If you looked in the mirror and reflected on the true
Freddie Mercury, who is he?
I'm quite a chameleon, you know. I change and I have moods.
I'd probably say I'm a, sort of, person of extremes,
because I can be very soft,
but that makes me that much more tenacious.
And when I'm on stage, I calm down. I become a very different person.
I gather lots of energy.
In a way, there's no, sort of, half measures.
I'm hot and cold.
So that's... You know, I gain momentum,
and then when I actually know when I want to release it,
it comes across like a tidal wave.
Freddie was born on Zanzibar,
an island off the coast of what is now Tanzania.
This was a British territory at that time.
His mother and father were British subjects.
When he was eight years old,
his parents decided to send him away to a British school in India.
Freddie suffered separation anxiety from a very early age
and therefore he latched on to people very quickly
and formed very intense relationships with others -
with both boys and girls.
He was, in a way, an outsider from the start.
And I think that informed the way that he always approached his life.
He really became a personality in his own right very early on.
When he was at boarding school in India,
he took the name Freddie from the start
and he also started to perform in local bands.
REPORTER: Local boy makes good.
Elvis 'The Pelvis' Presley, King of Rock and Roll,
returns to Tupelo, Mississippi.
Advance sales of his new disc topped the million -
a record of the record business.
By the late '50s, we had Western rock and roll seeping into India,
so Freddie was having piano lessons from the age of about seven,
and he'd begun to adopt the '50s rock and roll
and he formed his first band at school called The Hectics.
And I took piano lessons when I was in boarding school.
Of course, I didn't think at the time that I was going to
make music my career, but I was always interested in music.
I think I obviously had a musical streak.
And when it came in terms of being in a band,
being the singer is the best thing
because you're up front all the time.
I didn't want to be a drummer, bashing the drums at the back.
Music was Fred's salvation during his school years.
He dipped in and out of friendships.
He wasn't that interested in his academic studies at all.
And when he discovered rock and roll, that did change his life.
We were students at Ealing, both did graphics,
both were pretty much on the same wavelength musically,
so we were mates, you know.
I went to art college, you know, and I was going to be a graphics...
I mean, I did my diploma in graphics illustrations,
so I was going to be a graphics illustrator.
Our prime focus when we were at Ealing was music.
Our secondary focus was graphic design,
much to the chagrin of the tutors.
I realised that through college I spent more time
rehearsing our songs and things than doing the other thing,
and that's what I was interested in.
And I just said, "Look, I'm going to try and make money out of this
"or make a life out of it."
I mean, he did know he was going to be a star
towards the end of the college.
You know, "Some day I'm going to be a star."
"Yeah, sure, you are, Freddie."
You know, we were kind of cynical, but Freddie wasn't.
He knew what he was going to do.
The moment I finished college, my interests were in music.
All I wanted to do was music, so I set upon the fact that,
no, I'm going to try and make it as a singer.
Freddie had become a bit of a groupie of Smile
and he wanted what they had. He dipped in and out of some bands
but he hadn't really found the line-up to suit him,
and he saw himself as fronting Smile.
We formed Smile.
I was the lead singer and bass player.
I think Freddie always had it at the back of his mind
that he could do great things if he was in a band with Roger and Brian,
and I have a sneaky suspicion that behind the scenes
he was trying to engineer my... my removal.
Their singer decided to leave and they were auditioning singers
and I was right under their nose. It was so funny.
It never actually occurred to them to ask me.
Because I'm such a forceful character, they were in Smile,
and I said, "Well, I can't join you and become..."
You know, it's just, like, the way I feel is,
when somebody new takes somebody's place,
just everything has got to be new,
and so this was a completely new chemical reaction.
When you first came together, were you very different then?
Oh, yes, we were very hungry... Very diverse personalities as well?
Yes, but at that time, we were getting to know each other
and we had so much to, sort of, put across,
and we were very hungry for, erm...
For a hamburger! THEY LAUGH
Anything, right? Yes, we were just hungry.
We just wanted to... We just wanted to let it all out.
And so, you know, we kept... We took it from there.
# I was told a million times of all the troubles in my way
# Mind you grow a little wiser, a little better every day
# But if I crossed a million rivers and I rode a million miles
# Then I'd still be where I started, bread and butter for a smile... #
Freddie hit the ground running.
We can look at those early performances and really see
the flamboyance, the majesty of him, the way he commanded the stage.
He had all of that and more right from the start.
# Stay right where you are
# Keep yourself alive Yeah
# Keep yourself alive
# Ooh, it'll take you all your time and money
# Honey, you'll survive... #
This early Queen is hard rock.
It's bold.
Influenced by Black Sabbath and Led Zep.
You know, they really were quite, sort of, dark metal in those days.
People weren't quite sure how to take them.
But the fact was, the sound they made was extraordinary.
# And I ate a million dinners brought to me on silver trays... #
It was a beautifully constructed song
but unfortunately it wasn't constructed as a pop song,
and I think a lot of people, certainly at radio, thought,
this isn't really right for what we're doing. It's not formulaic.
We weren't the kind of band that actually said,
"OK, we're going to do this but if it doesn't work out,
"we will follow what somebody..." No, that's the wrong way to do it.
And that's what you have... I think a new band has got to have.
A real confidence in yourself.
# Do you think you're better every day?
# No, I just think I'm two steps nearer to my grave... #
The last thing you want is to have signed a new contract
with a record company and your image has failed or whatever,
and then suddenly the record company says,
"Why don't you try this because this is the new thing?"
If you do that, the record company is not going to like you because
they'll say, "Oh, this band will do anything." No, you've got to fight.
# Keep yourself alive Come on, come on
# It'll take you all your time and a money to keep me satisfied... #
# Fear me you loathsome, lazy creatures
# I descend upon your Earth from the skies
# I command your very souls, you unbelievers
# Bring before me what is mine
# The seven seas of Rhye... #
It's just epic.
And it is Freddie Mercury the rock singer as a young man.
When he goes up to those high notes,
there's a clarity and a ring and a resonance.
As a young rock singer, he just had this
really exciting upper register.
# You are mine, I possess you
# I belong to you forever Ever, ever... #
I mean, this song, for me,
feels like it could come out of Lord of the Rings or something.
It's got this epic storytelling side to it.
# Come on, let me take you
# The seven seas of Rhye... #
Getting on Top Of The Pops is one of the big signs of success.
You know, it was in everybody's living rooms.
And back then, of course, it was the only place you could see
these performances without buying a ticket and going to see the band.
Queen look slightly out of water, I've always thought,
looking back at that first appearance that they made.
They already looked like consummate rock stars.
# Fear me you loathsome, lazy creatures
# I descend upon your Earth... #
They presented as though they were going to be around
for a really long time, and how hideous it must have been
for them to mime on that show, because everybody did.
