Record Collecting (Queen acetates)

@john

I have a Freddie Mercury Acetate of "Excercise in Free love". On it it says the duration of the track is 3:58 min and they wrote Freddie as Freddy ;-)

This acetate has never been played and has been framed behind a tin layer of glass for over 10 years.

Here is the picture I just made.
http://i42.tinypic.com/rjnwn5.jpg

Does it have any value? (I wouldnt care that much, just wondering). And does the duration as mentioned on the acetate match up with official versions? Could it be possible that this acetate has a different version than the original recording?

TRS.. there is always a possibility that an acetate has a different version. The 3:58 on yours matches with the released version. You cant say if it is different until it has been played and compared with the released version. My guess is that this is an acetate for the Great Pretender 7" release and you have the B-side.

The spelling error on the label makes it interesting as either the writer had no clue, was not paying attention or maybe this is a pirate issue and thus the creator was not well informed (or once again, he did not pay attention to what he was doing).

It ofcourse has a value. I for instance would probably cough up between 150 and 200 euros for it. Others might pay more or less.

TRS, that pretty much matches up with the official length, which is around 3:56 anyways. There COULD be the odd chance that the mix itself might be different, but one can only find out by playing the acetate (I'd recommend whilst digitally archiving at the same time, if you're going to do that).

I'm just a tad envious you have that othewise. That's a great rarity to have :-)

@inu-liger

This acetate used to be stored in Garden Lodge for a number of years. It is one of those acetates that was brought home by either Freddie (or his entourage, Jim-Phoebe-Joe) after a Townhouse session and probably ended up in the loft of Garden Lodge.

In 1992 (when some of Freddie's stuff was being devided among his staff) this acetate left Garden Lodge and remained in the UK and then Ireland (where JH moved back to).
In the end I got it from JH in 2001 as a present and it has always been behind a protective cover and never been played.


@RonB PS: I would not mind to sell this at all as I am not a collector anymore.

[QUOTE] [b]TRS-Romania wrote:[/b]
I have a Freddie Mercury Acetate of "Excercise in Free love".
Does it have any value? [/QUOTE]
TRS-R: The simple answer is yes it does; however like Ron I would say this is the B-side, and that the A-side should be "The Great Pretender".
I don't think this has any special mix or unreleased versions because they really had to dig deep for the Freddie-box set and vitually everything of any musical value has been extracted from the session.

Nevertheless, it is a nice artefact, and is worth owning even if just to keep in the frame, and on the wall.
I would suggest if you want to sell, it seems Ron has made a very decent offer, and that you two should work some sort of private deal between you outside the glare of Qz publicity.

Hi John

Thanks for the answer, very much appriciated.

@RonB, I would be willing to sell it. You mentioned 150-200 EURO, so why dont we settle for 175 EURO (+ P&P).

TRS I already sent you a PM, please get in touch with me and we can go through the details. Thx!

....en als ik het goed heb, ben je ook nog een Nederlander... :)

Klopt! :)

PM sent by the way :)

A question:

The acetates can be played with a common turntable?

Yes they can be played with any turntable BUT not too often. Play em like 20-30 times (no idea about the exact nbr) and they will be worn out and worthless. They were never made to be played more than a few times as they were made for reference purposes only.

And please, for the love of all that's good, use a good stylus that hasn't been over-used and set the arm as light as you can without causing it to skip.

and at the same time make a digital copy and never play it again - those things were not made to last - they're test demos, designed to show how a record would sound - flexis by comparison are a million times better!

Personally I can understand why collecting these is interesting to people, it's when it turns into such a rare article that it tends to bring out the worst in people. One view of the TV programme Four Rooms is a classic example, four more unsavoury individuals it would be difficult to find.