Queen may be a quintessentally British band but many of their biggest hits from 1978 onwards were recorded in Montreux, Switzerland. The hit pop group purchased a studio of their own called Mountain Studios in 1979 after recording their seventh album Jazz there. They went on to record a further six hit albums there as well as solo projects by Freddie Mercury, Brian May, and Roger Taylor.

Five decades on, the studio is no longer in use and is instead a permanent exhibition dedicated to the band. Queen: The Studio Experience opened in 2013 and is located in Casino Barrière de Montreux, Montreux.

I visited in September 2024 when I was in town for the Freddie Celebration Days - an annual celebration to mark Freddie's birthday - and couldn't believe it was free.

When I say a freebie is a rarity for Queen fans, I am not joking. They are an expensive band to follow with pricey merch and even pricier reissues of recordings. Don't even get me started on the cost of concert tickets.

Admission is gratias all year round and the 9am-9pm opening hours Monday to Sunday ensure that any visitor to the area can find time to pop in. Donations to the charity set up in Freddie's name, The Mercury Pheonix Trust, are encouraged but not demanded.

The experience has accessible entry for wheelchair users and dogs and strollers are also allowed in. Walking through the doorway into a hall papered with notes and drawings from fans declaring their love, you enter a room filled with costumes and iconic mementos of the band.

The first thing that strikes you is just how small it is. Given how lavish Queen were known for being, I did expect something more epic. There are plenty of photo opportunities with life sized carboard cutouts of Freddie dotted throughout the space - even if the lighting isn't the most flattering.

The costume replicas include his iconic Wembly look from The Magic Tour with the yellow jacket and white pants as well as his "prawn" costume from the It's a Hard Life music video. There are plenty of the bands handwritten lyrics featured throughout the different displays.

Obviously this section doesn't resemble a recording studio and you need to walk through to another room to see where the magic happened. This is far smaller than you would expect and featured some of the dated equipment and instruments used back in the day.

A plaque on the floor marks the spot where Freddie Mercury sang his final vocals with the band. It feels disrespectful to try and stand in his footsteps, and everyone reverentially stepped around it when I was there.

It doesn't take long to see what else the studio has to offer, but it really does feel special. So many iconic songs were recorded here and Freddie spent his final recording sessions here laying down the vocals for tracks he would never see finished as he knew his death was imminent. It is impossible not to be moved by the thought.

You don't have to be a die hard Queen fan to appreciate this experience. The beautiful location beside Lake Geneva is an added bonus and while it is expensive to get to Montreux (and the area itself isn't cheap) if you are travelling anywhere nearby it is worth taking the time to drop in.