There was no live performing on Top Of The Pops.
When he goes up those high notes,
you can't do that without actually kind of using parts of your body,
and it's so obvious that he's miming.
But he's acting it, you know. He's still got the intention,
he's still got all of the emotional engagement.
# I'll take you to the seven seas of Rhye... #
Freddie, with Seven Seas Of Rhye, he was finding his voice
and in Killer Queen, he had found it.
# She keeps her Moet et Chandon in her pretty cabinet
# "Let them eat cake", she says, just like Marie Antoinette
# A built-in remedy for Khrushchev and Kennedy
# At any time an invitation you can't decline
# Caviar and cigarettes
# Well versed in etiquette
# Extraordinarily nice
# She's a killer queen
# Gunpowder, gelatine
# Dynamite with a laser beam
# Guaranteed to blow your mind... #
Killer Queen was everything.
It was dramatic, it had poise.
Great story, fabulous arrangement, musical arrangement.
Everything about it was just original,
and that's a hard thing to be, you know, in our industry, is original.
# To avoid complications, she never kept the same address
# In conversation... #
Who is the killer queen that they're singing about, you know?
This person, you believed that Freddie Mercury knew them
and had actually met them at some point in his life.
Freddie came into my office one day, at EMI,
and he put the record on and... "She's a killer queen..."
"Oh, I love it, Bubula. "It's going to be a monster hit.
"I love it. I love it. I love it."
"No, you're not listening" I said, "I was listening."
"No, you don't realise. It's about you."
I said, "What do yo mean, about me?" He said, "You're a killer queen."
I said, "What are you talking about, Bubula?"
He said, "Because I'm the queen. I'm the queen.
"And I can't have you and it's killing me."
That's the God's truth.
It's the new Queen single, actually, which I'm sure you'll want to hear.
It's out next Friday. Erm, Friday week.
# She's a killer queen
# Gunpowder, gelatine
# Dynamite with a laser beam... #
It needs people to hear it four to five times
before they say, "Hey, I must go and buy that record."
Erm, I'll have another listen to it. It's not really a breakfast record.
Maybe afternoon... A bit much, maybe, first thing in the morning.
# To absolutely drive you wild Wild
# She's all out to get you... #
A device that Queen used that wasn't new technology
but they certainly became champions of
is multi-tracking, multi-layering.
What this was was that they chose one harmony line,
for example, this note,
and all three singers of the band would sing it.
They would then record that three times or four times.
So from the same note, you have 15, 18, 20 different takes.
So what you end up with sounds like 100, 200 people singing it.
And that's really an amazing effect. It's a wall of sound.
# She's a killer queen
# Gunpowder, gelatine
# Dynamite with a laser beam
# Guaranteed to blow your mind.
# Any time... #
Yes, we did do all those harmonies. We didn't just hire a huge choir.
The three of us, you know, simulated those harmonies.
I mean, we can get a 160-piece choir effect
by just the three of us multi-tracking.
So we do the bass parts and we do the middle parts
and we do the sopranos, because, I mean, you know,
we like to show off our register. Why not?
# She's a killer queen
# Gunpowder, gelatine
# Dynamite with a laser beam
# Guaranteed to blow your mind Any time... #
Killer Queen was, like, the first thing that broke ground, erm,
worldwide, as it were.
I think in England and in Britain, I think Seven Seas of Rhye
is a track that actually... That's the track that actually broke us
in England, but I don't think it did anything anywhere else.
But Killer Queen paved the way.
That's when the so-called volcano erupted, you know.
It just suddenly, just went... It just went bang, you know?
Instantly, your ears prick up when you hear the intro,
when you hear those four-part harmonies.
# Is this the real life? #
We were all blown away.
# Is this just fantasy? #
The sheer audacity of the thing.
# Caught in a landslide
# No escape from reality... #
Just this kind of epic monster of a song.
# Open your eyes
# Look up to the skies and see... #
Bohemian Rhapsody is all Freddie's musical influences,
everything at once, all served up as a smorgasbord.
It's six minutes long and it takes you on a journey from
classical to opera to rock to hard rock
to a soulful ballad at the end.
Bohemian Rhapsody was basically... I was writing three songs
and they were meant to be different and I just...
I just couldn't finish them and I thought,
"Oh, damn it, I'll just put the three together."
# Any way the wind blows
# Doesn't really matter to me
# To me... #
A rhapsody, by definition, is a one movement piece of work
that goes through different episodic changes.
This is definitely a rhapsody.
We start off with the acapella section.
Just voices, no instruments.
Next, we have the piano and voice.
# Life had just begun... #
Sounds quite familiar.
We don't know where this song is going to go.
It sounds like just another one of Queen's songs.
And then, of course, it goes into Brian May's legendary rock solo.
# I sometimes wish I'd never been born at all... #
I mean, the guitar sound on that,
apart from the piano sound and the voices,
well, I would say now that's genius.
You have instruments creating sounds
that you didn't know they could make.
You have voices and this wall of sounds
that we know of Queen's music.
It's a whole song in the first three minutes.
It could stop after three minutes and you would pretty much have
a moving rock-based ballad.
This sort of confessional story
that he's saying, or that he's telling,
and then all of a sudden...
# I see a little silhouette of a man
# Scaramouch, Scaramouch Will you do the fandango? #
A new section, an operatic section.
You have characters, you have places,
you don't know where you are, what's happening. It's exciting.
And, crucially, it's very different to the beginning.
# Thunderbolts and lightning very, very frightening me... #
You start to hear call and response in the Galileos.
This is a very, very traditional opera technique,
almost like a Greek chorus.
# Galileo Galileo
# Galileo, Figaro Magnifico
# I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
# He's just a poor boy from a poor family
# Spare him his life from this monstrosity... #
It's often described as operatic,
but, for me, it's almost more kind of comic opera.
It feels more Gilbert and Sullivan than Wagner
in the staccato playing and in the way that the chords
are built up almost like bells as they're falling down
from the "Magnifico".
# Easy come, easy go, will you let me go?
# Bismillah! No, we will not let you go
# Let him go Bismillah!
# We will not let you go Let him go
# Bismillah! We will not let you go
# Let me go Will not let you go
# Let me go Never, never, never
# Let me go Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh
# No, no, no, no, no, no, no... #
We have this section in Bohemian Rhapsody at the end of the opera
where we really don't know where we're going.
Here are the chords that's played.
HE PLAYS CHORDS
Then we have a new section again. The listener does not know
what's happening, does not know what's going to come next,
and that's the excitement about Bohemian Rhapsody.
All of this harmonic turmoil progresses and progresses
and eventually we get to the huge climax,
resulting in Roger Taylor's top B-flat - massive note.
# Beelzebub has a devil put aside for me
# For me
# For me... #
# So you think you can stop me and spit in my eye... #
After the guitar solo section, we go to the next bit of the rhapsody.
