QUEEN – "Bohemian Rhapsody"/"These Are The Days Of Our Lives"

You can’t disentangle it from circumstance, but I really like ‘These Are The Days Of Our Lives’, the soft tones, the swoops of the verse. Couple it with the video and Freddie looking so frail, it’s devastating. Ever the shrewd showman, he’s playing out his last months for all they’re worth – I don’t mean that cynically; he’d want a neat, touching document, and it’s not as if he’d need to milk his situation for financial gain. It just feels like a goodbye, and as dignified as he could be.

Don’t know the other song.

According to last week’s BBC doc Roger Taylor wrote These Are The Days, but it fitted perfectly, almost frighteningly so, as Mercury’s official farewell. I still find it moving, especially as I can relate more to its air of middle aged regret these days.

Not really a load of point talking about Bohemian Rhapsody to an extent – it’s already got it’s own entry and there is more than enough worthwhile material there I would have thought.

TATDOOL is an interesting one. I really enjoyed the recent two part Queen documentary shown on the BBC. By this point in their career, Queen had decided to share song writing credits equally between all four members – presumably to quieten down some of the issues that they’d had in the early 80s around creative control of the group (issues that are most apparent from the reaction of the two public members of the group to the Hot Space album and some of Freddie’s comments around the time of his Mr Bad Guy album). It was interesting, to me at least, that the originator of this song was Roger Taylor, presumably talking about his own children who would have been on the cusp of adolescence at this point (i.e. before they got to be sulky teenagers!). It should be remembered that the song itself is not necessarily about death. It’s actually about parenthood and getting older and realising that partying is not the be all and end all – both ends of which it would seem Roger Taylor had extensive first hand experience.

Nevertheless, Tom is right, to an extent, that the emotional value that might be have been placed on this was all subtext – brought staggeringly home with the behind the scenes footage of the final video shoot shown in the recent documentary. The video itself, shot in soft focus black and white to try and hide just how ill Mercury was, does a hell of a job, as the full colour footage literally made me exclaim “bloody hell” to the screen. I’ve not been close to anyone who has died of AIDS, so it did a certain job of educating me – credit to the band that they kept working right up until the point when Freddie had definitely had enough.

The song itself is pleasant but, on its own merits, hardly shattering. The solo is one of Brian May’s more tasteful efforts and, I think, demonstrates the difference between a decent guitarist and the session guy that manages to kill the momentum in 1991’s earlier Everything I Do. May starts slow and brings the solo to a crescendo that, as a result, makes the last chorus more celebratory than wistful – only for it to be undercut by the final whispered “I still love you” – reminding us all, one final time, just what the subtext of all this is.

This is the last genuinely Queen number one ; the last couple of singles with Freddie’s vocals not quite getting there in 95. “A Winter’s Tale” is Freddie’s real farewell but alas didn’t have much of a tune to go with its poignant lyrics.

People have said that Queen’s quality control wasn’t that great but when you listen to Roger Taylor’s solo stuff – “Nazis” being the prime example – you realise that it probably worked quite well.

Should Brian and Rog still be trading under the Queen banner ? I don’t know. On the one hand you think they’re both smart and rich enough to do somethig else. On the other they didn’t kill Freddie, the songs belong to them just as much and if not them some awful tribute band would be cashing in.

10: I want to know when Brian May, Freddie Mercury et al would have found the time to vote Tory – do you reckon they organised their postal vote diligently before going on tour and, subsequently, when working abroad as tax exiles or what have you?

I’m not disputing the crux of what you’re saying but the thought of international rock stars getting their butlers to proxy vote for them or some such is quite amusing.

Doesn’t the right wing thing come from the refusal to apologise for Sun City and playing in South American dictatorships ?

I would acquit them but it seems being apolitical is tantamount to being “right wing” among our present day commissars.

13: They address the Sun City thing in the second part of the documentary. Funnily enough, it presents the Queen side of the story rather than both sides but for what it’s worth they claim that they insisted on non-segregated audiences (when asked how white the audiences were, Taylor concedes, mostly white), that they made an effort to visit non-white areas of the country and financially supported a school for the handicapped for victims of apartheid from the time of the visit onwards.

I would say it was a pretty silly thing for them to do – and Taylor seems to agree, stating he wished he’d “never heard of the bloody place”. Does it make them right wing? Dunno. Were the members of the band right wing? Again, dunno really. As Marcello points out, Brian May seems to be anti-Tory now, though I think this is a one issue thing (treatment of animals). He might well be right wing in all other senses but I haven’t a clue whether he is or not.

He stood in monotone, soft focus, pancake make-up hiding the blotchiness of his skin, looking like Bogarde in “Death In Venice”…but his eyes still sparkled. They’re the last to go. When all of your being screams in pain, and the thin, gaunt figure you see in the mirror echoes an avatar created by your “good friend” a good few years back, you know that chilling hand is already reaching for your shoulder, then it’s time to make way, to say your goodbyes and thank everybody for a wonderful time. The life and soul of the party was leaving.

And when the door closed shut and the taxi whisked him off, we returned to remember his moment of triumph, toast his memory and flip over to listen to that instant, that moment when he said he loved us and meant it.

