queen – The Hip Quotient

Queen, February 20, 1976: The Show I Missed; the Program I Prized.

Dana Spiardi — Fri, 20 Feb 2015 05:00:08 +0000

Question: what’s the next best thing to seeing your favorite artist perform at a rock concert? Answer: receiving a copy of the show’s program from a friend who attended the gig.

Okay, I know that’s a stretch. Sure, you can drool over a concert program all you like, flip its pages till they fall out, and take it to bed and read it under the covers with a flashlight. But it will never sing to you. It won’t make your ears ring for hours on end. And it will never blind you with pyrotechnics.

Nevertheless, I experienced a true rock-shock when my friend Tony Vigliotti walked into sixth period French class and presented me with a souvenir concert program from the Queen show he’d seen the night before at Pittsburgh’s Stanley Theater. This was the concert I’d been dying to see. Or rather, this was The Freddie I’d been dying to see. Frontman Freddie Mercury had become my style icon — my Killer Queen, so to speak, with his shaggy long-cut black pageboy and his fairy-inspired frocks. I didn’t want to sleep with him, mind you. I wanted to BE him. Or at least go shopping with him.

Queen was in town to promote their fourth studio LP, “A Night at the Opera,” which featured their opera-palooza “Bohemian Rhapsody.” I wouldn’t have even considered asking my strict parents if I could attend the show, had it not been for the fact that Tony V. was going.

I was 16, lived 35 miles east of Pittsburgh, couldn’t drive, and had never been to a rock concert. Surely my parents would trust Tony to take me! He was a year older and was held in high regard by my mom, who had known his family her entire life. Tony’s grandmother was my mom’s beloved comare – her godmother – a relationship of special importance in Italian families. Tony may have been the leader of Blairsville’s one and only rock band, Rampage, but he was no wild one. He was a good boy. A sensible, respectable boy.

But while my mom had no doubts about Tony’s superior character, she just wasn’t convinced that this Queen concert was a good idea. It was in the city, in a big stadium that was no doubt full of people on drugs. There would be big parking lots and possibly some nighttime outdoor walking involved. And, because it was February, there might be weather.

I accepted her decision, as I always did, without argument. But as much as I desired to see Queen in that career-defining zeitgeist, as much as I longed to see Freddie command the stage in the sartorial style I tried so hard to emulate, I quickly got over it. In fact, within a few months, I had gotten over the bulk of my Freddie obsession. (Teens, take my word: whatever IT is, you will get over it.)

Besides, why should I have sulked over missing that gig? I already had my tickets to see Bruce Springsteen play the nearby Cambria County War Memorial in two months. And there would be no worries about transportation: Mommy and Daddy would drop me and Barb L. off at the arena entrance and pick us up in the same spot afterwards. Despite the skepticism of my rock mentor (“I can’t believe you’re making your concert debut with Springsteen,” said Tony. “He’s all hype”) I would forever regard that April 12, 1976, show as the best concert of my life. (Okay, so Tony missed the mark…just that one time. I once predicted Madonna would fade away. Even rock aficionados are wrong sometimes).

But talk about a friend! Here was my Beatle-lovin’ brother…the guy I most enjoyed talking to in high school…the person who planted the seeds of my never-ending rock-n-roll education…the mate who understood, like no one else, how much I longed to see that Queen concert…the friend who thought enough to bring me a souvenir that I’ll prize forever.

I finally got to see Queen a few years later at the Pittsburgh Civic Arena. And you know what? Receiving that program from 1976 is a much sweeter memory.

Thank you, “Tony Velot.”

Here’s Tony, at left, playing bass with his band Rampage in the summer of 1975 at the Eagles Club in Blairsville, PA. Jeff “Turtle” Baker is on lead guitar and Gary McCrady is on drums. Today, Tony Vigliotti is best known as Tony Michaels, General Manager of WHJB 107.1 FM in Greensburg, PA. He hosts Jukebox Saturday, a long-running classic hits request show that airs on Saturdays from 10 am to 2 pm on three stations: WHJB, WDAD 1450 AM in Indiana, PA , and KOOL 103.3 FM in Punxsutawney.

