Freddie's last recording - Mother Love or IGSM???

Jim said the song was WRITTEN in 1990; he then said he was sure the song was recorded, but that doesn't mean AT ALL that it was written and recorded the same year... and even if it did, it could be as simple as recording it in 1990 and then adding new ideas or changing a verse, etc., a year later.

Track sheet for Mother Love says May 1991. It doesn't prove, however, that vocals come from then. The song could've been started in May and finished much later.

[QUOTE] [b]TheGame wrote:[/b]

[QUOTE] [b]princetom wrote:[/b]

[QUOTE] [b]Nick Browning wrote:[/b]

a winters tale was two weeks before he died[/QUOTE]


don't get me wrong, pal...
...but that has been discussed here a thousand times...
no need to crap it up again.


[/QUOTE]

So, any conclusion on that subject?
Freddie left Montreux 10.th november. Thats all the fact we know for sure (atleast according to Freestone).
David Richard mentioned that Freddie didnt behave very sick in the last session ( he did mention that the only "strange" behaviour was that he had to sit down instead of standing when singing). Didnt David also say that they did 2/6 weeks sessions ( 2 weeks in studio and 6 weeks off). Maybe my memory serve me wrong info here...
Anyway, back to topic.
Mother Love wasnt finished and the ending was made when Roger/Brian gathered to make an album of the material they had.
Which line to which song was the last.....i dont think we have any confirmed info on that one. Asking Brian doesnt seems to be quite reliable..
[/QUOTE]

Great post!

That´s why i said August/September, but i really feel that it was somewhere October or early November.

In this case i will relly on Brian´s word. I know that sometimes he makes "mistakes", but they are about insignificant things- at least for him. This was a very emotional period for him, and even though he never mentions dates, i think it´s ok if we take his word about the health state that Freddie was in the studio and cross it with the various Bios about Freddie. And if we do that we can get pretty close about the dates of the last recordings.

So having said this, i believe that there is no way that Freddie sang his LAST "Mother Love" lines in May 91. By the time he sang the last lines he was to weak to survive for another 6 months. I remember Brian stating that Freddie sang each line three times (of one verse), and then he went to rest, and was to become the next day(?) and never went back.

And the state of Freddie in this session is more in tune with his state during the time he left Montreux, wich according to Freestone is the 10th November [ I´ve read the book, but i can´t remember the exact time, so i´m relying on your memory here :-)]. And i remember him describing the journey back in the airport. Very emotional!

And if we take the fact that Mary Austin (?) said that Freddie stoped taking his Intravenous Medication Administration when he realized that he could no longer sing, then i think that we can say for almost total accuracy that his last sessions were around October/early November. Not to mention that at the time of the "Made in Heaven" release there were mentions in some press that his last song was recorded two weeks before he died. So if Brian says that he never went back, i think that is ok to say that his last recording was on "Mother Love", even though it was just three or four lines.

This is all by memory here. I´m not going to research this again. Now, if the information they provide isn´t accurate, then there´s little we can do.

On another note, if we compare the vocals from "A winter tale" (the MIH version) and "The show must go on" i would say that there´s very little possibility that they were recorded in the same year (1990). The "A winters tale" voice is more close to "Mother Love" than it is to "The Show must go on".

Just my two cents.

It's possible Mother Love was the last thing he sang. It's also possible that it's merely the last lyrics he sang which would be completed into a final released track. He may have been in the studio recording other random lines/songs after that which were never used either because of quality of the lyrics or vocals. In what seemed to be a very haphazard approach necessitated due to circumstance (singing a line here or a line just to leave the band with as much material as possible) it seems both convenient and unlikely his final contribution would have been two-thirds of a single song and one that ended up completed and on the final album.

It's possible Mother Love was the last thing he sang. It's also possible that it's merely the last lyrics he sang which would be completed into a final released track. He may have been in the studio recording other random lines/songs after that which were never used either because of quality of the lyrics or vocals. In what seemed to be a very haphazard approach necessitated due to circumstance (singing a line here or a line just to leave the band with as much material as possible) it seems both convenient and unlikely his final contribution would have been two-thirds of a single song and one that ended up completed and on the final album rather than a collection of random, in-cohesive and unusable material and odd throw away lines.

We know after all that Brian said Freddie asked for them to just "write me some words and I'll sing them" in that process it's hard to imagine something so united in narrative as Mother Love being the very last thing he sung as opposed to random lines which were just being thrown at him in a desperate attempt to try and salvage something from the remaining days/weeks they had left.

Regarding the accuracy of Brian's testimony: he was in Seville around Autumn, so it could be perfectly possible that he and Freddie had some ML recordings together and that then Fred went to the studios again without Brian, to finish or modify other things (AWT, for instance), and Dr May just assumed otherwise.

[QUOTE] [b]Sebastian wrote:[/b]

Track sheet for Mother Love says May 1991. It doesn't prove, however, that vocals come from then. The song could've been started in May and finished much later.[/QUOTE]

That's what has been mixing me up, hence the thought that IGSM convention recording could have been around the same time. Of course, I remember now Brian's version of events from the Days Of Our Lives documentary - which now makes my question seem completely daft.