He uses a device called a triplet,
which is when you force three notes into the space of two.
"Da-da-da, da-da-da." That's a triplet.
It's very conversational, so he's going,
"So you think you can stop me..."
# So you think you can love me and leave me to die
# Oh, baby
# Can't do this to me, baby
# Just got to get out, just got to get right out of here... #
And then it all slows down.
We get to the last section, just piano, just voice,
and a guitar harmonising with the voice. Very rare, this.
# Ooh, yeah
# Nothing really matters
# Anyone can see
# Nothing really matters... #
And then it comes back to the feel of the opening,
which is this beautiful, elegant, sort of confessional story.
It's been a huge journey in this six minutes of music.
Huge journey.
But it's been worth it.
# Any way the wind blows. #
JINGLE: The Network Chart!
After me having virtually put the three songs together,
they wanted me to sort of slice it up again.
The radios didn't really like it initially because it was too long
and the record company said, you know, you can't market it that way.
And I just said it either goes out in its entirety or not at all.
So it was a big risk. It was either going to be a big flop
because nobody would play it or something would happen.
What really broke that song was Eric Hall.
He was a plugger. Monster, monster, Eric Hall.
This schmuck here, Bubula. Eric Hall.
This schmuck here plucked it. Me. What can I do?
I remember playing Bohemian Rhapsody to Doreen Davies,
Radio 1's Head of the Playlist.
I played it to her. She said, "I'm worried."
"I know why you're worried." It was so long.
But by the time I then walked back to my office,
my secretary Louise said, "Eric, there's a call for you
"and it's Doreen Davies. Pick up the phone."
"What's the problem, my darling?"
She said, "Eric, I just played Noel Edmonds Bohemian Rhapsody,
"and it's going to be his record of the week",
which meant, in those days, that he would play it every day
on his show, but also all those other Radio 1 shows
had to play the other presenters' record of the week.
That means the first week Bohemian Rhapsody came out,
I had about 12, 15 plays of it. Amazing.
That really tore the market up and down, didn't it?
I mean, it sort of... It got us to a very different area.
The cross section of, sort of, the public then were so different.
I mean, we were then...
We suddenly realised we were playing to mums and dads
and, I mean, the people coming to see us were totally different.
Freddie put it all into one song. He put all his eggs in one basket.
And against all the odds, it was a success.
# Thunderbolts and lightning very, very frightening me. #
# Ooh, you make me live
# Whatever this world can give to me
# It's you, you're all I see
# Ooh, you make me live now, honey
# Ooh, you make me live
Our climb has been very quick.
The ball sort of started rolling and then it went so fast
during, say, Bohemian Rhapsody time, I think things were moving so fast
we couldn't even keep up.
I understand that in Japan that you couldn't even leave your hotels.
It was very difficult.
I suppose this time around it was...
We had to have bodyguards around. We did see a lot of kitchens.
In fact, yes, and we were reduced to travelling in laundry lifts
and things like that, but, the price of fame, they tell me.
The punk groups are referring to you and many other groups
as being these megastars. That their time is over...
Anti-establishment, yes.
It was a tough phase for us, actually.
At one point I actually thought it was going to be it.
But I think Queen have this sort of...
If there's a challenge, you know, we embark on it
and that's what keeps us going.
I'll never forget, we were in the studios
and the Sex Pistols happened to be in the next studio.
I got Johnny Rotten and Sid Vicious in to listen to one of our tracks
and I said, "I'll sing on one of yours if you sing on one of mine."
You should have seen them.
"We can't be singing with Freddie Mercury", and all that.
I was wearing ballet pumps at the time.
There's quite a lot of mythology about Queen and the Sex Pistols,
which is almost a novel, isn't it? Queen and the Sex Pistols,
they would seem like the antithesis of each other,
but they were signed to the same label - EMI,
so they were always going to come across each other.
I called Sid Vicious... I called him Simon Ferocious or something.
He didn't like it at all. I said, "What are you going to do about it?"
He hated the fact that I could even speak like that.
There's always competition. The competition is always there,
and whether it be a punk rock movement or, call it what you like,
it's all there. I'm never one for resting on my laurels, really,
because I always know there's that competition,
and that's what keeps us, you know, it keeps the driving force there.
Can I be bold to say that it almost brings the cunning out in you?
The cunning? I think you almost enjoy it. Oh yes.
# Buddy, you're a boy, make a big noise
# Playing in the street, gonna be a big man some day
# You got mud on your face, you big disgrace
# Kicking your can all over the place, singing
# We will, we will rock you
# We will, we will rock you... #
Queen and Freddie took punk and threw it away.
Freddie wanted to be unique
and he was unique in everything he did.
He didn't want to copy punks or copy anybody.
They went another way, which was the glamour way.
The glamour punk, I suppose.
# I've paid my dues
# Time after time
# I've done my sentence
# But committed no crime... #
From the start of this album, even from the onset
of actually writing it, writing the material.
that we weren't going to spend as much time in the studios
because I think we've done to death multi-tracking tracking harmonies
and the lavish productions and things.
We needed a change anyway. From the writing aspect as well.
And so I think we wanted a much fresher
and sort of raw approach to songs.
# I've had my share of sand kicked in my face
# But I've come through
# And we mean to go on and on and on and on
# We are the champions, my friends... #
And all of a sudden, by the end of that first verse,
it has built into what Queen do a couple of times,
which is these sort of football terrace chants -
these really anthemic songs that you can hook onto events in your life.
I wanted to write a song that everybody could sing along,
like a football chant or things like that, and, erm...
At the same time, I thought it would be nice to...
It's a winning song and it's meant for everybody, you know.
I had to say "we are the champions", but that doesn't mean it's us.
It's for...
I can just imagine people going to a game, and if their team wins,
they can go, "We are the champions." It's a winning song for everybody.
# It's been no bed of roses
# No pleasure cruise
# I consider it a challenge before the human race
# And I ain't gonna lose... #
When he's singing, "I'm not going to lose",
that goes right up to a B-flat.
It's really high.
It's a really hard vowel for most people to actually
create that sound on and he doesn't compromise.
He just anchors down because that's what the lyric is all about.
The lyric is all about not giving up.
# And I ain't gonna lose
# And we mean to go on and on and on and on
# We are the champions, my friends... #
It really is up to the listener to make up its interpretation.
And I like that, actually.
I mean, it's a nice escape for me, from the writer's point of view,
but I think from the listener's point of view,
it's nice that they can make up different interpretations.
So, basically, if you ask me what it's all about,
I would say it is tongue-in-cheek
and it's not to be taken too seriously.
I'm like, my God, I can't be serious.
No... You know, it's something that...
I wanted to write a song that was very cold and calculated
and kind of to the point.
And, basically, it was a song of sort of participation.
I wanted people to participate.