Only, you never got the sense from anyone that this was someone “gone to soon”. Rock & Roll deaths are events that spawn death cults and legend-creation. Freddie was different. The stigma associated with AIDS and HIV robbed us of the opportunity to lionise Mercury, as we had with Lennon or Elvis. And here was a performer that could easily outshine legends onstage. Yes, we were all sad. Yes, we all missed that vitality and joie de vivre, that was absent from all subsequent Queen output. A Freddie-shaped hole. This was perhaps the saddest posthumous hit this (Popular) side of “You Know You’re Right”.

I’m afraid I personally don’t give a stuff if they are/were Tories or not, aside from the curiosity (if they were) of someone in the industry not being naturally alligned to the Left, either in truth or for show. Queen were certainly not apologists for fascism for playing Sun City and other places, though, as Marcello says.

But I do agree entirely with Mike’s (“I would acquit them but it seems being apolitical is tantamount to being “right wing” among our present day commissars”). I’m assuming he’s referring to that bastion of impartiality, the BBC.

I see you still overrate absolute truth.

Not many records can have been made in such circumstances – the singer dying, and only he and a select entourage know about it, but as soon as people see the video they’re going to realise that something is seriously wrong with him. So it’s inevitably going to be seen as a leave-taking, if not immediately then soon and forever afterwards (that’s not meant to sound like Bogart, sorry!). And what a beautiful one – sensitively put together, with a wonderfully appropriate and tasteful guitar solo, lovely understated percussion and so many pretty flourishes (that line “the days were endless, we were crazy, we were young” delivered with a little leap of energy, you can almost hear Liza Minnelli singing it).

Even in Queen’s early days, nearly two decades before he wrote this, differences in perspective between generations were a common lyrical theme in Roger Taylor’s songs. “The Loser in the End” from “Queen II” addresses “mothers everywhere” with the words “you’ll get forgotten on the way/if you don’t let them have their fun/Forget regrets and just remember/it’s not so long since you were young”. In “Drowse” from “A Day at the Races”, which looks back to a childhood where you’re asked “to waste all your good times/in thoughts of your middle-aged years”, he concludes “there’s all the more reason for living or dying/when you’re young and your troubles are all very small”. “Tenement Funster” and “I’m In Love With My Car” are both keenly aware of the narrator’s youth facilitating the lifestyle he’s enjoying. Even in “Radio Ga Ga” there’s the wistful comparison between his generation’s consumption of radio, his parents’ and his children’s. You get glimpses of his Truro upbringing and the sense that he’d have been pretty well-adjusted even without the wealth the band brought him. Drummers with a catalogue of songs this good, anyone?

It’s fascinating that this originated from Roger Taylor. On first hearing, it was beautiful and moving, and seemed like a poignant and sincere farewell note from Freddie Mercury. I think it remains so, and it has evaded airplay, which helps. What surprised me the very first time I heard it, in some or other TV broadcast noting Freddie Mercury’s death, was that its poignancy and sincerity were amplified by the use of such an unusual phrase “Those Were The Days Of Our Lives.” This is a phrase which does not belong in the vernacular. In common use, the phrase is elliptical: “Those were the days…” Whether any further qualification may help is moot; no-one ever says “Those Were The Days Of Our Lives”.

But it’s obvious what was meant here. It was not an attempt to contrast the current period of time with a former one (though the use of “these” and “those” suggests it). There isn’t any disrespect when he sings “Those Were The Days”. Instead, it is a gentle reminder that “You Only Live Once” – and by writing / singing so much of the song (but not all of it) in first person plural, clearly someone else is involved and being implored to make the most of their short time on earth. “Fine. Youy may have had happy times and it’s ok to say “Those Were The Days…”, but I urge you to enjoy the present. “These Are The Days…”, please.”

Maybe some folk at this point (or well before it) think “yeah – duh”. But still, I think there’s more to it than that. At the time, there was a sense that Mercury’s enunciation and lyrics were inseparable; both slightly odd and largely loveable – one a consequence of the other.

As a farewell from the “intensely private” Freddie, one might have wanted the final outpouring to be the most frank and revealing yet – for us to feel the human touch from Planet Popstar, for us to hear him express himself in the way that all of us do. We didn’t, but we got the next best thing, a stylised and dignified statement of what he’d always been like, and we knew what he meant.

This is why Roger Taylor’s involvement is so fascinating: was his writing so brilliant that he managed to punctuate it with the kind of oddities and mannerisms that suited Freddie Mercury so well they seemed like his own? Or did Freddie Mercury take over writing the song at a certain point? Not having seen the recent documentary (yet), these questions are not rhetorical, and I’d love to know the answers. But when I do, it won’t diminish my regard for an incredibly apt valedictory speech.

Re 23: Dave Clark

#23 er…P**l C****ns.

#23 Dennis Wilson? Dave Grohl? Bill Berry?

As for These Are the Days of Our Lives, a fine song, well sung. As with so many Queen records, though, it’s a good record that might have been a better one.
In this case the drum programming and keyboard-sound choices make the record somewhat claustrophobic when a lighter and more airy touch might have suited the song’s wistfulness better. The percussion that hops between left and right speakers tends to distract me and stop me giving full attention to the vocal.
Maybe it’s just a reflection of my own tastes, but I’d love to hear a simpler treatment.

