take a video of a concert, they may be unable to post that video online because some artists do not allow unauthorized fan videos of their live performances to be shared online. In most cases, however, people will find that no issue is raised by opposing parties since most musicians do not want to alienate the very fans who pay to see them. Since 2007 YouTube has provided a program that lets copyright owners monitor such fan-made music videos, by allowing a record label, for instance, to drop in ads or “click to buy” links.

Queen kicked off the 2023 leg of their Rhapsody Tour on October 4 at the CFG Bank Arena in Baltimore, Maryland. May, drummer Roger Taylor and singer Adam Lambert opened the concert with “Radio Ga Ga” and ran through a total of 25 songs, including the first performance of “Stone Cold Crazy” since 2018 and a rendition of “Is This the World We Created…?,” which was live debuted with Lambert.