# We are the champions, my friends
Sing it!
# And we'll keep on fighting till the end... #
Come on!
"You brought me fame and fortune and everything that goes with that.
"I thank you all. But it's been no bed of roses."
It's my way of saying that, erm...
To a lot of people... I mean, a lot of people think
being a rock and roll star
is kind of going into a studio and making a disc
and then going around spending all the money,
which I don't think it is, and I think...
I know that a lot of people do realise that,
but at the same time, a lot of people don't.
They think it's a very easy-going life.
And, I mean, a lot of people still think when I say,
"Oh, we're going to America for a tour",
they think, "Oh, nice long holiday",
and that's just my way of saying that it's not easy going.
I mean, God, don't for one minute think
that it's all peaches and cream. There's no bed of roses.
# We are the champions
# No time for losers
# Cos we are the champions
# Of the world. #
Do you like being rich? Of course.
What do you do with... I flaunt it. What do you do with your money?
I spend it. On what? All kinds of things.
His enjoyment of life, he didn't let up.
You know, I'm going to be what I'm going to be.
And I think that was brilliant of him, you know,
but not a lot of people could do that.
I mean, you had to be very rich and know that you were going to be able
to sustain yourself financially to do that, and he knew that.
# Tonight I'm gonna have myself
# A real good time
# I feel alive... #
It's just such a celebration. It's so kind of life affirming,
but fundamentally it is just this really, really great pop song.
# Floating around... #
That euphoric feeling of not wanting a night to end
and having a song like that capture it is amazing.
# Don't stop me
# Cos I'm having a good time, having a good time.
# I'm a shooting star leaping through the sky
# Like a tiger defying the laws of gravity... #
My God, I mean, it was more than hedonistic.
It was absolutely fantastic. It was the most wonderful time.
We had no worries, we didn't worry about, you know,
getting anything, catching anything.
Sex was flamboyant, was wonderful.
We enjoyed every single moment of it. It was a freedom.
And Freddie embraced that.
You know, he took it in both his hands and absolutely went for it.
He really enjoyed it.
# Don't stop me now Cos I'm having a good time... #
We all went out, we drank a lot,
took some drugs sometimes, occasionally.
Looking back, one could have said, well, we behave badly
or somebody else behaved badly or they were too excessive.
# I am a satellite, I'm out of control
# I'm a sex machine ready to reload
# Like an atom bomb, about to
# Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, explode
# I'm burning through the sky, yeah
I thought it was a lot of fun, but, yes, I did have an undercurrent
feeling of, "Oh, aren't we talking about danger here?",
because we were worried about Freddie at this point.
And I think that feeling lingers, but it's become...
I'd say almost the most successful Queen track.
# Have a good time, good time... #
I like to go out every night. I hate staying in one room
I just... I want to do things my way and, erm, I want to have fun.
for too long anyway. I don't give a damn.
# Ooh, let's go
# Steve walks warily down the street
# With his brim pulled way down low... #
The '80s was their most successful decade by far.
Their focus is much more on their audience
and less on critical acclaim.
# The edge of your set... #
# The edge of your seat...#
You expected the unexpected.
You never quite knew what they were going to come up with.
And they came up with Another One Bites The Dust.
# Another one bites the dust
# Another one bites the dust... #
They went into funk. It's a funk song.
# Another one bites the dust
# Hey, I'm gonna get you too
# Another one bites the dust... #
Sometimes we make our own... We make our own challenges.
We were becoming blase.
You know, after you have success for a long time, whatever,
it's quite easy to say, "Oh, yeah, we are the greatest", or whatever.
But I really don't think we're that kind of group.
# Are you ready for this? Are you hanging on the edge of your seat? #
Delivery is really punchy and dynamic.
There's a lot of use of, kind of, consonants for spitting words out
rather than singing through long, elegant vowels.
You can hear in his voice the, kind of, commitment to it.
# Oh, yeah
# Another one bites the dust... #
I remember when it was out in America,
a lot of people that, of course, hadn't heard of Queen,
were buying it thinking that we were a black act
and then would come to see us and realise we were all white.
# Another one bites the dust
# Shoot out
# All right. #
I'd like to think that I'm just... I'm a songwriter.
I don't want to be just, erm...
..in a sort of minority of just writing heavy, heavy music.
Besides, I like... I like...
It's interesting for me. I just like writing different songs every time
and I hate repeating the same formula as well.
It used to be that you were pigeonholed as a performer.
You did this style and you did this style well.
Amazingly, Freddie Mercury, along with Queen,
were able to push all the boundaries that were there
and start fusing different genres together.
A lot of people keep saying to me, you know,
"Why haven't you repeated Bohemian Rhapsody?"
I mean, the whole point of that is to write a song
and then just leave it that way.
How can I repeat that kind of thing anyway?
It's just... It would be farcical.
# Seaside
# Whenever you stroll along with me
# Merely contemplating what you feel inside
# Meanwhile, I ask you to be... #
For me, Queen are always a rock band.
However, there are influences of other genres in their work.
A lot of the music hall stuff is amazing.
They've got this brilliant sense of sort of very British humour -
a sort of British seaside... There's a song Seaside Rendezvous.
# I feel so romantic Can we do it again?
# Can we do it again sometime? Ooh, I'd like that... #
I really like My Melancholy Blues.
# Another party's over... #
It's like you've walked into a jazz bar. It's just piano and vocals.
Oh, it's supremely good.
# Well, I don't wanna talk about it... #
One that means a great deal to me, Somebody To Love gospel.
And you don't immediately associate Freddie Mercury with gospel.
# Can
# Anybody
# Find me
# Somebody to love? #
It's just beautiful,
those harmonies, when they're all singing together.
And then when Freddie starts on the piano,
it's pure confessional.
# Ooh, ooh, ooh
# Each morning I get up I die a little
# Can barely stand on my feet... #
Aretha Franklin's, like, phrasing is just wonderful.
I wish I could sing like her.
You know, her phrasing is just so beautiful.
It's so effortless, and it's just... She just sings like a dream.
It's like she doesn't have to think about it.
I mean, when I have to sing, I think about it.
I'll practise a few phrases and then do it.
Whereas I can tell by just listening to Aretha Franklin's records
that she just goes in there and just... It's effortless.
# He works hard Every day
# I try and I try and I try
# But everybody wants to put me down
# They say I'm going crazy... #
What you then find in the middle section is a build-up of notes,
build up of voices.
# Find me somebody to love
# Oooh Find me somebody to love... #
It reminds you of being in any sort of performance with a gospel choir
and all you want to do is join in with that music.
# Somebody Somebody
# Somebody Find me somebody
# Find me somebody to love
# Can anybody find me
# Somebody to
# Love. #
I love the way he fuses a couple of genres together
but doesn't compromise on being himself.
