John Hurt on Freddie Mercury

Holly2003 wrote: brENsKi wrote: why do people dismiss stuff as impossible or rubbish - just because in their own "stepford world" queen are always no1?

fact: queen had monumentally fucked upt heir own worldwide reputation in several ways:-

1. sun city
2. the "gay/drag" IWTBF thing and America
3. not doing "band aid" due to "other commitments"
4. a couple of band "splits"

from 1980's "the game" thru to 1984's "works" queen's reputation was in freefall. they had lost america (for good) and by Live Aid (1985) they were not Britain's no1 band.  In reality they would have struggled to make a top 10 British acts of that time. Just off the top of my head - i would say these "active at that time" aritist would've been bigger than queen in britain in 1985

Wham!, Eurythmics, Bowie, Spandau,, Elton john, McCartney, Smiths, New Order, Culture Club and of course - the biggest at that time - Duran Duran

don't belive me? check the NME/BBC and Billboard (USA) sales for the time - queen were in the doldrums.

yes liveaid change things, but the comment was accurate at the time -Hurt was right
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

1. Sun City -- agree it hurt Queen in the music press but I doubt the general public gave it much thought
2. IWTBF: Perhaps it hurt Queen in the US, perhaps not. The rest of the world didn't seem to care. The Works sold strongly all over the world, and was even moderately successful in the US.
3. Band Aid: not doing it didn't hurt Queen at all.
4. Splits rumours: probably helped their career. The press often mentioned that The Works tour could be their 'farewell' -- a guaranteed crowd-puller. Radio One in the UK were hugely supportive of The Works singles, and this was (in part) due to interviews band members did saying if The Works wasn;t successful they would probably quit. 

The Game was successful. Under Pressure was successful. Hot Space was not. The Works was hugely successful, and their reputation /fame/sales grew off the back of huge hit singles like Ga Ga and IWTBF. By the time Live Aid came around, Queen were already very successful and prominent again, and had put Hot Space behind them.

I agree Bowie, Eurythmics etc (The Police too) were all huge in the UK in the 1980s, but aside from a short time from 1982 to early 1984, so were Queen.
Agreed.

Thats why Bob Geldof had to get them to play Live Aid.

FWIW...

At the time of Live Aid, the Mr Bad Guy album was also out and doing quite well.

Not mega-sales, obviously, but I distinctly remember watching Live Aid and being disappointed that they didn't do IWBTLY (I hadn't quite got into Queen at that point, but knew enough to hope for that catchy song from a couple of months ago.  I probably hadn't heard HTF before that day :-D ).

GratefulFan wrote: "The Beatles:Stones != Queen:Duran Duran. Come on now. Beatles vs. Stones was a massive and 'official' rivalry that entire marketing campaigns were written around for years, with one band being the antithesis of the other. Queen and Duran Duran were incidental and transitory rivals in the same way that all the other bands operating in the same space and time were rivals, all hoping to outdo every other."


Absolutely. There are numerous discussion topics on the net regarding whether one is a Beatles fan or a Rolling Stones fan. Many people still believe that one is either a Stones fan or a Beatles fan. But Queen and Duran Duran? If Queen ever had a rival, and I'm not sure that they did, it certainly wouldn't be Duran Duran.

I don't think queen had any rivals like the beatles vs the stones or the who vs led zep.......they were so different than the average rock band that they couldn't be compared with anyone,  by the the time they hit it big most big time rock bands were on their way down.  maybe the eagles were more rivals if anything.  Queen was never the biggest  band in their 20 year career,...but They were alway's one of the biggest. their biggest strength was their longevity.  I should add that the boy's are the 5th biggest selling artist worldwide of all time.  That's more than Zep, the who, and the stones.   Imagine if they sold more records in the states?.....

On the subject of popularity in the early 1980s, let's not forget that Queen Greatest Hits was also massive and continues to be among the best-selling albums in the history of music. ( I wonder if Hot Space suffered from post-Greatest Hits syndrome i.e. the trend for albums released immediately after a 'hits' album to not sell as well as previous efforts.)

Amazon wrote:

Absolutely. There are numerous discussion topics on the net regarding whether one is a Beatles fan or a Rolling Stones fan. Many people still believe that one is either a Stones fan or a Beatles fan. But Queen and Duran Duran? If Queen ever had a rival, and I'm not sure that they did, it certainly wouldn't be Duran Duran.
=================================

Yeah.  It's possible Hurt was using humour there - like "the Beatles and the Stones ha ha ha", which might not come over in print.  But outside of that it was a pretty crazy statement.

It's been intersting to see the proposed rivals by individuals....KISS and The Eagles thus far.  Brian May separately referred to both KISS and Journey as 'kind of like our American counterparts' which implies some feeling of competetiveness or other connection.  Personally I don't see either of those latter bands as even in the ballpark, but that's just me.

Only rivalry equivalent to Beatles-Stones that I can think of would be ABBA-BoneyM.

I think that without competition,nothing good comes out. Freddie was a virgo,after all :)) and he needed to be the queen in every situation. And he WAS! You can't compare Queen and Duran Duran,and Freddie with no other lead singer. To me,Freddie was and always will be unique.