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What ever version on which ever tour it was a song that never worked live, & it was boring

These versions sound good to me.

One may get annoyed, but these "gifts" from Freddie might even sound marvellous. It makes those versions unique.

Personally I would say he had to sing this night after night, which would drive you mad particularly as the song was written years before.
I see no reason why he wouldnt experment for his own amusment just to shake things up a little, if he liked something it would get used again.

Yes he oversang songs, he wasn't perfect, plus again why not it's live not just a copy of the studio track.

having played in a band for 30+ years I can say with certainty you just have to change things up a little, to stay the same is to die...it's boring as hell.

Fred was known to have a low boredom threshhold so i think this is simply trying to make the same song more interesting for the singer and stop him from falling asleep while performing it.

Agree that it never worked live. To me, it never sounded like they gave it much effort to sound at all like the studio version, which had its own delicate balance.

[QUOTE]

[b]Togg wrote: [/b] Personally I would say he had to sing this night after night, which would drive you mad particularly as the song was written years before.
I see no reason why he wouldnt experment for his own amusment just to shake things up a little, if he liked something it would get used again.

Yes he oversang songs, he wasn't perfect, plus again why not it's live not just a copy of the studio track.

having played in a band for 30+ years I can say with certainty you just have to change things up a little, to stay the same is to die...it's boring as hell.

Fred was known to have a low boredom threshhold so i think this is simply trying to make the same song more interesting for the singer and stop him from falling asleep while performing it.[/QUOTE]
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The versions from the Sheer Heart Attack, Opera, Races, NOTW, and Crazy Tour are different than the studio version--but they sound good with the phrasing he does. The 1980 versions come across as obnoxious and oversung!

He was coked off his head.

I wrote this in the comments to the "obnoxious" Hartford clip.
That's not really oversinging, I don't think, when we talk about how he sings "cigarettes." It's more like an aggressive interpretation.
Granted, there's no proper definition of oversinging. But it's not a melisma, and it's not a forced delivery for lack of being able to hit the note.
Sinatra did this kind of aggro-interpretation of his repertoire all the time later in his career.
I guess I think y'all debaters need to come up with a different word for "oversinging."
He's not hitting bum notes so much as singing it in a different style. Talk-singing is one way to put it; macho-aggro another. I might like these versions as opposed to, say, Live Killers, if it was a clean recording.

Oversinging is simply "overdoing" the singing. It doesn't have to be full of vocal acrobatics. Simply hitting higher notes than needed, can be considered oversinging.

Greg, I disagree with your definition of the term. The notes on "cigarettes" and others aren't higher, by the by; they're lower, and expressing a different emotion entirely. He's vamping. You might even say he's doing a karaoke version of his own, well-known song, as if to say to the crowd, "well you know this oldie-but-a-goodie, let's all sing along to it." It's beside the point that he's not singing it in falsetto, or ducking high notes; it's a different interpretation.

I didn't make up the term or definition. Look on Wikipedia and it says "overdoing the singing." There's also many sites that describe oversinging as either overdoing the singing, overdoing vocal acrobatics, singing too loudly, etc.

Actually, he is hitting higher notes than the record and many versions before 1980. Like cigarettes is supposed to end on a C4, he hits a G4 on all three syllables of the word. There's also many versions where he sings lines like "guaranteed to blow your mind" on mostly G4 (instead of dropping down the scale towards the end of the line). I can give you a laundry list of all the oversung phrases on the Killer Queen performances from 1980.

He is technically oversinging the song, and other posters like "Yara" have commented on Freddie's oversinging from this era.

So, when he talk-sings 'caviar cigarettes' in Hartford, he's hitting *higher* notes than on record? OK.

[QUOTE] [b]Daniel Nester wrote:[/b]
So, when he talk-sings 'caviar cigarettes' in Hartford, he's hitting *higher* notes than on record? OK.
[/QUOTE]

No, you're not getting it, and that's actually false:

On the record he sings "caviar and cigarettes" starting on a G4, then when he sings "cigarettes" he hits Eb4, D4, C4 in that order (each note on each syllable). On Hartford, he sings (not TALKS) "cigarettes" on all G4s. Last I checked, singing a G4 is higher than notes in the C4-Eb4 range.

I never said he "talk-sings" cigarettes on Hartford, so that's a red herring from you.

I'll take your word for it on the notes. But I would say the interpretation--and make no mistake, it is an interpretation, he's not singing these notes *unintentionally*--is not obnoxious or purposefully "macho," as you say. Those last two terms are redder than most red herrings are, especially when you're the one setting up the topic. You're like, "OK these versions are obnoxious/lazy/oversung--why do we thing this is the case?"

Because when I make a statement or an observation, I can back it up with the audio. I don't go around saying "oh, he oversang this song" and expect everyone to say "oh OK, I guess he did." If someone asks me questions on whatever I say, I will explain everything and show either a video, or an audio sample proving my statement!

The "macho" and "obnoxious" stuff aren't red herrings because I brought them up in my very first post. I didn't throw them out to distract other people. I said that because that's the vibe I'm getting from some of these performances! If you are purposely singing notes with a heavy chest connection, and purposely deepening your tone, it sounds "macho" to my ears!