When I'm not thinking about it, that's when it happens best.
I mean, I know there's a story about Crazy Little Thing Called Love.
I mean, I was having a bath and I just suddenly had an idea and...
I called up Paul and I said, "Just get me a guitar"
Just an acoustic, and there I was in the bath.
And because I was restricted in the bath,
I could only play three chords. I can still only play three chords.
And so I was limited and out came Crazy Little Thing.
# This thing called love
# I just can't handle it
# This thing called love
# I must get 'round to it
# I ain't ready
# Crazy little thing called love... #
It's very different. It is rockabilly, rock and roll.
And I think you have to put it into the context
of Freddie's age and Elvis Presley.
You know, Elvis Presley, like Freddie,
was this iconic figure and this is almost an homage.
He even imitates his voice
and imitates the way he shapes consonants and stuff.
# Take a backseat, hitchhike
# And take a long ride on my motorbike
# Until I'm ready Ready, Freddie
# Crazy little thing called love... #
It's just another example of how he wasn't in any way concerned
about drawing influences and celebrating them.
He didn't try and hide them.
He would celebrate them and pay homage to them.
# Crazy little thing called love
Yeah, yeah
# Crazy little thing called love... #
Queen, at the beginning of the early '80s,
became the first significant rock band to actually tour South America.
That was a big deal.
The logistics of a tour like South America in the '80s,
in the early '80s, when you haven't got mobile phones and internet...
..it's literally suitcases of money being exchanged for visas
and it's dealing with armed guards
and it's working out how to get a sound rig through a jungle.
For me, Sao Paulo is the pinnacle of that effort.
It was madness though, wasn't it, in South America?
They have the biggest stadium in the world.
They can hold 200,000 people at one time.
Hello, Sao Paulo!
CHEERING
My personal favourite moment is Love Of My Life.
You know, it's mind-blowing.
They're singing the verses and the choruses back.
# You've broken my heart
# And now... #
It's... It's up there with Live Aid.
CROWD: # Love of my life, can't you see? #
And you can tell that Freddie and Brian
are realising the impact of this song as they're singing it.
# Because you don't know
# What it means to me. #
Everybody wants to play to the biggest audiences ever.
I want to play to as many people as I can.
And the more the merrier, you know, because music is for everybody.
It's an international language and that's the way it is.
So, as far as I'm concerned, I like to...
I like the whole world to listen to my music, and I want anybody
and everybody to come in and listen to me
and look at me when I'm playing.
# I still love you. #
It's absolutely beautiful listening to the audience sing back to him
his words, his melody, because it is one of those songs
that if you've ever been in love
and felt vulnerable, it speaks to you.
CROWD: # Away from me
# Because you don't know
# What it means to me
# Love of my life
# Oooh
# Yeah. #
CHEERING
Very extrovert stage act by any standards.
Will you be able to go on with... You mean I flaunt it?
You're over the top.
He was nothing like the performer out there on stage.
So, he would walk out on stage
and he would put on the stardom the way you put on an overcoat
and he would go out there and become someone else.
He would treble size and he would stun everybody with his presence.
And then at the end of the show, he would come off,
he would drop the stardom the way you take off the overcoat,
and he would reduce that down to being Freddie.
Everybody looks at me on stage and they think that's how I am.
Like, arrogant, and...
And when you look at me now, I'm quite boring, really.
But, no, I like to enjoy life, but, I mean, that's just my...
A lot of people ask me that. That's my stage persona.
That's the only way I like to be on stage, but that doesn't mean...
..I go around wearing the same clothes...
But I still like to have a good time offstage as well, you know.
But, erm, oh, no. I mean, I think...
..most of the time I leave that face back on the stage.
He's an amazing contrast of an introvert and an extrovert.
Offstage, he was very often quite shy, quite quiet,
quite reserved, didn't give a lot of interviews.
OK? Shoot. OK.
Why haven't you done any interviews in the past few years?
Because I hate them. Why? I just hate them.
I hate talking to people I don't really know.
You I know, so I'm doing it. Yes, thanks.
I found out later that he couldn't stand journalists.
He thought we were all scumbags. He hated the lot of us.
He couldn't see the point of doing publicity.
One, well, I suppose he has to promote that as well.
Yeah, I'm talking to you. That's about all I'm going to do. Right.
That's my worldwide promotion.
I think you can often tell if he likes the interviewer.
And that's true of lots of performers and musicians.
If it's someone he knows or he's comfortable with.
If he knows it's someone who's not going to stitch him up,
then he's much more playful and he's much more catty and fun.
I assume you mean the other members of Queen? Yeah.
Who do you think I meant? What are their names again?
Stop that shit.
In general, people think that you are not really like the way you are.
First of all, you're hysterically funny and...
Well, you are. I'm hysterical, all right.
Now, you are funny. I mean, you are.
You're funny and you're talkative and you're a great storyteller...
That's because people do get the wrong impression of me
because they've got... It's the media, basically,
built me up being a real ogre and a tyrant on stage
because of the way I come across on stage.
I'm very volatile and that's the only part they see of me.
I mean, I don't talk to everybody,
so they don't really know the real me.
And I don't think anybody will.
We understand a bit more now that artists are human beings
and that they have feelings and they're going to have ups and downs,
whereas, possibly, in Freddie's heyday, we didn't,
and we expected them to be Freddie Mercury on and off stage.
Erm, and the idea of him being shy...
..was just so impossible to imagine.
But, of course, that was the truth.
There used to be a pub in Montreux on Lake Geneva in Switzerland
where Queen had Mountain Studios
and I was in there with a friend of mine
and suddenly spotted Freddie in an opposite corner,
and we ended up going down to the shore of the lake,
just the three of us, and Freddie said to us...
.."You guys are the lucky ones.
"You can walk down the street, you can just be who you are."
He said, "I always have to be him
"and there are times when I don't want to be him."
And he was talking about Freddie Mercury in the third person.
And for the first time I ever saw the division
between who he really was and who he had to be.
And what he was really saying was that,
"I've created this monster and now I have to be him.
"I have to live according to his rules and not mine."
And it haunted me for a really long time and I felt sorry for him.
Thank you very much. OK. Thank you.
Fine. Thank you. That's good.
Oh, that's great. I wish all of them to be that short.
# Give me
# Body
# Give me
# Body
# Give me... #
The success of Another One Bites The Dust
and Crazy Little Thing Called Love in America,
you could say that sort of threw them off whack
because John and Freddie are then pursuing that sound,
listening to a lot of funk,
and trying to bring it back in Hot Space -
the Queen album that, critically, an awful lot of people
think is a bit of a misstep.
They were taking risks. They were experimenting.
Brian May and Roger Taylor didn't like it very much either.
Brian May, in particular, wanted it to be more rock and roll
than it turned out to be.