“Sweet Lady” is my favorite song from “A Night at the Opera.” That album had the distinction of being the most expensive ever produced at the time of its release in 1975. I like this video because it shows a collage of clips featuring the Freddie I loved best, in the style that once made me swoon. But even after he cut his hair, grew the moustache, and swapped the white billowy caftans for hot pants, there would always be a special place in my heart for that “Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy” of 1976. RIP, Freddie.

Dana Spiardi, Feb 20, 2015

My Queen-Size Crush on Freddie Mercury

Dana Spiardi — Fri, 05 Sep 2014 04:00:00 +0000

When I was 16 years old, Queen vocalist Freddie Mercury was the man I most wanted to meet. I didn’t want to sleep with him, mind you. I wanted to BE him. Or at least go shopping with him. Seriously, he was one of the people who inspired me to get out of my tiny Pennsyltucky hometown. I figured that if I studied hard enough, I could go to college, get a good job, save my money, and then move to London and hobnob with him and my other Brit rock idols. As it turned out, I went to college, got a job, moved to a strip-mall-suburb, and got to hobnob with Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Harold Denton in the backroom of an Italian restaurant just off the interstate. But THAT’S another story.

I flipped for Freddie just after the album “Sheer Heart Attack“ was released (it featured the ultra-cool track “Killer Queen,” which was supposedly inspired by Jackie O). Freddie was the most fashionable creature I had ever laid eyes on. I adored his exotic looks – the kohl-rimmed eyes, the long, shimmering hair. It never even occurred (or mattered) to me that he might be gay or bisexual! After all, the rock ‘zines like Creem and Circus frequently mentioned his live-in girlfriend Mary Austin. I was dying to know all about her. What did she look like? Did they exchange clothes? And it’s funny, but in the early days the rock press never alluded to the fact that Freddie Mercury was actually Farrokh Bulsara – a Parsi born in Zanzibar! Imagine my delight when I learned that fact. A dusky, dashing man from a country named Zanzibar.

Because of Freddie, I took to wearing black nail polish – on one hand only – as did he. I layered on the best waterproof eyeliner I could find in the local Rexall. I bought a black shiny trench coat and fancied myself the Black Queen of the band’s second LP. And I sought out the most outrageous Freddie-inspired clothes I could find, most of which I found in two small boutiques — Paraphernalia and The Piscean – both located at suburban malls. That’s me in the photo, trying to look like dynamite-with-a laser-beam.

Alas, my royal crush had run its course just about the time the band released the “News of the World” LP – which contained those two tiresome stadium anthems, “We Are The Champions“ and “We Will Rock You.” By this time, Freddie had sheared off his beautiful locks and was sporting a close-cropped haircut and a mustache. He cast aside his Carnaby Street frocks and elegant, billowy kaftans and bared his furry chest. But I never stopped adoring that good old-fashioned lover boy. I jumped at the chance to see Queen when they played the Civic Arena in Pittsburgh in 1980. Musically, it was a great show. I still have an indelible image of Freddie strutting around – bare-chested – in tiny red shorts! But Queen was never just a glam-band. Guitarist Brian May kept the electricity surging at peak level. Frank Zappa once said, “Actually I get more surprises listening to a Queen album than I get out of Jimi Hendrix’s albums….Some of the things that they’re doing mix-wise on these albums are very difficult.” Now that’s quite an endorsement, coming from a hard-to-please cynic like Zappa.

Queen’s popularity seemed to decline in the US by the mid-1980s, as Freddie became increasingly flamboyant. Americans, with their puritanical roots, probably had trouble embracing a performer who was – by that time – so openly gay. But Queen’s appeal never waned in Europe. The band’s only major faux pas was their decision to perform in apartheid South Africa in 1984, thus breaking the United Nations cultural boycott (they were subsequently fined by the British Musicians Union). Brian May justified the move, claiming the band was non-political. “We play to anybody who wants to come and listen,” he said. It was a bad move, nonetheless. But, as I’ve said before, I’m pretty forgiving when it comes to rock-n-roll.