Thanks all for indulging me, though - I appreciate the discussion :)

[QUOTE] [b]Mr.QueenFan wrote:[/b]
(...)

On another note, if we compare the vocals from "A winter tale" (the MIH version) and "The show must go on" i would say that there´s very little possibility that they were recorded in the same year (1990). The "A winters tale" voice is more close to "Mother Love" than it is to "The Show must go on".

.[/QUOTE]

Having said this i just want to say something wich i think it´s fair to say in this situation. I´ve read the Jim Hutton book - Portuguese edition - and at the time i was impressed that he stated that "A Winter´s tale" was recorded in 1990.
I can examine Freddie´s voice and reach my own conclusion, BUT if someone who WAS THERE states their experience, then i believe them. In no way i´m trying to disrespect Jim Hutton´s words in any way. I have a tremendous respect for Jim and the others who took care of Freddie, and i have no reason to doubt their word.

And that´s why i added MIH version, because it´s possible that Freddie revisited this song later... or not!

Just needed to add this bit to my post.

[QUOTE] [b]Sebastian wrote:[/b]

Regarding the accuracy of Brian's testimony: he was in Seville around Autumn, so it could be perfectly possible that he and Freddie had some ML recordings together and that then Fred went to the studios again without Brian, to finish or modify other things (AWT, for instance), and Dr May just assumed otherwise.[/QUOTE]

You´re right.

Guitar Legends was from October 15 to 19 ( i don´t remember Brian´s night), plus reharsals for the Brian May band.

In this next video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DxbV3xEypw0

The only conclusion is that ML session was the last time Freddie was in the studio with Brian. (7:03)

Roger Taylor says that he believes ML was the last one (6:23);

There´s other little things that can help defining the time for the Made in Heaven sessions.
They say in the video that they went to Montreux after the pictures in the news, and the paparazi surrounding his home. If someone knows this dates, then we can have a time frame for the Made In Heaven sessions.

And one last question:

Didn´t anyone ever bother asking this questions to Greg Brooks at the Queen conventions?

It's really odd, but the more they tell us, the more it becomes as clear as mud. I can't keep up with all of the stories.

The one thing that comes to mind is Dave Richards saying something to the effect of (and I'm paraphrasing heavily here) 'two weeks later, someone called me and asked me what I thought about Freddie Mercury having died'.

The thing about that quote is that it hasn't got anything explicit preceding it. If he'd said "two weeks after recording Mother Love", or "two weeks after recording snippets of some song that turned out to be unusable", it might've been more definitive.

Freddie's last recordings being in May certainly does not fit with the narrative they've been building in the documentaries (singing even when he can't stand up, or quitting his meds when he couldn't perform anymore), so either they're all horrible liars or someone's taking a track sheet too literally. There's dozens of possibilities as to what his calendar was like in 1991. Recording music can be enough of a shit storm for a healthy individual with all of the time in the world.

Anyways. I've never seen it definitively stated that he didn't record on his last Montreux trip, and it's hard to imagine the man doing nothing from May-November.

What a depressing topic, I'm going to go eat some Pringles.

There´s an interesting interview with David Richards (producer) for the Rolling Stone magazine in 1995.

http://www.queenarchives.com/index.php?title=Queen_-_12-XX-1995_-_Rolling_Stone_%28Germany%29


Right in the beginning there´s this question and answer:


"Q: Was A Winters Tale the last song Freddie wrote for Made In Heaven?

DR: A Winters Tale was the last song he wrote, the last song he sang for MIH was Mother Love, which Brian wrote for him."

It´s a very interesting read.

So, i think that we can conclude for 100% shure that Freddie´s last recording was indeed "Mother Love". We still don´t have the time frame of the sessions, but it answers the original question by the topic starter Thistleboy1980.

Just to nitpick: DR said ML was the last song he *sang*, not the last song he *recorded*. Freddie could've still been recording keyboard parts *after* his last vocal take.

There's a Jim Beach TV interview which was posted around the beginning of the 40th anniversary (which I can't find). Where he states 'he worked up until the June'. I read that as he finished on the 31st of May.

There's another post on a forum somewhere where someone stated that they asked Brian directly when he met him & Brian said that May was the last time Freddie was in the studio.

You've also got the Jim Hutton book where is says Freddie finished in the spring (ie May) & wasn't interested talking about music after this time (which I can't quite believe).

To contradict that, you've gotten the press statements from 1991 saying ML was recorded 2 weeks before his death & then those pictures printed in the Sun (worlds worst newspaper) of his last birthday where he actually looks 'alright'.

IMO ~ ML is the last one, & the 'official' sessions where all done & finished by the end of May. Winters Tale was recorded around the end of 90 - beginning of 91.

Speculation ~ being a 'band' Freddie wanted to work with the other 3 recording music & not separately. It was tying everyones diaries together & Mar-May 1991 was THE Queen sessions ~ end of.