Hot Space, the album, went on off on a limb,
and I said let's just do some of this black stuff that, you know,
that I liked, and I forced the other three to do it.
They hate me for it now because it didn't sell that much
but I still love the album, you know. It's just...
They're just songs.
# Body language.
# Body language
For two years, we didn't come up with anything,
we didn't tour, and I think that was a good thing.
We sort of went away from each other and then when we came back,
it was like coming back together again from the start.
So we started fighting about all...
All the things we used to fight about five or ten years ago.
And so off we go again.
The I Want To Break Free video is one of the best things
I've ever seen.
Everyone, for some reason, thought it was his idea to go in drag,
but it was Roger Taylor's idea to go in drag.
And if you look at the way that they did it, Roger Taylor is the only one
that looks vaguely pretty, if you want to put it in those terms.
# God, no... #
It wasn't my idea at all. I'm sure everybody thinks it's my idea,
being outrageous... It was Roger's, wasn't it? It was.
It came from Roger. And everybody thinks, I bet...
They ask me, "How did you get the other three to get in...?"
In fact, they ran into their frocks quicker than anything.
# For the first time and this time I know it's for real... #
What this encapsulates perfectly is flipping on the head
that whole idea of what a band should be,
what a band of four men should be.
# God knows I've fallen in love... #
Is it dedicated for the gay world?
No, not at all. Not at all.
That song... To start off with, that song was written by John Deacon,
you know, and he's a very happily married man
with about four children.
We need to remember that America during the '80s
was a very conservative country
and glam didn't go down as well in the States
as it did here because we have a sense of irony.
America was not ready for cross-gender.
It just was a bit of a step too far.
# But life still goes on... #
A lot of the American psyche is always very, very literal
in terms of the way they perceive things.
If they thought that it was just drag queenery, it clearly isn't.
The very fact that it would alienate the sensitive American psyche
is still... The point is still absolutely valid.
I mean, one wonders what they think of RuPaul now.
# So, baby, can't you see? #
It's got nothing to do with gay people at all.
It's basically about everybody. Somebody who has a very tough life
and he just wants to break free from whatever problems he's got.
It's got nothing to do with the gay thing.
# I want to break free, yeah. #
# An amazing feeling
# Coming through
# I was born to love you... #
So, Mr Bad Guy, Freddie's first solo album, you can tell,
was written for, you know, those gay clubs in the early '80s
where he was hearing that kind of dance music.
# Was born to take care of you... #
You have to bear in mind that the early '80s,
homophobia was part of the establishment.
However, there was a scene.
To discover that scene, to discover bars and nightclubs
where you could be yourself...
For the first time, certainly in British history,
there were places where you could be you.
That must have felt so incredible, so freeing.
# An amazing feeling
# Coming through... #
That freedom that came from the person he was able to be
I think is reflected in Mr Bad Guy.
# With every single beat
# Of my heart
# Yeah
# I was born to take care of you
# Every single day... #
Barcelona...
..that's just a whole other world.
That's an exceptional, exceptional piece of work.
# I had this perfect dream
# Un sueno me envolvio
# This dream was me and you
# Tal vez esta aqui... #
The difficulty was, there was no template for this before.
There was no real crossover before this happened.
Opera singers don't sing rock and rock singers don't sing opera.
It's a different technique. So what we had to do
is find something which didn't compromise either one's talent.
# Is slowly coming true
# The wind is a gentle breeze... #
So we met at the Ritz in Barcelona and a quick decision was made
to try something out, and he said,
"Well, I don't know where to start, really."
I said, "Why don't we just start about... Let's give it a title."
He said, "Let's call it Barcelona - It Was The First Time That We Met."
And that, of course, is the first line of the chorus.
# Barcelona
# It was the first time that we met
# Barcelona
# How can I forget?
# The moment that you stepped into the room
# You took my breath away
# Barcelona
# La musica vibro
# Barcelona
# Yella nos unio... #
It wasn't easy, I'll tell you that, because Fred kept saying,
"Well, we can't... She's got to do these operatic diva things as well",
so we had to build in places for her to do a little, you know,
a fabulous operatic cadenza.
We had to have bits in it where Fred was just Fred.
It was all these things that we had to take into consideration
that made it a tricky write.
# Dejalo nacer
# Let the music play
# Ah-ah-ah... #
Sometimes, for a duet to work really, really well,
you want as contrasting voices as possible.
It's the fact that the two voices are so different but so committed.
When the song is reaching its climax at the end
and you've got that big choral "viva".
# Viva... #
Montserrat Caballe then does what's known as a cadenza,
which is a run of notes in a relatively free time,
and she goes from the top of her voice
down to the bottom of her voice,
right the way back up to the top of her voice.
# Aa-aa-aa-aa-aa-aah... #
Freddie doesn't try and do that because that's not what he does.
He almost just shouts the word Barcelona.
# Barcelona... #
He just comes crashing in,
celebrating what he does on the word Barcelona,
and it is so different from what she has just done,
it creates this kind of moment of real drama.
# Aaaaaaaaah. #
And I remember when we finished it, Fred said, "Oh, that's finished."
You know, "We'll put this out as a single."
And I said to Freddie, "Are you sure about this, mate?
"It's..."
You know, "It's absolutely nothing to do with
"what you've done before with Queen or whatever."
And he said, "Do you like it?"
I said, "Yeah, I do." He said, "Well, it goes out."
That's another mark of Freddie Mercury.
When he had the conviction, when he thought something suited him
or a good piece of work, he went, "Yep, that's it.
"Let everybody hear it. If they don't like it...", you know.
Did you ever sort of take vocal lessons at any stage? I mean...
Not at all. Not at all.
No, it's just, erm...
That's my voice. I didn't, erm...
I think most of the time, I actually misused my voice
because I have these nodules on my vocal cords.
He had this amazing range due to abnormalities in his vocal folds,
which is very rare.
But what that meant is that he could sing exceptionally high
and exceptionally low.
So, on average, and people do vary, a low bass note is this F here.
And the highest note that a tenor can usually go is this note here.
Now, Freddie Mercury, his voice could go from here,
one semitone higher than the lowest bass note,
but instead of this note, which was the tenor note,
he could sing all the way up here.
Three octaves.
Amazing range. Totally unique.
# Why? Why?
# Why?
# Love, love, love, love... #
His ability to jump from low to high is incredible
and I know there was a study that showed
the way that his vocal cords vibrate
is different to most other singers.
# Gets me higher, higher, higher... #
But though we don't see Freddie using this amazing range
in one song, we get glimpses of it. We Are The Champions, for example,
we see an octave jump in the last chorus.
# We are the champions
# We are the champions... #
Going down to a low G in Bicycle Race.
# Bicycle, bicycle
# Bicycle, bicycle, bicycle, bicycle race. #
An A-flat in Somebody To Love.
