They were unique.
Thanks for posting! I watched one or two documentaries on Queen. Both were really good.
Saw them at Irvine Meadows in the early 80’s? Actually, went to see Billy Squier who was opening for them. If I remember correctly, we were in the fifth row, center stage. I became a fan that night. The only problem I have with the way that band is remembered, Brian May was every bit as much of that experience as Freddy Mercury. As I recall that concert, May’s guitar work is what stands out in my mind.
I remember distinctly the first time I heard Queen. I was about 12 and often I would go to my best friend’s house after school. We would sit on the floor and play records on a portable phonograph. My buddy just had to play this new album his older brother got, Night at the Opera. We played it over and over again … until his brother caught us.
Gee!!!. Her body is hardly cold.
I thought she died a few weeks ago??
I like this rediscovered Queen song; but the lyric content has a long history of people who faced great hardship. Here is an upbeat folk version of the forerunner of the lyrics:
Mississippi John Hurt - You Got To Walk That Lonesome Valley (Live)
And here is a stirring a capella version by the Fairfield Four, reminiscent of its origin as a slave work song:
It already has 2 million hits on YouTube. I suspect by tomorrow it will have made the band a cool million $ from all the release points.
The first time I saw Queen in concert was in spring 1973, we heard this song “Killer Queen” on the radio a few days earlier for the first time, it was really something compared to the domestic raunchy rock out at the time. (Didn’t know they had two albums out before that)
There was a concert announced a couple months later and skipped last hour to get tickets at The Masonic Temple downtown Detroit. (long burned down)
Bet there was barely 300 people there, the place was empty so to speak and had only about 3000 seats. Hardly any lights or anything, they looked like a warm-up band for a college concert.
We held our Bic lighters up after the third set....SUDDENLY Freddie rose from the middle of the stage with a single white light behind him...
Heard Bohemian Rhapsody for the first time, A Night At The Opera hadn’t been released yet so nobody had heard it. It still gives me goosebumps almost 50 years later.
Not typical of Queen as I remember them, but very well done. The lyrics teach something the world appreciates, or idolizes, namely self.
bkmk
One of my favorite memories: I always sang along to the car radio, when I was a kid. One time, Bohemian Rhapsody came on, when my dad was driving. I think I had just sung, “Bismillah,” when my dad asked, “How do you know that song?” My dad loved classical, and he thought I was singing an opera.
I’ve read a lot about Brian May’s “Red Special” guitar that he and his father built from scratch. Apparently that was the main guitar and the guitar he used every song they recorded. There were reissued in the 80’s and Guild even made a version back then. Hard to believe he didn’t have a few other guitars to rotate when playing on tour. How did it stay in tune during a 2 hour set back in the 70s? He wasn’t running in between songs was he? Did he even have a guitar tech off stage in case he broke strings of that was his only guitar?