Queen

Lester Freamon

Aka Caveman
Joined
Nov 18, 2008
Messages
6,842
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Midnight sun territory
The band, that is.

From age ~6-12 it was probably the only band I listened to. I still love them to bits, and I can probably challenge anyone in a Brian May air guitar solo contest. Any other fans? What's your favourite songs? If I was to single out a song it would be this:




And George Michaels fantastic rendition of Somebody to Love deserves a mention.


Now, fill this thread with youtube clips!
 


Amazing intro, the shivers at 2:18
 
The Caveman said:
Brian May and Roger Taylor are not bad vocalists at all.
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Indeed. I always loved this one.



Brian May also sings excellently but Taylor's voice is more original to my ears.
 
I think it's a bit unfair to have a brain like Brian May's and that kind of talent to go with it.

A fecking astrophysicist as well as a rock star? That is taking the piss.
 
The Caveman said:
I think it's a bit unfair to have a brain like Brian May's and that kind of talent to go with it.

A fecking astrophysicist as well as a rock star? That is taking the piss.
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Luckily for us we'll always have his hair to laugh at.
 
sidsutton said:
Luckily for us we'll always have his hair to laugh at.
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Plus the fact that he married Angie Watts from Eastenders

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phelans shorts said:
Fun fact of the day, queen are the only band in which every member has written a uk number 1.
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I take it you mean an individual song writing credit? Because many bands just split the copyright equally regardless of who wrote it and so have all contributed to number one singles.
 
Yeah, queen tended to say who wrote it, with the majority going between may and mercury, it didn't stop Taylor and Deacon getting in on the act, most notably with I want to break free for Deacon and radio gaga for Taylor.
 
phelans shorts said:
Yeah, queen tended to say who wrote it, with the majority going between may and mercury, it didn't stop Taylor and Deacon getting in on the act, most notably with I want to break free for Deacon and radio gaga for Taylor.
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I actually think your fact is wrong. As far as I'm aware Queen have had 6 UK number 1 singles as follows:

Five and Queen - We Will Rock You (2000)
George Michael and Queen with Lisa Stans - Five Live EP (1993)
Queen - Innuendo (1991)
Queen - Bohemian Rhapsody (2nd entry) (1991)
Queen and David Bowie - Under Pressure (1981)
Queen - Bohemian Rhapsody (1975)
Queen Number Ones | Number One hits from the UK Singles Charts

Of those songs, 'We Will Rock You' is solely credited to May, 'Innuendo' was credited to all four, BoRap is credited to Mercury, 'Under Pressure' is credited to all four and David Bowie.... I don't think Taylor or Deacon have a UK number one on their own?

Maybe you mean US number one singles?
 
They were good at what they did. And what they did was anthemic pop-rock often verging on novelty.
 
phelans shorts said:
Hmm heard it on a show about great bands Saturday, could be but why would BBC lie?

Actually it's from the BBC ofcourse it wrong :p.
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In the US Queen have only had two number one singles, 'Crazy Little Thing Called Love' (Mercury) and 'Another One Bites the Dust' (Deacon). So across the UK and US, Taylor hasn't had a number one as far as I can see.
 
Although 'Radio Ga Ga' (Taylor) did reach number one in Ireland... right that's enough music nerdyness for now.
 
A further controversy ensued in August 2006, when an organisation calling itself the Islamic Mobilization and Propagation petitioned the Zanzibar government's culture ministry, demanding that a large-scale celebration of what would have been Mercury's sixtieth birthday be cancelled. The organisation issued several complaints about the planned celebrations, including that Mercury was not a true Zanzibari and that he was gay, which is not in accordance with their interpretation of sharia. The organisation claimed that "associating Mercury with Zanzibar degrades our island as a place of Islam". The planned celebration was cancelled.
 
Grinner said:
A further controversy ensued in August 2006, when an organisation calling itself the Islamic Mobilization and Propagation petitioned the Zanzibar government's culture ministry, demanding that a large-scale celebration of what would have been Mercury's sixtieth birthday be cancelled. The organisation issued several complaints about the planned celebrations, including that Mercury was not a true Zanzibari and that he was gay, which is not in accordance with their interpretation of sharia. The organisation claimed that "associating Mercury with Zanzibar degrades our island as a place of Islam". The planned celebration was cancelled.
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:lol:

Surely associating mercury with Zanzibar generates the island a huge amount of tourist revenue, whereas they don't seem to grasp that tourism is their best way out of poverty.

Some people and their blind faith eh? Pfft.
 
