All Thing's Queen

It wasn't bad, actually, and always nice to hear anything new from John "retired with his dignity" Deacon.

It says a lot that the film ends with "hey, 40 years on we're still rocking America", but without any comment whatsoever from Adam Lambert. There are pimps with more generosity to their charges than Brian & Roger.

Sky Arts showed a good effort on Freddie - The Great Pretender - over Christmas (and which I've caught up with now). Made in 2012 to promote a project I don't recall hearing about then, it covered his 80s projects, solo albums and beyond. The Barcelona song was apparently Montserrat Caballe's idea and nothing to do with the 1992 Olympics. There was a clip from after Freddie's death of Brian & Roger on TVam to criticise press criticism, and sat next to a wholly disinterested Paul Daniels who hadn't the wit or the manners to empathise.

So here's the Bo Rhap trailer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6S9c5nnDd_s

Not sure why YT clips don't appear to be appearing just now.

Anyway, SA showed "Live at the Rainbow" the other week, a decent gig from late 1974, when they were pushing/previewing Sheer Heart Attack, so it was a chance to hear some of their earlier material which otherwise has been largely forgotten (well, I don't suppose the biopic will want to make much room for stuff like Ogre Battle, really).

The biopic premiered this week.

BBC4 are tonight repeating the "Rock the World" doc about the NotW album, and "The Making of Bohemian Rhapsody" which isn't

I was intrigued by the Making of Bo Rhap because it didn't ring a bell. Not surprising as it was from 2004 (they showed a similar repeat about Common People a week or 2 back). They really squeezed the life out of the song over the hour, the nadir being a round table of "intellectual experts" arguing what the lyrics mean, and how only Roger Taylor knows the truth!

You know who's easily amused?

Still think their finest hour was Live Aid in 1985-absolutely stole the show and gave a hell of a performance on really warm evening-how many bands can get the whole stadium doing the Radio Gaga arm thing(in unison) and with perfect timing. One of the best nights of viewing pop music there has ever been.

There was a good doc on SA recently looking at how Adam Lambert came to be the frontman, and how the other 2 filled in their time for 18 years. John Deacon typically got about 10 seconds mention from Roger, and Paul Rodgers didn't get a whole lot more (maybe he was too busy to be interviewed, eh?)

Channel 5 did a new(-ish) one on Queen (well, Freddie really) before Christmas, which seemed reminiscent of a previous one they did, only with a few new faces (apparently there are still "friends" who haven't previously had a turn at this game, even after 28 years) - OTOH, no Paul Gambaccini. He was very generous, apparently. Now you know (!)