Opening Number - Queen Extravaganza (Somebody To Love) American Idol 2012

Wednesday's episode had 16 million viewers. A fair portion of them were teenagers.

When kids find music they like, they go onto youtube and text their friends about it. This is what most kids do nowadays.

This is not a battle of numbers. My original point stands.

It was fun. Too bad they are not using bigger venues for the tour.

In the 1970's Queen was never on TV in the USA. I am glad they are finally getting the TV exposure they should have always had. I want everyone to know Queen's music. All generations. It is part of music history now, and I think the USA really missed out while Freddie was alive so it is still a new discovery for some people. The producers of American Idol are British and that is why we are finally having good exposure of Queen on American TV. Thank goodness for that.

Good performance by the Queen Extravaganza and nice ending. I didn't make the "It's Late" connection until Sir GH brought it up.

About the Idol contestants "singing" with the band... Oh my God, It. Was. AWFUL! Painful to watch and horrendous to listen. Worse than Five, Britney and Beyonce together.

Brian's WWRY guitar solo is the only reason I made it through the end. An instrumental break focusing on the Doctor on U.S. TV, that was cool.

About the "Idols", IMO Adam Lambert is a million times better than them... and he kinda sucks!!

[QUOTE]

[b]The Real Wizard wrote: [/b] Wednesday's episode had 16 million viewers. A fair portion of them were teenagers.

When kids find music they like, they go onto youtube and text their friends about it. This is what most kids do nowadays.

This is not a battle of numbers. My original point stands.[/QUOTE]
"Wednesday's episode had 16 million viewers" and a "fair portion of them were teenagers", of which we're to assume "a million" watch Queen videos (and told all their friends), but it's "not a battle of numbers".   I can only imagine you mean it's not a battle of meaningful numbers, but a battle of stuff you've pulled out of the air.  The facts are that teen and 20-something viewership never dominated the demographics of Idol, whose median viewer age is now 48, and on top of that are down about 30% this year.  That comes from an article in the LA Times a couple of weeks ago titled "American Idol: Has it Lost the Kids?".   TV watching in general is way down for young people.  There's little reason to automatically assume even that the total teen viewership numbered a million, let alone that that converted to watching Queen videos on YouTube for every last one of them, and further meant retention or sustained interest.  And telling their friends.

Truthfully you have no idea what the impact on interest in Queen by young people is, and since you're using these nebulous 'facts' to underwrite dismissing and essentially insulting 'whiners' and 'complainers' I don't think a reasonable degree of certainty is too much to ask.  Really, for all we know the net effect of a karaoke showcase of Queen could be a reduction in future interest.  Maybe for every second kid that ends up on YouTube for three minutes a disillusioned dad reaches saturation point and never, for example, makes singing Bohemian Rhapsody in the car on the way to school a family tradition.  Who do you think is making that video go viral by the way?  Kids? Or parents? 

Bottom line is you don't know, I don't know, and neither of our states of not knowing has much to do with people who want to voice disappointment with whatever they like.

I still think Marc's pretty good. Maybe going a little overboard in places here, but I suppose that's his way of making an impression. He really is very good.

The guitarists are not nearly good enough to be putting on that schmucky routine together.

The harmonies were fucking God awful. Seriously, work on that shit. I think, performance issues aside, that's the thing that TV mixers screw the hardest sometimes.

Roger and Brian bursting out of nowhere was fucking great. Could've just been those two, honestly, but then it wouldn't have been on TV. Champs, the both of 'em.

All in all it's very good to see Queen getting some proper recognition in a very public way. It's great to see Brian and Roger playing. And it's fantastic that the singer is (for a change) a cut way above your usual Idol cunt.

I can't really get over how lackluster the guitarists are though. For all of those theatrics, they do an average job of playing the song - and they're acting like they wrote the bloody thing or something!

Ultimately I like the QE idea more than the fuckin' musical... cutting out the shit jokes and just playing some music. Great idea. Without Brian and Roger jumping out at the end though, this video would just be a fantastic singer and an average backing band. I don't see how that's an Extravaganza.

Amazing how subjective all of this is. I really didn't like the vocal all that much. Less the eventual coolness of Brian and Roger the whole thing had kind of a Queen Revue feel. I'd like them go one step further from cutting out the jokes to cutting out the musical remnants all together and just be a rock band.  As it stands, it's nothing I'm driving to Toronto for.

[QUOTE]

[b]The Real Wizard wrote: [/b] Can the whiners suggest a better method for the remaining members of Queen to make their music known to the general public of tomorrow?

If not, then click here:

http://crossfitmidcounty.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/no-whining-2x1.gif[/QUOTE]

Oh, that's simple. They can join the Queen Illuminati Spy Ring and exchange acetates of the new Queen & Adam Lambert single, called "Backflip". I've been told the video is especially interesting.  

For those not as fortunate, I suggest Greatest Video Hits 1 & 2, the odd live DVD, and the first 5 to 7 albums. Sure beats wachting medleys with 20 second snippets of songs that have been played to death anyway. Some of these albums were backflippin' good!

By the way, why is everyone who does not agree with you a whiner? Is it the godlike omniscient powers bestowed upon members of the Illuminati thingie? Or have you suddenly been possessed by the ghost of Greg Brooks?

To be honest, I had low expectations on the Extravaganza thingy and considering it was their first performance before a TV audience, I'd say they passed the test.
I'm sure they will get better.
Remember the first few shows in the tour with Paul Rodgers? There was excitement and all but the performances were far from perfect.
I'm not saying it's the same, though, but the Extravaganza project seems like it will be an interesting show and certainly more than just a tribute band playing in a club.

