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For those of you who haven’t read the rest of my site, welcome!!! For those who have, you can skip the introductory spiel in the next paragraph. I’ll
try to be brief then – but by way of background: This is the first
time I’d ever seen Queen play live, although I was born in 1962, was a
great fan of theirs as a teenager, and, on the face of it, lived through
years of opportunity to go. However, the fact that Queen was the music
that I was most involved in when, at the age of 15, I lost my mother to
cancer, and with the unenlightened treatment of and attitude to this
tragedy which typified that seventies era, I ‘lost’ Queen’s music,
which became locked in a sort of time warp. This went on for years,
until finally, in 2002, a set of circumstances came together which led
me to make a journey back to deal with the events of that time, in a way
that I hadn’t dealt with them before, and the associations that
Queen’s music still held for me helped me to do that. This tour, then,
in which the band has found a way to play live, and at the same time in
Freddie’s honour, took on a special relevance for me from day one.
Like others, I certainly never thought it would happen; that I would
have this ‘second chance’. But here it was… You
better lose yourself in the music, the moment Eminem
Hurry
put your troubles in a suitcase Come let the new child play… Brian May – 'Long Away'
Me
on the station waiting to set off. (Photo by my daughter, Georgia -
thanks!!!) My
Day One shaft of light that shows the way This is going to be my day Though it can be won by no mortal man The way things have moved, there must be a plan A road, long and winding, has led me here Some things you can’t change but there’s nothing I fear Nothing in the world can take it away Left standing no more – it will be my day.
A
Kind of Magic - Roger Taylor
The Long and Winding Road - The Beatles The past, the present and the future are really one – they are today. Harriet Beecher Stowe Georgia and I set out on the train to the south London flat where her father’s brother and sister-in-law live. Arriving early in the afternoon, there was time to write the above poem and have a little snooze. Georgia was supposed to take a picture of me before I left, but she absconded with her cousin Barbara and I had to set up this shot myself, which I managed to do thanks to the fridge freezer in the kitchen which proved just about right for a camera prop!
About to set off on the day of my dreams – me in my Queen II (!!!) T-shirt (purchased from the fan club, of course!) (Thanks to the free hire of Grace’s fridge freezer as a camera prop!) So off I went, heading first for the Prince Albert pub, where I was unable to locate Jacky, who, I later found out, had been held up in traffic. However, there was a friendly crowd there wearing a variety of T-shirts and regalia. I sat in the pub garden with my glass of white wine, thus avoiding the cigarette smoke. Some Queen music had been promised but was notable by its absence. I hadn’t listened to any Queen all day, in fact, and was suffering from withdrawal symptoms! Still, I’d soon be compensated! I hadn’t arrived at the pub until about 6.20, and in the course of my time there, the pub emptied rapidly (must change my deodorant! No, it MUST SURELY have had more to do with wanting to be well in time for doors opening). So I wasted little time in drinking up and leaving myself. I was, however, concerned that I might have pangs of hunger and thirst once inside the Academy and the evening was underway, so I stopped off at a Chinese supermarket to buy some lotus paste pastries and a bottle of iced tea, and made my way to join the queue outside the front of the Academy, although the exact position I should stand wasn’t clear at first as there were two queues. There were programme-sellers outside but at £12.00 each I wasn’t going to bother this time – my memories of this evening would be enough. Finally, after seven, when the doors opened, the queues started to move. The guy controlling the rate of entry happened to stop the queue when I arrived – it gave me the opportunity to take this photo:
And I listened in to the conversation he was having with the people behind me when he gave the exact capacity of the venue – just under 5,000. Suddenly, he gave the go-ahead, I thanked him, and moved towards the door to collect my ticket. That part went very smoothly, and I finally had The Ticket in My Hand, and replied ‘I will’ most resolvedly when the guy said he hoped I would enjoy the show. Now I was through, there were no further barriers – this was a time of great inner joy.