More Speculation ~ Fred's last trip to Montreaux was purely recreational, he might have popped in to see David Richards to say hi.

The only thing occurs to me is

a) yeah, 6 months ~ you would think Freddie would've wanted to get maybe 'more' stuff down. but:

b) if that was the case, why no recording equipment at Garden Lodge? If it was me, I would have wanted to perhaps get some stuff down if I was feeling reasonably well for a few hours, regardless of the quality.

To contradict that, Roger said, there were guys with camera's peaking through the downstairs loo window!!! So, perhaps not!

There's also that trip to Metropolis studios (wasn't it) in late 1991 ~ again maybe a drop in to say hi/bye type visit?

I think we're all reading too much into it in the hope there's a hidden 'A summers tale' in the archive, which there obviously isn't!

[QUOTE] [b]scovel001 wrote:[/b]
The only thing occurs to me is

a) yeah, 6 months ~ you would think Freddie would've wanted to get maybe 'more' stuff down.[/QUOTE]

It seems they didn't have (or want) any material to be recorded. After the Innuendo sessions they came up with two new songs, and bits and pieces for a third.

You'd think that they would have done some cover songs or collaborations, or that Brian would have given his solo songs for Freddie to sing.

That's why it's very hard to believe the official claim that they were giving him anything and everything to sing while he was still able to do so.

[QUOTE] [b]scovel001 wrote:[/b]Speculation ~ being a 'band' Freddie wanted to work with the other 3 recording music & not separately.[/QUOTE]

Being in the digital era, a loooooooooooot of recordings were done separately, and it'd happened for both The Miracle and Innuendo as sessions would sometimes overlap with other projects they'd be doing at the time (Barcelona, Shove It, MBDTK, BTTL, The Scottish Play) and a lot of songs were done by one, two or three at the studio (e.g., John wasn't there when Steve recorded the solo for Innuendo, only Brian was there when he developed most of Show Must Go On, Roger wasn't there when fans visited them near the end of The Miracle sessions, Roger also missed the writing session for Party, etc.)

Each recording would need approval from all four and they'd all be involved in one way or another in deciding which songs to include and the order and the single and all that so it was in fact a band product but it doesn't mean that all four of them were all the time together in the studio. Not even as early as the first album such a thing happened (Roger did session work, John was still studying, Brian was a maths teacher), they'd be together for the backing track but that was it.

Reasons to believe recording sessions took place after May/June:

* Documented visits from Freddie to Montreux in August and in October; Peter Freestone confirmed he'd only fly there to record... going through customs and putting up with all the logistics just to walk around and see the ducks wouldn't make much sense anyway.

* The (certainly much romanticised but also probably carrying a bit of truth) comments by Fred's former bandmates and former girlfriend (to name a few) of how he kept recording until he physically couldn't do it any more, etc.

* Indeed, a workaholic would be six months doing nothing?

Whether such work was usable or not is indeed a different story, but there's a lot to suggest there were sessions after May, either in Switzerland or in England, or both,

[QUOTE] [b]Sebastian wrote:[/b]

Reasons to believe recording sessions took place after May/June:

* Documented visits from Freddie to Montreux in August and in October; Peter Freestone confirmed he'd only fly there to record... going through customs and putting up with all the logistics just to walk around and see the ducks wouldn't make much sense anyway.

* The (certainly much romanticised but also probably carrying a bit of truth) comments by Fred's former bandmates and former girlfriend (to name a few) of how he kept recording until he physically couldn't do it any more, etc.

* Indeed, a workaholic would be six months doing nothing?

Whether such work was usable or not is indeed a different story, but there's a lot to suggest there were sessions after May, either in Switzerland or in England, or both,[/QUOTE]

Great post Sebastian.

And to add to this list:

On the same interview os David Richards to RS in 1995 : http://www.queenarchives.com/index.php?title=Queen_-_12-XX-1995_-_Rolling_Stone_%28Germany%29

there´s this:

"Q: What sort of feelings do you have about the release of MIH?
DR: We fulfilled Freddie's last wish. He wanted to make music till the last second, he wanted to sing. It was a difficult situation for all of us, but especially for Freddie, but he really wanted this project to be finished, even though he knew that the album would be released after his death."

I think that this is very clear, that Freddie wanted to sing untill he was able to, and he thought about music and this project in particular a lot, because he knew it was his last.

As for the interviews and documentaries, we have to understand that these are edited. For example, when they speak over the "These are the days of our lives" video, and say things like "...around this time.." we are led to believe that it was around the video time, but we have to understand that Brian and Roger are not seing the video. They´re just talking.


And one last thing:

On the same interview there´s this bit:

"Q: How long did you work with Freddie on this album?

DR: Let's say it took us about 4 weeks for recording, in this period the songs were written and recorded(...)"

-------

Of course these were not consecutive weeks, but can anyone tell the dates of the incidents with the Newspapers that are in this video (the first two minutes):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DxbV3xEypw0

Can anyone remember the dates that Freddie appeared on those tabloids?

Even if we don´t get the exact date of the sessions we can start to make a picture of it.