GratefulFan,

Sometimes you are so bang on, but other times you say a whole lot but say a whole lot of nothing. This is unfortunately one of the latter.

Like I said, this is not a debate of numbers. No need to nitpick my posts by saying I wasn't able to count exactly how many kids watched Queen videos on youtube today. Obviously nobody can acquire the data to do that arithmetic. And no need to bring up outlandish possibilities either. Of course I realize people of all ages watch AI and that there are an infinite number of possibilities of what exposure to a new song could lead to. I get it. But it really isn't relevant. It's just verbal masturbation.

The point is - when Bri and Rog do AI, it's for publicity, particularly to expose Queen's music to the next generation.

These days, teenagers tend to hear new music on youtube. And they text. A lot. Put those two things together, and there are a ton of kids who learned about this old band called Queen over the last couple days. Can we at least agree on that, without it turning into a sparring match of semantics?

Actually GF does make a good point. For every kid watching this and developing an interest in Queen;s back catalogue there are probably as many thinking "what's this shit?" And for every kid developing an interest there are probably as many older fans, casual or otherwise, just cheesed off with what Brian and Roger are up to, or bored listening once again to WWRY/WATC etc. Clearly their new record company wants them to do this stuff but not all publicity is necessarily good publicity. On balance though I would guess this will raise Queen's profile in the USA and the extravaganza is better than I thought it would be.

As for the performance, I don't usually agree with Zebonka -- mostly because he's Australian and their collective heads are big enough already -- but he's spot on with his critique. Martel started off a bit rough but at times he really nailed it.

I loved how their guitarist did a flip JUST LIKE BRIAN TAYLOR!!!
Their drummer was almost as good as john Mercury!

I only wish Freddy May was stil around to see this!!!

I LOVE YOU FREDDY FOREVER!!!!

^get used to seeing stuff like this from now on^


Anyways someone mentioned Queen being a global phenomenon....they've ALWAYS been that!
The only thing you have noticed recently is the market saturation.

And yeah, saw that commerical around February..someone"s invested a grip of $$$ into north american promotion

I even just heard it on a local AM radio show "Mason and Ireland"

And they just promoted pop boob Justin Bieber about two weeks ago on a live play by play (supposedly he IS an NBA fan, and has played in celebrity ball games...but why??)

Anyways...it was interesting.

First time I've heard somebody VAMP Somebody to Love as if it were broadway -_-

If that's the case, they're not aiming to get back the rock crown...

They're aiming for the big buck musical going crowd...not the average joe nobody.

Which would be their redemption...

Be that as it may... They've got a new audience. That's cool. I just wish they would record something new.



I'm afraid I might be one day snickering and saying : Man... They aren't **** without Freddie... Freddies the band.

Someone called it toxic GLEEIFICATION...


Oh well... Maybe I'm just in a bad mood. I'll still go see it if I can scratch up enough bread.

For me, I felt they were not introduced properly last night. These folks have been living and breathing this stuff 24/7. Who are they? Let's meet them. A brief intro package could and should have been attempted to have shown the process, meet those selected. Find out how they came into Queen. All that stuff. A proper introduction. Is that really so hard? Who is this guy singing? Let's meet Marc (and Jennifer for that matter - she's so mysterious ... Was that her on stage, the one with the back tattoo?). I digress.

My 2nd point. I loathe the word "extravaganza." It makes me think of the following:

1). Macy's one day sale advert
2). Furniture store closing - all items must go. 80% off, etc.

Music does not come immediately to mind - despite the very clear definition in the dictionary. Why is that? I don't know. I'm not in charge of the how and why of language. It just doesn't. Who uses the dictionary to look up extravaganza?

To that point, i feel it could of used a better naming convention/marketing team. I would have hired a specialty American advertising firm to collaborate with and help develop a crossover name with greater care and more appeal to the music going American scene. It has to be tailored to modern American consumption - that's just reality when touring major U.S. Cities. Extravaganza is not a common speech term for us yanks - too fussy of a word and spelling effort (yes because we are lazy and impatient and created texting to shorten words - not lengthen them!) Spelling rant over.

Please understand, I want this project to be a success. I want everything Queen does to be a success.

That's where I'm coming from - no disrespect, just honest feedback. And I should have spoken up earlier, and that's on me.

[QUOTE] [b]Donna13 wrote:[/b]
It was fun. Too bad they are not using bigger venues for the tour.
In the 1970's Queen was never on TV in the USA. I am glad they are finally getting the TV exposure they should have always had. I want everyone to know Queen's music. All generations. It is part of music history now, and I think the USA really missed out while Freddie was alive so it is still a new discovery for some people. The producers of American Idol are British and that is why we are finally having good exposure of Queen on American TV. Thank goodness for that. [/QUOTE]

Well, to be a geek. Their most prominent US coverage was obviously their appearance on SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE
Where they performed CRAZY LITTLE THING + UNDER PRESSURE.

Aside from that there was a Brian May Band appearance on high rated goon Jay Leno's Tonight Show.

Before that...some huge fans have documented a few mini documentaries of the band while touring the north eastern states. But those were mainly relegated to "in local news" status.

Finally; the last stuff I know about are some 2-5 minute interviews prior to a new tour which were on Entertainment tonight.

Here's a video of new generations enjoying Queen, this probably happens because good publicity or because this guy is a Queen fan who is teaching their children how great music sounds like!

http://screen.yahoo.com/bohemian-rhapsody-on-the-way-to-school-29096336.html?pb_list=7f1a2256-9c2e-4b61-a955-7dc6a44e9127

I agree mostly with Zebonka, the guitarists weren't far above average to begin with, and their wanky antics didn't help. The backup singers were awful. I liked everything else though.