When Freddie passed away from bronchial pneumonia resulting from AIDS in 1991, I felt like I had lost an old friend. I’ve digitized my old vinyl Queen albums and enjoy listening to those fabulous, underrated songs from the early 1970s: “Death on Two Legs,” “Sweet Lady,” “The Seven Seas of Rye,” “Now I’m Here,” “Brighton Rock,” and “Tie Your Mother Down.” AND, like those morons in the movie Wayne’s World, I never fail to crank up the dial, bop like mad, and sing my lungs out every time I hear “Bohemian Rhapsody“ on the car radio.

Queen has enjoyed a resurgence in popularity in recent years, due to a certain Lady who claims she adored the band’s singer and took her stage name from the group’s song Radio Ga Ga. Thanks, Freddie, for inspiring a whole new generation of brave, over-the-top performers. But I think that even the outrageous Mr. Mercury would have considered a raw-meat dress a bit gauche.

Happy Birthday, Freddie! September 5, 1946 – November 24, 1991

Here’s the clip that started it all for me!

And here’s Brian, explaining the famous”waltz-riff” he developed for “Sweet Lady.” Check out Freddie’s performance! This is my favorite hard-rocking Queen song.

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Brian May – The Asteroidal Axeman

Dana Spiardi — Sat, 19 Jul 2014 18:46:56 +0000

Lots of rockers and actors have had asteroids named in their honor, but Brian May is no doubt the only true scientist of the bunch. The brainy guitarist/astrophysicist best known for his work with Queen turns 67 today.

In October 2007, after playing rock and roll for his entire adult life, he completed a PhD thesis in astrophysics, titled “A Survey of Radial Velocities in the Zodiacal Dust Cloud.” (His astroid is “52665 Brianmay,” for all you science fans.) Imagine…he managed to do his homework AND stay up late playing in a band! Bet he got straight As, too.

He was at the top of his class as a musician, as well. Although Brian was never part of the revered Clapton-Beck-Page inner-circle of British electric-blues guitarists, I consider him a virtuoso. I could always recognize his distinctive style. He used his custom-built “Red Special” guitar to produce sounds that mimicked all kinds of instruments, from trombones to piccolos. So unique were Brian’s special effects that early Queen albums boasted “No synthesizers” on the sleeve to inform listeners that the sounds they were hearing were produced by a real guitar, not a computer.

It’s his earliest work with Queen that I love best — on tracks like “Keep Yourself Alive,” “Brighton Rock,” and “Stone Cold Crazy.” In 2012, readers of Guitar World magazine voted him the 2nd greatest guitarist of all time, and Rolling Stone pegged him at #26 in their list of Top 100 guitarists.

The AIDS-related death of Queen’s dazzling frontman Freddie Mercury in 1991 sent Brian spiraling into a severe, near-suicidal depression. To this day he says he’ll never fully recover from the singer’s passing. Yet, he’s managed to move on. After 30 years of research, he completed his PhD, all the while staying active as a musician. He formed the Brian May Band, released several solo LPs, performed on other artists’ records, and toured with Queen’s original drummer Roger Taylor and former Bad Company singer Paul Rodgers in a band called Queen + Paul Rodgers.

Brian served as Chancellor of Liverpool John Moores University from 2007 through 2013, and in 2005 he was appointed a Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE) for “services to the music industry and for charity work.” Here he is, atop Buckingham Palace, playing “God Save The Queen” at Her Majesty’s Golden Jubilee celebration.

Here’s Brian, hammering out some great licks on “Stone Cold Crazy.” This is my favorite Queen period, circa 1974. Freddie was magnificent. And I always loved those billowy shirts that Brian used to wear. John Deacon is on bass and Roger Taylor on drums.