American Idol runner-up Adam Lambert has claimed that he is set to join Queen as their new frontman for a tour this summer.

Lambert, who reportedly impressed the band when he teamed up with them to perform classic tracks including ‘The Show Must Go On’ and ‘We Are The Champions’ at the MTV European Music Awards last November, told the Daily Star that he had “no intention” of trying to replace the group’s original frontman Freddie Mercury.

“The intention is to pay tribute to Freddie and the band by singing some fucking great songs. It’s to keep the music alive for the fans and give it an energy that Freddie would have been proud of,” he said.

He went on to add: “After the EMAs, I heard faint little slithers of backlash from people saying: ‘You can’t replace Freddie Mercury.’ But I already knew that. There’s no intention in my mind of replacing Freddie. That’s impossible. The way I’m choosing to view it is that it’s a great honour and one I’m in no way going to shirk.”

The tabloid also reports that Queen are set to headline this year’s Sonisphere Festival, but similar rumours which surfaced last week were dismissed as “completely false” by the event’s official spokesman (January 26).

Last December, Queen guitarist Brian May admitted that he and drummer Roger Taylor can “never be Queen” in the way that they used to be without Mercury and bassist John Deacon. It was previously reported that they were in talks with Lady Gaga about the possibility of her becoming the band’s frontwoman.