Queen guitarist Brian May issued his first new solo work in over two decades with the January 1st global digital release of a brand new track, “New Horizons”, written by Brian and Don Black, recorded and completed in December 2018. The single had its worldwide premiere from NASA control headquarters in Maryland USA on New Year’s Day, Tuesday, January 1st. Check it out below.

Premiering the brand new NASA New Horizons short film, May has posted the complete Ultima Thule Flyby in one minute featuring music he composed. He has also issued the following message:

"The Grand Ultima Thule Flyby ! 

Here it is! Perhaps the shortest full-length movie in the world! It’s also packed with real science and astro technological achievement. To produce this movie, it took 13 years of space travel, about 700 million dollars, and the expertise of hundreds of NASA engineers, navigators, astrophysicists and rocket scientists.

And today I’m proud to reveal this very short movie which depicts completely faithfully the whole approach sequence - plus the glimpse the probe captured looking back towards the Sun at the ‘crescent’ view of the KBO after the encounter. OK ! The star of our film is a KBO called 2014 MU69, or Ultima Thule. Shall we start courting the Oscar nominations now ?!

Enjoy !

PS. This piece of music was planned to provide the conclusion (the coda) of the incomplete video which already exists for the full-length New Horizons track. If this sounds confusing, I’ll explain later !!! Meanwhile special thanks to the brilliant Harpist Maria Banks - for a special uplift!"

Read May's complete message here.

“You know, I don't know if anyone's going to like it yet,” May tells Newsweek, where you can read more about the "New Horizons" single. It is the legendary guitarist/songwriter’s first official solo single since “Why Don’t We Try Again”, taken from his Another World album in 1998.

“New Horizons” is Brian’s personal tribute to the on-going NASA New Horizons mission, which on New Years Day 2019 will achieve the most distant spacecraft flyby in history, in an encounter with a remote Kuiper Belt Object (KBO) named Ultima Thule, far out beyond Pluto on the edges of the solar system.

May, who has a doctorate in astrophysics, and is a New Horizons science collaborator, will be present at the New Horizons Maryland, Washington County, base of operations on New Year’s Day to witness the historic final approach as it happens. Brian was also present for new Horizon’s triumphal Pluto flyby in 2015, and delivered the world’s first stereoscopic image of Pluto, from the ground-breaking data that the NH probe delivered.

Brian’s “New Horizons” track (Ultima Thule mix) celebrates the whole 12-year Journey of New Horizons probe and includes a message from Stephen Hawking congratulating the team on their successful rendezvous with Pluto three years ago. In a broader sense, the song is an anthem to Mankind’s spirit of exploration, reaching ever further out into the Universe.

“New Horizons” will have its global premiere, broadcast live on January 1st at 12:02 AM, EST (5:02 AM, GMT) from the New Horizons control Center in Maryland, USA, at the moment when the historic Ultima Thule encounter is confirmed.

Says Brian: “This project has energized me in a new way. For me, it’s been an exciting challenge to bring two sides of my life together - Astronomy and Music. It was Alan Stern, the Project Instigator of this amazing NASA Mission, who threw down the glove last May. He asked if I could come up with a theme for Ultima Thule which could be played as the NH probe reached this new destination. I was inspired by the idea that this is the furthest that the Hand of Man has ever reached – it will be by far the most distant object we have ever seen at close quarters, through the images which the spacecraft will beam back to Earth. To me, it epitomizes the human spirit’s unceasing desire to understand the Universe we inhabit. Everyone who has devoted so much energy to this mission since its launch in January 2006 will be feeling they are actually INSIDE that small but intrepid vehicle - only about the size of a grand piano - as it pulls off another spectacular close encounter. And through the vehicle’s ‘eyes’ we will begin to learn, for the very first time, what a Kuiper Belt Object is made of. And pick up precious clues about how our solar system was born.”