When I finally got into the stalls area of the auditorium, I chose an area facing the right of the stage as the audience view it – partly because I would be near the Ladies’ but also because I figured that this was the area of the stage where Brian would stand most of the time and, as I’d never seen him in person before, it would be great to have him in my line of vision! I got talking to a guy next to me, henceforth to be known as ‘my neighbour’ and we whiled away the considerable length of time by chatting from time to time. As he asked whether I’d ever been to a Queen concert before, I told him my story very briefly, always aware that it sounds a bit daft, but he appeared to understand – or at least, I don’t think he was just being polite – there’s a lot more understanding about this sort of thing in general these days. I gave him my website URL and said he would visit. So if you have visited and read this, thank you very much for looking after my place while I went to the Ladies! Also, I hope you’ve enjoyed the site if you’ve had the chance to read any of it! We’d probably been standing there for over an hour when a note started to sound. It might have been the first note of ‘One Vision’, but it held as it was for ages and ages, sometimes fading, at one point accompanied by a twinkling of keyboards; later on the audience piped in with a Freddie-type ‘DAY-OH’ or ‘Why are We Waiting?’ at which point – as if by response – some percussion… As I stood there all the minutes this was going on, I became aware that at that point, I could be in any time I wanted to be, and at any place too – but there was truly only one place and time I wanted to be in right there and then, and that was here, and now. God sure does work in mysterious ways! As patience around me started to wear thin, I shrugged, making a remark to my neighbour that I had waited 28 years and another few minutes wouldn’t matter. He joked in reply that he hoped it wouldn’t be another 28 minutes! Eventually, the note started to vibrate in my heart. But then it stopped, and suddenly broke into Eminem, and thanks to my daughter’s love of hip hop, I recognised this as the song from which Brian had quoted on his soapbox earlier. (See the four lines at the top of the page). I started to dance and rap along to it, at least those four lines, which I was able to express in a way that was loaded with their full meaning at that place and at that moment. When it was over, Paul arrived on stage in front of a curtain, and started singing ‘Reaching Out’. Suddenly, from nowhere, Brian appeared, playing alongside him, at which point I gasped in surprise – and then the curtain fell to reveal Roger drumming and the rest of the band – the other two guitarists – Jamie Moses and Danny Miranda (bass), and Spike Edney on keyboards. The music broke into ‘Tie Your Mother Down’ which sounded perfectly amazing and paced on with such energy that I was breathless by the end of it. There really was only one drummer on stage! Realising that we'd actually only just got to the end of the second number, I was wondering how I was going to make it through the concert! Not to mention that lot on stage – but there was no let-up! ‘A Little Bit of Love’ and ‘I Want To Break Free’ – Paul letting us take over part of the vocals – followed. The inclusion of this song had been greeted with surprise after Fancourt, but there may be at least two very strong reasons for it. First, it was composed by ‘Deaky’, and history may very well yet judge it as his most successful song. Second, the lyrics themselves hold poignancy for the situation Queen were in – finally breaking free from all those years of deadlock and out on the road again… Then Paul asked ‘Any fat-bottomed girls out there?’ and some of us were certainly able to answer ‘yes!’ with glee – and gratefully disallowing any thoughts of a possible breach of today’s painful Political Correctness, I did my own fat-bottomed dance along to it! Then Paul accompanied himself on acoustic guitar for the first few bars of ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’, by the end of which the whole venue was whirring, although I’m not sure that those in front of me had much room to dance! Then things quietened down a bit when Paul sang ‘Seagull’, Roger emerging to play bongos. Next, Brian sat down with his acoustic guitar and started to hold a cheerful, confident and cosy ‘fireside’ monologue – he said that the fact that the spirit had been kept alive was partly due to them, but also to us. He asked ‘Can you believe that we’re doing this?’ and I think he answered his own question by saying ‘it’s a miracle’ and going on to boast that he could play anything he wanted to – we settled on ‘’39’ by cheering! – ( yes, we could hear the call many years away!) Then