# Find me somebody to love
# Find me, somebody to love... #
He can go from the very bottom of his range
all the way up from the top with no worries at all.
Most people have a break in their voice and he just glides over it.
So that means he's not scared of using the top of his voice
in a sort of screaming way or a very light way
or a very, kind of, classical soprano way.
# I don't want my freedom
# There's no reason for living
# With a broken heart... #
My voice takes a beating.
When you say your voice takes a beating, yet you go out on stage...
Because I sing my arse off and it's very hard to do it.
Freddie apparently credited his amazing range
to some extra incisors in his mouth - four extra incisor teeth.
Unfortunately, we think this isn't necessarily the case.
Some studies have been done and it shows that that wouldn't affect
the voice, but what it does do is create space in the mouth.
He was able to open his mouth really wide
and that may sound a little bit odd, but when you think about it,
acoustically, brass instruments have a tube
and then a wide opening at the end. If you think of a trumpet,
the larger opening at the end gives the amplification its kind of push.
If you can't open your mouth very wide, you will never be able
to really sing with some of the higher dynamics.
July 13th, 1985 - it was the global jukebox.
It was the opportunity to feed the world.
It wasn't the first time in history that rock concerts
had been held to raise money for causes,
but it never had been televised.
It has never been a global experience.
Because Live Aid was a one-off and it was such a massive event,
you needed a massive band like Queen,
who were complete pros at they did, to bring everybody together.
It was a huge cultural moment
and Queen were a huge, important cultural band.
Fred, I remember him just before it, didn't speak too much about it.
You know, he was quite modest about, you know, what it entailed
and I think given the fact that this was the largest audience ever
in the history of just about anything, if you knew Fred at all,
you knew damn well that he would want to be the best.
Her Majesty, Queen!
I remember Freddie talking to me about Live Aid
and he said that they had been rehearsing
and, well, they rehearsed to the inch of their lives
because they hadn't been doing a lot at that stage.
And it became very serious for Queen and for Freddie.
What he said to me, "We're going to get this right
"because we want to do this", and apart from it being
a great charity thing, they just wanted to show
what they could do and how good a band they were.
And it couldn't have been planned better.
In the Live Aid performance, when he starts off with Bohemian Rhapsody...
..you can see that he's playing around with the rhythm a little bit
and the melody, and I think that's because he knows that
the audience are all going to sing it with him.
So, if you change that slightly, it means that you can be heard firstly,
and also it means that you're once again driving home with the story.
And that's what Freddie Mercury is all about.
Telling the story of the lyrics.
# Mama
# Just killed a man
# Put a gun against his head
# Pulled my trigger Now he's dead... #
They came out and they blew the stadium away,
and I only found out why afterwards.
They had a sound engineer called Trip Khalaf.
And just before Queen went out on stage,
Trip went around to the sound desk and he whacked the sound up.
So, from the moment they started playing,
they were louder than everybody else.
Everybody in the stadium went...
Everybody backstage went, "Who's making this sound?"
and ran to the monitors to see who was performing.
It was extraordinary.
Radio Ga Ga is just incredible because he's exploded into action
after sitting at the piano.
And all the gestures he's doing is to galvanise the audience
into participating in the song with him.
So him standing centre, raising his hand, punching forward,
is both an invitation and a kind of...threat.
You know, he's going, "Come on!"
Like, "Come on this journey with me."
Everybody!
# All we hear is radio ga ga
# Radio goo goo Radio ga ga... #
Lots of punches forward. At the note change, he puts his arm down,
so he's going between these kind of two points of contact
with the audience.
And he moves... From centre stage, he moves down to stage left.
He gets down on that lower platform there, sort of taking everybody,
including the roadies around the stage, by surprise.
So he goes, he's galvanising, he's asking people to participate.
And that's kind of the story of Radio Ga Ga.
# We watch the stars
# On videos for hours and hours
# We hardly need to use our ears
# How music changes through the years... #
They were not Queen's audience. They were everybody's audience.
But the most extraordinary thing
was the way Freddie communicated with that audience.
This was the best audience for him, the entire world.
And Freddie really demonstrated that day what he did best,
which was engaging with a live audience
and making them part of the show.
When they did Radio Ga Ga, the hand clapping sequence,
you know, everybody fell into it.
And it's one of the most moving sequences of the footage
from Live Aid, is to see that sea of audience
responding to Freddie in that way.
# All we hear is radio ga ga
# Radio goo goo Radio ga ga... #
When the hand claps kick in, it's just a...
It's just a beautiful moment. They knew how to work a stadium.
# Radio, what's new? #
Try and put yourself in his place.
I don't know how you'd get into that frame of mind,
the fantastic confidence and the affection for the audience.
I mean, clearly, in order to draw the audience into that,
you've got to have an affection for them.
# Loves
# You! #
CHEERING
In terms of unifying the entire audience
and the millions watching around the world as well,
what better way than doing the vocal warm ups?
# Ay-oh
CROWD: # Ay-oh... #
One, you're showing off and you're being brilliant
and everybody knows you're an amazing vocalist,
but the main thing that you're just bringing everybody together.
It's spine-tingling. It gives me goose bumps, just thinking about it.
It's a real moment of connectivity between the audience and Freddie.
# Ayyyyyyyyy-oh
CROWD: # Ayyyyyyyyy-oh
# Ay-oh Ay-oh
# De-da-de-da-de-da... #
He seduced them. He had them in the palm of his hand.
It was extraordinary to watch.
You could tell the rapport they had with the crowd
was like nothing else any other artists had on that day, at all.
Didn't come close.
# De-da-de-da-de-da... #
# De-do De-do
# De-do De-do. #
All right! All right!
"All right! Everything after that moment is just...
He just sails through it because he's playing.
And there are very few performers
that would put themselves in that position.
Give it to me one more time!
But the one thing Queen did differently from anybody else
who appeared on Live Aid - they rehearsed!
It's very simple. You know, it's a job.
It's a day at the office.
You've got to prepare for it. And Queen did.
They went into a rehearsal studio for three weeks
and they honed it down.
So you had Status Quo sort of wandering over the car park,
hungover from the night before,
and you had Queen, who did it properly. No wonder they stole it.
There ware going to be pros and cons to not touring for a while,
because, for a singer, touring is exhausting.
Queen having not toured for a while,
perhaps that's why he sounded so great
because, actually, he'd had some vocal rest.
# Buddy, you're a boy, make a big noise
# Playing in the street, gonna be a big man someday
# You got mud on your face, you big disgrace
# Kicking your can all over the place... #
Resting as a singer is so important,
Keeping your voice match-fit, building yourself up to a position
where you can sing and hold an arena in the palm of your hand,
of course, that's hugely demanding,
and a lot of Queen's numbers are big vocal numbers.
That is really tiring on the vocal cords.
