More than three decades after the death of Freddie Mercury, Queen continues to perform — a reality that once seemed impossible to the band itself.
Mercury died of complications from AIDS on November 24, 1991, and in the immediate aftermath guitarist Brian May says the surviving members believed the band had reached its natural end.
How May and drummer Roger Taylor managed to carry on to this day owes something to Mercury and a gift he gave to the band in his final days.
Speaking recently with Sammy Hagar on Rock & Roll Road Trip for AXS TV, May recalled that Queen had long agreed that if any member died, the group would stop.
“I suppose what we did was give it up,” May explains. “We actually did give it up when Freddie died. We’d always said, ‘If one of us goes, that’s it.’ So Roger and I both went out kind of grieving to the max and saying it’s over.
“We didn’t even want to talk about it for quite a long time.”
But in the singer’s final months, Mercury — who had once fought with May over one of his most celebrated guitar solos — himself had already been laying the groundwork for the band to continue. Despite rapidly declining health, May says the frontman was determined to record as much as possible before the end.
“Freddie, in his last days, was like, ‘Okay guys, I’m not going to be here long. Just give me stuff to sing,’” May recalls. “Write me stuff on the back of a cigarette packet — whatever. Just give me stuff to sing.”
The band obliged, bringing Mercury fragments of songs so he could record vocal parts whenever he was physically able.
“And then when he’d gone… he was very undramatic about it,” May says. “He was never maudlin, ever. I never saw him cry or go into self-pity. He never did that. He was like, ‘Let’s just do it. Let’s keep doing stuff.’”
Freddie was always inspiring. If he was here now, we’d be doing what we always do, I’m sure.”
— Brian May
Those final recordings eventually became the foundation for Queen’s 1995 album Made in Heaven, released nearly four years after Mercury’s death. The surviving members built new arrangements around Mercury’s last vocal and piano performances.
“We made the last album, the Made in Heaven album, with the tracks Freddie had left us to play with,” May says. “It became a real labor of love because he left some lovely little bits and pieces.”
For May, Mercury’s presence is still felt whenever the band performs.
“Freddie was always inspiring,” he notes. “If he was here now, we’d be doing what we always do, I’m sure.”
In recent years, Queen has found new life touring with vocalist Adam Lambert, who has fronted the group alongside May and Taylor since 2011.
According to May, Lambert’s willingness to reinterpret the band’s classic material keeps the music from feeling frozen in time.
It blows my mind — the range that Adam has and the courage he has to morph things into a new place. I love working with that right now.”
— Brian May
“Adam brings fresh views on things,” May says. “He’s not afraid to say, ‘Why don’t we try it this way or that way?’ So the songs are not fossils. They’re alive and evolving with Adam.”
Lambert’s vocal range, in particular, continues to astonish the guitarist — especially when the band performs Queen’s epic ballad “Who Wants to Live Forever.”
“Sometimes he blows my mind,” he adds. “We do ‘Who Wants to Live Forever,’ which Freddie would do at times, but if he if he felt a little off color, then that was going to be a little bit too much strain for Freddie.
“Adam will always do it and always pull it off, and he’ll take it higher and higher. I’m standing there playing and sometimes I’m going, ‘What did he just do?’
“It blows my mind — the range that he has and the courage he has to morph things into a new place. I love it. I love working with that right now.”
While Queen + Adam Lambert have performed a number of the group’s biggest hits, May says there’s one song they’ll never play, out of respect for Mercury.
The band has no official plans to tour right now. Should that change, don’t expect to see them in the U.S. for the immediate future. May has said ““America is a dangerous place at the moment,” in the wake of the U.S. government killing American citizens Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minnesota in January.
May has also sworn off performing at Glastonbury, due to the culling of badgers that has occurred at the farm where the festival is held.
In related news, Steve Vai recently revealed that he had a chance to play May’s Red Special — his home-built electric guitar — around 1980 when he was 20, and found the guitar impossible due to its incredibly baseball bat–like neck.
“Between the gauge .008 strings, ultra-low action, and a neck the size of a small tree, I played it like a baby giraffe on roller skates,” the guitar virtuoso says.