# 23 still – Karen Carpenter had to be dragged screaming away from her drum kit, they say. Does she count?

I spent the Christmas of ’91 at my Grandma’s house in Liverpool, and Queen seemed to be everywhere. When Top Of The Pops was on Grandma said “Ever since I first heard that song, I knew he was going to die young.” My mum told her to stop being silly. My main impression was that Freddie looked very toothy and gawky in the video to Bohemian Rhapsody, which was a good thing.
TATDOOL went perhaps a little over my head at the time, but listening now it’s as simple and effective as everyone else has said, a fitting note to finish a career on.

#23 – Robert Wyatt?

Fitting epitaphs. Bo Rap obviously stands on its own two feet regardless of circumstances. People tend to describe the song as in three sections: ballad/mad opera bit/heavy metal – but of course there’s that final grandeur of the ooh yeahs and that sustained, understated guitar playing on the wistful bit that takes it to the gong. Whatever you think of the lyrics, those dynamics bring in one hell of a sadness when put alongside Freddie’s death.

In contrast, I’ve never been a fan of TTTDOOL. For me, Queen never seemed to know what to do with keyboards, and too often headed for the MOR setting; with all of them having a go at it they also lost many of the interesting passing chords, inversions an’ stuff that the previous full-time piano player had dropped in. But as people have pointed out – given the video and the context… wow.

Oh er yeah I knew that of course, honest guv. But I’ve seen it described as a three-act thing so many times. (Wasn’t reading Popular when the original went #1 – may have to check back and find myself so totally isolated on this one…)

#26 – TATD certainly would have stood alone as a fine tribute. On the other hand, wasn’t this single raising money for AIDS charities like the George and Elton one had been? If you’re looking to maximise the yield to the charity, it’s not a bad idea to tie in the farewell single with the band’s best-known song which hasn’t been out as a single for 15 years. In terms of the all-time best selling singles in the UK, combining this re-issue with the original release took Bo Rhap from just outside the top ten to number two, overtaking “Mull of Kintyre” and second only to Band Aid, where it would stay until another notable premature death nearly six years hence.

Thanks for the songwriting drummers, a choice collection. I was thinking of Dave Grohl and Karen Carpenter when I posted the original question. You could also mention Kevin Godley and, if you’re counting Marvin Gaye’s first gig as playing drums, you’d have to include Madonna (and maybe that bloke who played drums on The Ballad of John and Yoko…).
Dave Grohl once listed his favourite drummer jokes for a magazine interview, which included:
Q: What’s the last thing a drummer says before he leaves the band?
A: “Hey guys, why don’t we do one of MY songs?”

Oh, and happy belated birthday P*nk Lord. Maybe you can advertise next year’s bash on this site?!

^^ You beat me to it, Wichita. Her ill-fated solo album never had a single writing credit attributed to Karen. And Richard wrote for The Carpenters didn’t he?

Most of the time it was outside writers, but Richard wrote Goodbye To Love, Top Of The World, Yesterday Once More and Only Yesterday.

@25: My understanding of the Queen writing process prior to the sharing of the song credits was that the originator of the song would bring it to the group, stuff would be suggested by all members and the originator had final say over whether these ideas would be included or not (apparently this was the major source of tension in Hot Space, with May and Taylor desperate to add rock bits to Deacon and Mercury’s songs, with them steadfastly refusing, as they wanted to make more of a disco/funk record).

When they started sharing credits, I think a similar situation obtained but with time limited due to Freddie’s ill health, there was less worrying and more collaboration. I suspect that Freddie’s hand is in there on TATDOOL though I have not seen concrete proof of that (and more is the point, given his ill health and how many decent takes he would have been capable of, I’ll bet that he would have been able to sing it as he wanted on the grounds that that was what he was physically able to do). On his vocals near the end of his life, the documentary repeats the well known story about the recording of The Show Must Go On but also reveals that for his last few vocals for Made In Heaven, he did three different takes and that was what the rest of the band were going to get to work with, end of story (understandably).

If you still haven’t seen it, I really recommend the documentary. The story Brian May tells about his Dad coming to see them perform is a good one besides all the other stuff they talk about.

‘right wing’ panto? Yes. The cultural/sporting boycott of SAfrica was utterly mainstream in political terms in the 80s, encompassing all parliamentary parties (including some softish tories), the sporting establishment blazers, and pretty much every representative of the black majority in South Africa itself. The ‘right wing’ position wasn’t support for apartheid itself – that was only the position of the absolute loons of the far right, including one or two MPs linked to the Tory Monday Club – the mainstream ‘right wing’ position was, well we don’t like apartheid either but boycotts don’t do any good, you can’t interfere with people’s right to make money, and ‘politics’ has nothing to do with sport & showbusiness. pretty much exactly the Queen position, then and after. In context, ‘apolitical’ doesn’t mean anything I’m afraid – to say ‘its not a political issue’ was, precisely, the right wing argument