I don't listen to them much (or at all) now although I was a big fan when the first few albums came out and they are by far the best live act I've seen. I saw the Live Killers set at a small venue in Manchester - Mercury was a stunning singer and showman.
 
Wibble said:
I don't listen to them much (or at all) now although I was a big fan when the first few albums came out and they are by far the best live act I've seen. I saw the Live Killers set at a small venue in Manchester - Mercury was a stunning singer and showman.
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Agree 100% about Mercury. IMO he and Robert Plant are 1a and 1b when it comes to frontmen(order depends on who I'm listening to at the time). I listened to their first few albums non-stop as a nipper because my dad was a huge fan.
 
MikeUpNorth said:
I actually think your fact is wrong. As far as I'm aware Queen have had 6 UK number 1 singles as follows:

Five and Queen - We Will Rock You (2000)
George Michael and Queen with Lisa Stans - Five Live EP (1993)
Queen - Innuendo (1991)
Queen - Bohemian Rhapsody (2nd entry) (1991)
Queen and David Bowie - Under Pressure (1981)
Queen - Bohemian Rhapsody (1975)
Queen Number Ones | Number One hits from the UK Singles Charts

Of those songs, 'We Will Rock You' is solely credited to May, 'Innuendo' was credited to all four, BoRap is credited to Mercury, 'Under Pressure' is credited to all four and David Bowie.... I don't think Taylor or Deacon have a UK number one on their own?

Maybe you mean US number one singles?
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The need to be a bit picky here..... Taking into account that Another One Bites the Dust, was a US number 1, and a huge hit world wide, we can credit John Deacon with a number 1 hit. As has been highlight previously that leaves Taylor. However, this is in fact untrue.

I've hightlighted above the second release of Bo Rhap, after Freddie's death, which was a double A side with These Are the Days of our Lives. Whilst credited with being written by Queen every where, that was due to them agreeing to do so. This was in all intent and purposes a Roger Taylor track. Roger also wrote the B-side to the original release of Bo-Rhap.

Now then, I may have shown my hand as a Queen fan, by knowing the above, but I'm not too bothered. I think the problem for many people with regards to Queen is that they never really stuck with one genre or another. They lost a lot of fans back in the day when they released the Hot Space album which contained Under Pressure, and though still around in the 80's they recorded less, as they took a break from the industry and of course later on in the decade Freddie became to ill to tour, but did lay down some wonderful vocals for the band to fill in later on. Not sticking to one thing or another led a lot of people to mock them, and also they did become rather predictable, in that anything they released late on had at least one Brian May solo inside it.
 
The Caveman said:
I think it's a bit unfair to have a brain like Brian May's and that kind of talent to go with it.

A fecking astrophysicist as well as a rock star? That is taking the piss.
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Roger Taylor - BSc (hon) biology
John Deacon - BSc (hon) 1st class - electronics
Freddie Mercury - Dip in Art & Design...

I don't think it's fair that Brian gets singled out for being so clever, the whole bloody band were. Add to that Brian built his own guitar which he still uses. Deacon built amps that were used by May and himself. Deacon and May helped create design of the light rigs they used to use. Freakingly over clever that lot were.
 
Tribec said:
I've hightlighted above the second release of Bo Rhap, after Freddie's death, which was a double A side with These Are the Days of our Lives. Whilst credited with being written by Queen every where, that was due to them agreeing to do so. This was in all intent and purposes a Roger Taylor track. Roger also wrote the B-side to the original release of Bo-Rhap.
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'These Are the Days of Our Lives' is, as you say, jointly credited to all four members, as everything post 'Kind of Magic' was. The joint-credits was the thing that stopped the band splitting up, as previously they argued relentlessly over who's tracks would be the singles and on the albums. Indeed, as you mention, the B-side to BoRap was a matter of controversy as B-Sides to big selling hits earned a lot of money at the time. 'I'm in Love with my Car' was chosen after Roger Taylor locked himself in a cupboard and refused to come out until it was agreed his song was made the B-side.

By the way, I work for EMI Music Publishing and the amount of royalties these guys still generate is insane.
 
MikeUpNorth said:
'I'm in Love with my Car' was chosen after Roger Taylor locked himself in a cupboard and refused to come out until it was agreed his song was made the B-side.
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:lol:
 
The Caveman said:
Any numbers on that?
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Can't really give confidential numbers. But if you take one of the biggest earning modern artists on our books - James Blunt unfortunately - Queen still earn many multiples more than him every single period, even when Back to Bedlam was selling bucket loads.
 
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