Quite often I have quite vicious nightmares—like the other night just before the Rainbow concert. We were sleeping in the Holiday Inn and I dreamed I went out on to the hotel balcony and the whole thing fell and I was a heap on the pavement. Really I was petrified when I woke up in the morning.
Catalog
Freddie Mercury
Farrokh "Freddie" Mercury (born Bulsara; 5 September 1946 – 24 November 1991) was a British singer, songwriter and record producer, known as the lead vocalist of the rock band Queen. He was known for his flamboyant stage persona and four-octave vocal range. Mercury wrote numerous hits for Queen, including "Bohemian Rhapsody", "Killer Queen", "Somebody to Love", "Don't Stop Me Now", "Crazy Little Thing Called Love", and "We Are the Champions". He led a solo career while performing with Queen, and occasionally served as a producer and guest musician for other artists. Mercury was born of Parsi descent in the Sultanate of Zanzibar, and grew up there and in India before moving with his family to Middlesex, England, in his teens. He formed Queen in 1970 with guitarist Brian May and drummer Roger Taylor. Mercury died in 1991 at age 45 due to complications from AIDS, having confirmed the day before his death that he had contracted the disease. In 1992, Mercury was posthumously awarded the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to British Music, and a tribute concert was held at Wembley Stadium, London. As a member of Queen, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2001, the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2003, and the UK Music Hall of Fame in 2004. In 2002, he was placed number 58 in the BBC's 2002 poll of the 100 Greatest Briton
You've got to make sure that you don't ever admit to yourself that this is your peak. If you admit to yourself that this is your peak, then you're on the way down.
I was a precocious child. My parents thought boarding school would do me good so they sent me to one when I was seven, dear. I look back on it and I think it was marvellous. You learn to look after yourself and it taught me to have responsibility.
Putting people in different categories is unfair. You have to judge people on what they are.
The whole band is very particular. We don't go in for half measures and I'm very hard with myself. There're no compromises. If I thought a song wasn't quite right, I'd discard it. I'm very intricate and delicate.
A lot of my songs are fantasy. I can dream up all kinds of things. That's the kind of world I live in.
You have to have confidence in this business. It's USELESS saying you don't need it. If you start saying to yourself, 'Maybe I'm not good enough, maybe I'd better settle for second place,' it's no good. If you like the icing on the top, you've got to have confidence.
I play on the bisexual thing because it's something else, it's fun. But I don't put on the show because I feel I have to and the last thing I want to do is give people an idea of exactly who I am. I want people to work out their own interpretation of me and my image. I don't want to build a frame…
To be honest. I'd like people to think there is no falsity in me because what I do is really my character. But I think mystique, not knowing the truth about someone, is very appealing. I'd be doing myself an injustice if I didn't wear makeup because some people think it's wrong. Even to talk about…
I think I'm totally original. I'm sure there are many people who see themselves in me, but that's to them. I'm me, basically, and that's how I like to be.
The concept of Queen is to be regal and majestic. Glamour is a part of us and we want to be dandy. We want to shock and be outrageously instantly.
Jimi Hendrix is very important. He's my idol. He sort of epitomizes, from his presentation on stage, the whole works of a rock star. There's no way you can compare him. You either have the magic or you don't. There's no way you can work up to it. There's nobody who can take his place.
People think I'm an ogre at times. Some girls hissed at me in the street...'You devil.' They think we're really nasty. But that's only on stage. Off stage, well I'm certainly not an ogre.
We tend to work well under pressure. But do we row? Oh my dear, we're the bitchiest band on earth. You'll have to spend a couple of days with us. We're at each other's THROATS. But if we didn't disagree, we'd just be yes-men, and we do get the cream in the end.
It destroys the soul to hear that you're all hype, that you have no talent, and that your whole career has been contrived.
We've always put our neck on the line. We're fussy and finicky and have very high standards. If a song can't be done properly, we'd rather it isn't done at all. We're the fussiest band in the world, and we put so much loving into every album.
I'm hopeless with money; I simply spend what I've got. I guess I've always lived the glamorous life of a star.