a song which was always done as a trio - ‘Love of My Life’- Freddie’s song, performed in the past by Freddie, Brian and the audience – was now a duet, with Brian and the audience carrying each other along in memory of our missing third member. Then came an interesting version of ‘Hammer To Fall’ which I’d first heard on ‘Rock Radio’ the previous weekend. It started slowly, with Brian, Roger and Jamie on harmonic vocals, finally breaking into the well known rock pace of the song when Paul took over the singing. It was great to hear that historic last verse performed here live – it had been cut out of the musical, but still has a great relevance for some of us!!! After that, Brian started on his guitar interlude, moving from front stage to back, standing against the background of a video. On the commentary of ‘It’s a Hard Life’ on the Greatest Hits II DVD, Brian stated that that video had been a ‘Freddie indulgence’. Time now for a Brian indulgence! ‘And we indulged him…with pleasure, I have to say, really…’ The video led us through London traffic to a point where he knew that he was standing outside the Dominion – we moved on to the front of Buckingham Palace, and climbed up the walls, knowing very well where he was going to end up! Just in case there were any doubts, we finished up out in the galaxies with exploding supernovas, and all the time, the incredible sound of the Red Special, accompanied later by Roger’s drumming, filled the auditorium. It was simply amazing. This had been Brian’s journey, which, in many ways I’d shared, but in a different way and for different reasons. Then Roger came to the mike he said it was like a family reunion! I’m glad he recognised me as one of the family despite my long absence! In fact, I feel that other Queen fans had managed to party on a massive cruise for many years – I’d been there too, but somehow managed to sleep through it. On awaking, I had to backtrack on everything I’d missed – often by looking at someone else’s view of it, until I got to set up this site. Now, for the first time in all these years, I had my own memories to add to those of my teens. It was, in fact, some of my teen memories which were shown on the black and white footage of the 1975 tour to Japan which provided the backdrop for Roger’s first vocal on ‘These Are The Days Of Our Lives’. There were cheers when the first pictures showed ‘Deaky’ and then Freddie. Towards the end of the song, Roger ended the line ‘I look, and I find no change’ with a chuckle while his left arm was extended to present Brian. We joined in ‘Radio Ga Ga’ in the usual hand-clapping way – such a wonderful song – the vocals were taken over at the end by Paul - then rocked along to ‘Can’t Get Enough of Your Love’. The next thing that happened I found quite extraordinary. Roger drummed up the introduction to ‘I’m In Love With My Car’ and I thought ‘What’s happening – who’s doing the vocals – not Paul surely?’ – he was nowhere to be seen. Then when Roger started singing along to his drumming I was so shocked that I was lost for the first few lines and wished I could have asked him to start again! I seem to remember sending off my suggested set list with the word PLLEEAASSE! next to this song, but I’d never had it in mind that Roger would be doing more than singing it, although I had no idea who might do the drumming. I really thought those days of him drumming along to his own singing were over – I really thought I’d missed my chance in life to see this, but I hadn’t! Although I wasn’t thirteen and him twenty-five now – I’m forty-three and he’s fifty-five – that didn’t matter one bit in the course of that song – and if I could say that one moment meant more to me personally than any other during that concert, this was it – salvaged from my tragically marred teens, gift wrapped, and presented to me thirty years on – this was truly compensation at last. ‘I wrote damn thing’, Brian stated to introduce his own vocals for ‘I Want It All’, which was followed by Paul singing ‘A Kind Of Magic’ – both songs sounded great. Then Brian asked ‘Ready, Roger?’ – I didn’t hear the reply, but it was taken as a ‘yes’, and footage of Freddie singing Bohemian Rhapsody appeared on the screen, Roger drumming in front of it – an amazing sight – and sound. After the harmonic piece, when pictures of Freddie, interspersed with some of ‘Deaky', were shown, Paul appeared on the stage singing the last piece, which was now completely live with Brian on guitar, and as the song built up towards its close, I remember Paul standing on the edge of the drum stand, microphone stand held high in one hand. This was a triumph on behalf of Freddie – and, after the gong at the finish, I could freeze-frame that moment in my head with the three of them there – Paul on the left, Roger centre behind the drum kit with sticks extended aloft in his right hand in front of him, and Brian to the right, guitar lowered, acknowledging the adulation of the crowd. I displayed V-signs for victory towards the stage, thinking at the same time that I intended the reverse to anyone behind me who might still pour scorn on this. At the same time, venom-spitting words I wrote to those newspapers at the beginning of the year fly into their place one by one on Brian’s letters page – have those people now finally got what this is all about? I believe it was also at this point that my neighbour remarked that Spike was ‘grinning like a Cheshire Cat’ – I was grateful for the commentary as I wasn’t quite tall enough to see that far over to the left of the stage! Fittingly, the next song was ‘The Show Must Go On’, which was followed by the two encores – one with songs from ‘Paul’s side’ – ‘Feel Like Makin’ Love’ and ‘All Right Now’ (it definitely was!) and the well-seasoned Queen finale of ‘We Will Rock You’ and ‘We Are The Champions’. It was at this point that I decided to try to take some photos. I took one but it turned out really blurry, then held my camera up, preparing to take another. Then – just for a second – but it can’t have happened (or could it?) because I was not very far forward – my eyes met with Brian’s, and he made what appeared to be a deliberate move over to pose next to Paul. I had to take this one, even if I had imagined the whole thing (a bit blurry, though!)
Finally, I took one more. This was the best one:
The last four songs all lived up to the excellent quality of the concert. I think that I wanted to cry during ‘We Are the Champions’ – I think I managed a sniffle – but I had done most of my crying before tonight, and this wasn’t a time for crying, but to victory over adversity which is contained in the message of this song. Years ago, Brian had admitted, as young men, they had fallen about laughing when Freddie first presented this song. Who would have thought then what it would come to mean? For everyone here, but for me personally - I was carrying a living hell at the time it was first released. Maybe it’s the point that I could I suggest that the ‘losers’ referred to in the song are the doubters. So it ended – the six of them lined up – to the background of the National Anthem, a moment like the ones I’d witnessed on footage of the finish of other concerts. Most of the time I had my eyes on Roger at this point – he just kept smiling that wonderful smile. It wasn’t a moment for a crown or royal regalia but Queen the live band were back again.
Picture: George Chin - www.georgechin.com I was glad to see that most of the press were positive about the concert, finally showing some perception as to what this was all about. I could, from the beginning SO see where Brian and Roger were coming from on this – yes Brian, if my logic was too much for a certain newspaper then there were reasons for that. There was the strong parallel between my curtailed adolescence and Queen’s curtailed careers, and in both cases, the world as we knew it had been ripped to pieces by a premature death. In many ways, the lead-up to this day had not been easy. When I first wrote my story on this site I said that the fact I’d never seen Queen play live was a source of regret, but so what? This was, of course, written against the background of the fact that at that point it was never likely to happen. After the tour was announced the whole sequence of events and the way things moved suggested to me that there was a special connection between this tour and my own story. Having dealt with something that should have been dealt with years before - ‘facing the music’ in the truest sense, and the passage of time had hardly made it any easier, I heard Brian talking about the tour on the radio, excitement and enthusiasm unbounded. I was cheered to hear that Freddie's mother had added her blessing to their venture. There have also been other problems very much in the forefront of my life recently. Seeing Queen isn’t going to solve these overnight, of course, but I feel an old burden has now been lifted somehow. That’s what I’ll take away with me in order to gauge the way ahead. They played with such a sound that ensured they would be heard in Heaven. In fact, I never thought I’d hear such a sound produced outside Heaven! ‘Ready, Freddie?’ – mum, Vicki? Could you all hear them? ‘Gitarrendonner’ – ‘guitar thunder’ as a German newspaper article described it. Paul’s voice was out of this world too, and he twirled that microphone stand in exactly the way he wanted. Truly, this was a night way beyond my dreams and I shall never forget it. My writing ©2005 Now-Im-Here.com
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