# We are the champions, my friends... #
So the fact that he'd had some rest, I think he sounds great on Live Aid.
I think his vocals... When he goes up to the high notes,
I think he sounds amazing.
# We are the champions
# No time for losers
# Cos we are the champions of the world... #
I've got to tell you, I never used to go to many concerts,
but I went to the Live Aid shtick.
I watched Queen, who were sensational.
Sensational, they were.
And I stood in that audience and cried.
I thought, "That's my Freddie out there!" Boy!
The Live Aid performance is 20 minutes of pure energy.
And what's amazing is you listen to the early albums of Queen
and you see that energy, that they never stopped.
He never stopped.
I mean, what a legacy to...
All that you want to do is give the audience the performance
that they want, the performance that they want to feel part of.
# We are the champions We are the champions
# No time for losers
# Cos we are the champions
# Of the world! #
CHEERING
Nobody wanted to admit that Fred was ill.
Fred was one of the larger-than-life characters
that you see only in movies.
But this is in real life.
We all just went into a bit of denial,
although there was something... Obviously, Fred wasn't well.
There was never this feeling that Fred couldn't beat whatever it was.
There was a sense of disbelief.
There was a lot of speculation in the papers
about what was happening. There was a lot of condemnation of him,
in terms of, "Well, if you live that kind of hedonistic lifestyle,
"What do you expect?"
And when what was revoltingly referred to
as "the gay plague" first appeared
and there was such dreadful homophobia in the media
at that time, Freddie was the one going around, saying,
"Well, I'm doing everything with everyone, dear.
"I'm not curbing my enthusiasm.
"I'm continuing to live my life the way I've always lived it."
So that bravado was, you know, a death sentence for him, really.
He was... What he was really saying is, you know, "I'm going to die."
But he didn't care.
And I think there wasn't so much a death wish in Freddie,
as just a refusal to kowtow to anything that might inhibit
the way he wanted to live.
Ladies and gentlemen, the chair of the BPI, Terry Ellis!
In 1990, at the Brit Awards, Queen were awarded the ultimate accolade,
the Outstanding Achievement Award.
Brian was wearing a dinner suit with his clogs, you know,
his trademark, which I thought was hilarious.
And Freddie came on
in this powder-blue suit,
looking very gaunt.
He looked small.
I mean, Freddie Mercury wasn't a giant of a man,
but he always looked so tall and imposing.
And you watched it and think,
"Oh yeah, that guy is not very well, is he?"
On behalf of the group,
I'd like to say thank you very much to everyone within the industry
and, perhaps more importantly, outside the industry.
Brian May made the speech, and Freddie was in the background.
It was as if... they were protecting him.
The looks on the faces of the other members of the band
were very sombre.
You would think that to be there,
accepting this Outstanding Achievement Award,
was the sort of pinnacle of their career
and they should be very excited by that.
Nobody was.
There was a sense of something being over,
rather than something just beginning.
You gave us a lot of freedom
to pursue what we loosely call our art,
to any extent that we felt like at the time,
and to go out on a lot of strange limbs,
which seemed very precarious at the time,
but we didn't quite fall off.
It's kind of subdued, it's kind of sad.
There's no joy there, really.
It's as if, em...
You know, I'm sure they were chuffed to bits to get the award,
but it's as if they all knew
that there was something a lot bigger happening in their lives.
Freddie said nothing, except right at the end,
he stepped forward to the mic and he said, "Thank you."
Thank you. Goodnight.
And it was the last time he ever appeared before...
..a live audience, it's choking me up here.
Um...
That was the last time we ever saw him in public.
# Empty spaces
# What are we living for?
# Abandoned places
# I guess we know the score
# On and on
# Does anybody know what we are looking for...? #
I think Innuendo is an album about borrowed time,
and I think that's what makes it such a masterpiece,
and I do really think it is a masterpiece.
# In the pantomime
# Hold the line... #
It's... It's a testament, really, to Freddie's whole life.
# The show must go on
# The show must go on, yeah
And there is a defiance in it, even though it is a very sad song.
I think it's probably one of the most poignant songs,
one of the most...naked songs.
During the recording, Freddie was incredibly ill.
There are quite a few stories about moments in those recordings
where I think Brian, especially, with The Show Must Go On,
had concerns that the song he'd written,
Freddie wouldn't be able to perform and to hit certain notes.
I did a complete demo for The Show Must Go On,
including that very high part, you know, "On with the show."
I remember apologising in advance,
I said, "Look, I've done this in falsetto.
"I don't know if it's possible to do it full voice,
"but obviously that would be great."
And he went, "Oh, for God's sake!"
And he said, "Roll the tape!"
A couple of vodkas, and he went for that line,
which is...outstanding, you know, for him to reach those notes.
He's reaching heights he's never done before.
He's just finding the energy from somewhere.
And the voice on The Show Must Go On is incredible.
I've never heard anybody sing like that in my whole life.
# I face it with a grin
# I'm never giving in
# On with the show!
# Ooh, I'll top the bill, I'll overkill
# I have find the will to carry on
# On with the show, on with the
# Show!
# Show must go on, go on, go on, go on... #
It just makes, you know, anyone who knows that story
and knows the story of those final years,
it's...it's so heartbreaking,
because those songs have such resonance and such meaning.
CROWD NOISE BUILDS
Towards the end of the Magic Tour,
that was Queen at their absolute peak,
and it's quite rare that you get to do the biggest gig
when you're at your best, to the most people.
All those sort of stars have to align,
and that's what happened at Wembley in '86.
Hey!
Whoo!
# One man
# One goal
Ha!
# One vision
# One heart
# One soul
# Just one solution
# One flash
# Of light
# Yeah, one god, one vision... #
The way the audiences were included in his persona,
in his stage persona,
that's what's made him
loved by everybody.
# Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa
# Give me one vision... #
Freddie's legacy is really tied in
with his relationship with his audience.
People don't forget in a hurry when you care about them,
and you can't fake that.
It's as if there's a globe of light at the centre of everybody,
and Freddie's was like a supernova.
And everybody was drawn to it.
And they're still drawn to it, it's still glowing.
My darling friend, as I dared to call him,
he stood the test of time.
Not many people have that, not many people have that.
He had a special talent,
like Sinatra, like Ella Fitzgerald, like Elvis Presley.
They have got special talent.
And boy, do I miss him, I miss him so much.
The friendship is something that's invaluable.
That's how I remember him.
He was a lovely friend, a lovely man,
and we miss him very much.
# One flesh, one bone, one true religion... #
If I didn't do...this, I don't have anything to do,
you know, I can't cook, I'm not very good at being a housewife.
I just, um... This is in my blood, I mean, I just...
It's so in my blood, I don't know what else to do, you know?
# Gimme, gimme fried chicken! #
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
MUSIC: God Save The Queen by Queen
Subtitles by Red Bee Media